Careless

 August 22 Word of the Day: Careless

 

Times arrive, moments and days, when careless is accepted, the lack of notice people have given to care. Careless occurs and how an individual will find out is their test of awareness. To pay attention to the daily news is to experience high levels of carelessness, that being an implicit element of any news item. One notices a complete lack of opinion pieces addressing the matter of sins of omission, papers being in the business of telling us things that must be noticed, not that could have been avoided. Except, do they? Articles go on for pages itemising sins, the prime cause of their existence, but can also direct attention to sins of omission; if only someone had done what they ought, this would not have happened. The author has asked about the root cause of their news items, unstated but their reason for being, that cause being not just the given of sin, but also the sin of omission. We tut and scapegoat, we judge and complain, we turn the page. Sin is very popular as a subject, it seems, of interest to an average reader, especially while there is someone to blame, someone who should have done better. Such overload of news about people in the world leads to the disagreeable condition called indifference. Can indifference be quantified? Its presence could be accounted as anywhere between plethora and almost zero. Editorials never headline with Sins of Omission. But the existence of carelessness is such, it may as well anyway be the subtitle of most editorials. There is a requirement amongst editors to keep the terms simple and name the sin. The exhausting experience of witnessing carelessness daily may, by chance, even prompt one to greater awareness of our own. This can lead to guilt, doubt, neurosis, everything and sundry, regardless of immediate need and even one’s own well-being. People in well-paid positions are available to help deal with your carelessness, your sins of omission, their job being aid at a price. Relentlessly many people refuse to visit such well-paid people, choosing instead to join the rank-and-file of the indifferent. This carelessness may be indulged, becoming widespread, with the cure being remorse, or simply learning how to stop. But how? Love your neighbour as yourself, as they say, starting by learning who is your neighbour. The commandment is quite explicit, five words, while the words needed in each case may expand into books and lifetimes. The need to be paying attention is the first step. To address carelessness requires one to notice that the person is there, with needs, a task that itself is an act of care. Added to which one must have the preparedness to see the needs and act upon them. In most cases this does not involve payment of any kind, and may result in reactions and rejections that may discourage and even cause loss. Sin is so tiresome, it’s stupid. Yet times arrive when the demand to overcome carelessness cannot be put off another moment. We must do what we must with that which is at our disposal.

Image: St Paul's Cathedral, Melbourne.