Some People Are Not Worth Your Attention

Send a strong message by sending no message.

I saw three headlines pop up on my phone and computer within a five-minute span. They all had to do with anti-mask rallies and the movement against masks from people all over America. I saw them for a second, contemplated whether the articles were worth clicking, decided they weren’t, and then moved on.

It gave a lesson to me that sometimes, people are just not worth your attention, and not worth your engagement, and some news that engages something so trivial as mask wearing isn’t worth my attention either. Look, I’m sure anti-mask wearers are perfectly nice and kind people in real life that might be my friends, but putting on a mask literally takes two seconds and has no detriment to someone’s quality of life, while potentially limiting the spread of a deadly pandemic.

But this isn’t an article on whether to wear a mask or not to wear a mask. If the conversation has even verged into the territory of what people’s rights are to wear a mask or not wear a mask, then the anti-mask movement has already won. They gained the upper hand because they have recentered the conversation.

I went the past several months wearing a mask because not only was everyone else wearing a mask, but I needed it to walk around and go into the store. Again, I don’t want to focus too much on masks vs. no masks because that’s not what I want to focus on — but I do want to focus on what we give attention to.

If something holds your attention, in some ways it has power over you. For example, there is a scene in “Mad Men” where one of the women in the office, Peggy Olsen, is repeatedly subject to sexist overtures and comments. Peggy says something like “what were they thinking?” to another co-worker, Joan.

To have the advertising men in the 1960s change their sexist beliefs and behavior, they had to first acknowledge those beliefs. But Joan understood fully well that they didn’t see any problem with their behavior. She knew that she had to pick and choose her battles in the sexist world of 1960s advertising, and throughout the series, sometimes she took a stand…

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