We live in what I call "The Disclaimer Generation".

Essentially, this means a large majority of people tend to preface a statement by making a disclaimer in an attempt to avoid responsibility for what they're about to say. This is something they will say when they're in the company of people they know are of a particular mindset, and they want to keep in good with those people, yet give themselves an excuse for saying something that people might disagree with.

For example...

You may have heard someone say something to the effect of,

"Now, you know I'm not racist, but (insert totally racist statement here)."

In fact I saw another one on Facebook not long ago in reference to Jimmy Fallon's mother who had recently died:

So to unpack this a bit, this guy felt that Mr. Fallon’s mother passing away was touching enough to make a post about being sorry that she died….yet was compelled to make the point that he’d never watch his show, presumably so his chosen peer group won’t ostracize him for such an act due to some pseudo-political reason (the guy’s profile pic featured the US flag to express his undying patriotism which likely oozes into all of his casual conversations, after all). At least, that’s what I get out of it.

And then to top off their bigot sundae, some will add that one lovely cherry, “I’m just sayin’” to further absolve themselves from the backlash of their own words. It’s as if they’re pretending they’re reading it from a cue card, like someone else was the author.

This language exists everywhere, it seems.

I don’t know if it will be something we can ever get rid of, or if it might require a step or two in evolution before we can phase this behavior out, but I just wish people would stop trying to sugarcoat their bullshit, be real with one another, and take responsibility for that which they feel so compelled to express.

I didn’t engage with this individual, but for me it adds to the face of the situation we find ourselves in today. It further embodies what one might consider the average person, or average intelligence level. As George Carlin once said,

“Think about how smart the average person is,and then realize, half of them are dumber than that.”