Militant Decency: The Art of Channeling Anger Into Action
Why it’s okay to get angry at the world and what to do about it.
Growing up, I had an anger problem, particularly in middle and high school. It was understandable to some degree — I had a mental illness and had no idea what was going on in my head, but I knew that it was terrible. So, I lashed out at pretty much anything.
Thankfully, at the specialty high school I was eventually transferred to, they had an anger management group, where I learned to control my anger and not lash out at people. The lessons stuck in my head quite well, although it wasn’t until later in college that I was able to properly master my anger and not occasionally lash out and punch random inanimate objects.
That said, anger, and controlling my anger, has been an important piece of my life up to this point. I have come to the understanding that anger is a legitimate human emotion that we can and should feel. However, it is how we express that anger that defines it.
I’ve been a big fan of not simply stewing in my anger at things but rather using that anger as a means of action. Whether that’s channeling my anger into creativity or using the anger as a means of action depends on the situation, but the point is to do my best to turn the anger into something.
I was recently reintroduced to a variant of this through social media when a friend posted something that mentioned one of my favorite authors: Terry Pratchett. Pratchett was well-known for touching on a wide variety of social justice issues in his books, one of the most prominent being Boots Theory of Socioeconomic Unfairness. I highly recommend you follow that link and read that quote — it’s still relevant all these years later.
However, Pratchett had a concept that I have done my best to take to heart — militant decency. It is prevalent in the Night Watch group of books but appears throughout his works, and I think it’s a fantastic approach to social injustice.
Militant decency is the idea that you can look at how terrible the world — socioeconomic injustice, racial inequity, the general cruelty and horribleness that humans perpetrate on each other — and get deeply, intensely angry. In fact, you should get angry — there’s a lot of horrible stuff out there going on every day.
The next step in militant decency, however, is turning that anger into energy for doing the right thing and making the world a better place. Just as I’ve been channeling my anger into something productive, we as individuals can take the anger from the injustices wrought upon the world and the people in it and turn that into progress.
None of this means you shouldn’t be angry. Of course you should be angry! Look at all the horrible stuff out there! The anger isn’t the thing you should be fighting. Part of the process of channeling your anger into something productive is acknowledging the anger in the first place.
You can be angry and still do something productive, and you can still be angry after you’re done. Do you think the people protesting racial injustice in the streets are happy about it? No! A lot of them are angry at the state of the world! Why else would they be there in the first place? The point is that they’re doing something productive with their anger by pushing for a change.
What’s better is that you can channel that anger into being a better person every day. Are you angry that the minimum wage hasn’t gone up in over a decade? Leave a $20 in the tip jar at your local cafe. Upset that racism permeates everything in American culture? Stand up to it in small ways, like calling out racist comments.
Expressing your anger by simply treating people well and being a better person is a fantastic way to employ militant decency. It makes me angry that people treat each other like crap, so I’m going to express my anger by being nice to everyone. I leave big tips, compliment retail workers, and drive slowly through construction zones.
Anything I can do to be decent to someone means I’m fighting back against the cruelty and awfulness that permeates existence these days. Anything I can do to fight injustice, right wrongs, and improve the world turns my anger into action.
I don’t have to try and get rid of the anger — rather, it is better to acknowledge it and understand that it may not go away for a while. However, as long as I am angry, I can use it to fuel the things that make the world better, even in a small way for a single person. As long as I have anger, I can use it to make and do things to create a change in the world.
And oh boy do I have a lot of anger right now.
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