People get really angry when you suggest they might not be seeing clearly with a bag tied over their head. Few things enrage a blindfolded person more than being told they’re blindfolded. You can watch them bump into other people for hours, but the moment you mention the bag, you’ve “crossed a line.” Observation is violence now. Apologize for your “sight privilege” and reassure them that darkness is just as valid as light.

I saw a woman sitting in front of an empty easel, facing West, trying to paint the sunrise with a bag tied over her head. When I gently suggested that removing the bag could drastically improve visibility, she told me she identified as “bagless” and could see just fine.

That’s why I need to start blogging again.

People keep telling me I’m wasting my time writing to bagheads. “John,” they say, “Social media doesn’t solve anything, doesn’t change minds, doesn’t fix any problems. It’s just a place where everyone screams their opinions at each other.” Quite right, and totally irrelevant.

I don’t get to stop saying true things just because the audience hates it. In my line of work, the customer is not always right. Sometimes the customer has a bag fastened over his head which makes him wrong about almost everything (except what it smells like inside burlap coverings).

I’m going to keep telling bagheads that they’re facing the wrong direction…and their canvas fell off the easel…and there’s no paint on their brush…and it’s midnight so sunrise is 7 hours away. And then they’ll tell me I’m judgmental.

“John, you jerk! Everyone’s entitled to paint from their own perspective!”

Right. Everyone is also entitled to evaluate your painting from their own perspective. My two cents is: your artwork is garbage. I know I’m supposed to affirm your talent, compliment your technique, and credit the decision to publish that abysmal offering as ‘courageous.’ I’m not doing that because it won’t make either of us feel good.

I can see the sunrise. With a smidgen of humility, you could see it too. You might not be able to paint it but that’s alright. There will be another one tomorrow morning and when it arrives, you’ll finally be looking in the right direction.

(Matthew 15:12) Then the disciples came and said to him, “Do you know that the Pharisees were offended when they heard this saying?” He answered, “Every plant that my heavenly Father has not planted will be rooted up. Let them alone; they are blind guides. And if the blind lead the blind, both will fall into a pit.”