Defensive

I have this problem, where I get unreasonably irritated when I see people posting about things that I have already covered in the blog. I do know that not that many people read it, but if only they would!

Anyway, after having several posts referencing Marie Kondo's work, including two specifically focused on books, one friend posted a meme and then a friend of hers replied with something else, and they both irritated me.

The meme was a picture of Marie Kondo suggesting that you limit yourself to 30 books, split screen with a picture of a big pile of books saying "Where? On my nightstand?". Then the reply was about Marie Kondo having once gotten rid of things belonging to her family members and criticizing that.

Those were technically two separate irritations (beyond why more people are not reading what I have to say), and each of those is an example of a larger concern, so we are going to fill out the week dealing with this.

For the meme itself, okay, we have covered how everything about her method is based on what works for you, and what is joyful for you.

It should be pretty well-established that I love books. Even so, there are books that it does not benefit me to own, if for no other reason than that it may get in the way of finding the books I want.

Funny story: during the long period where the library was closed due to the pandemic, there was a book that I was sure I had turned in before, but it did not show as checked in. It was at the bottom of a stack of books on my nightstand. Of course, there is another book of mine that I should be able to find, but can't. Maybe that went in the library slot, convincing me that I had turned the other one in; they were on related topics.

That does not spark joy. 

Maybe you can have 250 books, and be happy, but that happiness requires getting a bookcase. Maybe you would be happiest with 20 books and a library card. The point is that it is about you, so the common response of indignation -- albeit often humorous -- to this tyranny is wrong, and only comes up because of a refusal to take in any context. 

(Which, in all fairness, is an issue that crops up in many other frustrating ways.)

The reply was worse. The standard response would be something about needing more books, maybe humorous, maybe indignant.

Instead, evidence was offered of Kondo being a troubled person.

It is true that as a somewhat neglected middle child who was obsessed with tidying but not caught up yet on the need to have items that spark joy, she did sometimes tidy things that weren't hers. She did acknowledge that, and that it was wrong. It's in the book.

Also wrong: when there were things she knew she did not want but felt guilty discarding them, she sometimes gave them to her younger sister as "presents". (A solution also provided in the Swedish death cleaning article.) 

Kondo's interest in tidying started early, but she had a lot of false starts, many of them happening very young. She is open about that.

The negativity about Kondo seemed a little spiteful, but that the commenter would know that detail -- either without having context or without caring about the context -- is interesting. It seems like it would require having gotten that from another source.

There were a lot of negative articles and things about Marie Kondo a few years ago, I think in response to the show. That was what drew my initial interest. I would see other people defending against the willful misunderstanding and noting that a lot of the criticism was racist. 

It seems that is still happening. Now I am one of the defenders.

I fully realize that my friend who posted the meme was not acting maliciously. I don't know her friend who replied, but that was probably not conscious malice either; just something that got stuck in the head, and now will come to mind any time Marie Kondo is mentioned.

However, what is out there for us to see and hear, what sticks, and and why... that all has a lot of factors going into it. It is important to understand how racism and capitalism influence us. 

There will be more on that.