Speaking of engagements, I informed my family in our WhatsApp group chat that I had the ring and would propose soon. All of them were excited and congratulated me. My sisters and my mom loved it. My dad did too, but then he said, “Be careful with it, don’t lose it; you have a habit of losing valuable things.” It caught me by surprise because I certainly don’t have that habit. I responded, “What do you mean by that? Which things?”
Then, in a separate message, he sent a voice note listing the valuable things I had lost. The time I crashed my grandma’s car, 15 years ago. The time I lost a jacket he bought me for Christmas, 6 years ago. The time my 2006 Hyundai Sonata’s engine stopped working, 4 years ago.
When I listened to this, I thought, “What’s the point of him telling me all this? Why not just congratulate me for such an important occasion in my life? Why mention things I did years ago? It’s pointless. Completely unnecessary.” As if he hadn’t lost valuable objects too, just like most people who own things do at some point in their lives. So, as usual in our relationship, I responded in a very respectful but stern manner.
I told him that it’s not right to judge and forever label me as “someone who loses valuable things” just because I lost several things in the past. It’s as if I labeled him for his past mistakes. And he has made mistakes, worse than losing material objects. In the end, he apologized and our relationship is as good as ever.
But just imagine if everyone were always punishing people because of the mistakes they made 5, 10, or 15 years ago. Wait a minute… it’s exactly what happens nowadays. It’s called ‘cancel culture’. As Urban Dictionary defines it, “the act of damaging someone's life or career because they made human error.”
It's ridiculous when people nowadays cancel someone because of a thing they did or said in the past. As if the ones condemning didn’t make mistakes. All of us are humans. All of us are developing and growing. All of us have done things in the past that we aren’t proud of. But we learned and we moved forward. That’s how life works. That’s the meaning of being alive and evolving.
Everyone has the same light within, some surrounded by more layers than others. Some with brighter lights and some with almost darkness. You shouldn’t condemn and vilify people for their past mistakes. People learn. People change their opinion. People grow.
And I am talking about the kind of mistakes that most people make, accidents caused by ignorance or carelessness. Not about criminal mistakes that actually hurt other beings, like murder. In that case, we should bring them under the law and reform those people.
It’s easy to condemn, ostracize, and shun people because of their littlest past mistakes. But the human race will never move forward with this kind of attitude. We must be kind, compassionate, empathic, and understand that each of us is growing at our own pace. Each of us is doing the best we can. Each of us is making mistakes and learning from them.
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