On Bad Behaviour

Last week, I sat through my first diversity training session. My part time chaplaincy role at the provincial jail locates me under the purview of the Government of Alberta, evidently, and the government wanted to ensure that I was diversity certified. My expectations were, well, low (see here). I was expecting ninety-minutes of condescending lectures combined with contrived vignettes, simplistic question-and-answers, and sombre warnings of the importance of morally policing the behaviour of others, all informed by a woefully naïve anthropology. I have to say, I was pleasantly surprised. Just kidding. It was pretty much exactly what I expected.

I suppose here is where the obligatory caveats go. Of course, we should strive to have workplaces free of bullying, abuse, harassment, and discrimination (or, as my diversity training session helpfully put it, “BAHD Behaviour.” Get it, B-A-H-D! So clever). Of course, no one should feel belittled or mocked for this or that aspect of their identity. Of course, serious violations should be reported to the proper authorities. Of course, we should strive to be decent people in our workplaces and to treat our fellow human beings as we would wish to be treated. All of this seems blindingly obvious to me.

But this message somehow lands a bit differently when filtered through the DEI machine. The overall impression I had was that my main job at work was to be zealously and relentlessly monitoring the behaviour of my co-workers, constantly on the lookout for any transgressions, specifically those related to race, gender, and sexuality. I had to do my part to create a culture where everyone knew that BAHD behaviour was “problematic” and “unacceptable” (two words that are surely growing weary due to their overuse over the last few years!). Intent never matters, only impact. The foundation of all BAHD behaviour is the misuse of power (really? It seems to me that human sinfulness is rather more inventive and persistent across the power spectrum than this). As I completed the final quiz and received my official government seal of diversity appeal, it seemed to me that my government overlords were expecting rather a lot of me. I was to become an angel and to demand that my coworkers be the same.

The next morning, I was intrigued to come across two pieces on bad behaviour in The New York Times. The first was called “16 Adults on the Virtues and Pleasures of Being Bad.” The second bore the headline “The Case for Acting on Your Desires and Not Being a Good Person.” Well, well, I thought. Someone needs to get themselves to a diversity training session. Clearly these people are unaware the bad behaviour is problematic and unacceptable. If they were my co-workers, I would be duty-bound to run off to HR to report them.

I read on, curious to see what kinds of bad behaviour were being advocated. I was stunned to discover a sordid tale of human depravity that would make Dostoevsky blush. No, just kidding. I wasn’t stunned at all. What followed was an entirely predictable list of socially approved sins.

• a gay man confessed to eating at Chick-fil-A (“homophobic chicken”)
• someone confessed to getting high when they should be working
• another confessed to (yawn) having an affair, courageously prioritizing their own pleasure over marital duty

In addition to these, there were confessions of:

• shopping at stores with unjust labour practices
• more drugs
• buying plastic pants (?)
• using Ozempic
• lying to others while drunk
• playing violent video games
• taking kids to McDonald’s
• gossiping
• maintaining a Facebook account to stalk people from one’s past
• having commitment free sex with blurred boundaries

The tagline on one of the articles read, “on why you should listen to your worst instincts and darkest desires.” After reading these two pieces I couldn’t help but think, “Yeesh, I must have worse instincts and darker desires than the average NYT reader.”

This is, of course, a very carefully curated list of acceptable (even laudable) transgressions. No one’s confessing to racism or sexism or transphobia here. No one’s admitting to verbally abusing their co-workers. Or not caring about climate change. Or liking Donald Trump. Or thinking that DEI initiatives are misguided (at best). No, instead, we have someone confessing that every once in a while, they take a break from their virtuous lifestyle to take their kids to McDonald’s or buy something on Amazon. How brave.

As I compared these two experiences—the diversity training which implored me to avoid any and all BAHD behaviour and reading the NYT articles encouraging me to be bad more often—I couldn’t help but think that this is a perfect snapshot of our cultural moment. We careen in between performative virtue and self-congratulatory vice. And in the process, we fail to take real virtue or vice seriously enough.

I do, however, agree with the last line of one of the NYT articles: “We are contradictory creatures, wondrously and terrifyingly so.” Indeed, we are. We should be a little more honest about the extent to which this is true.

Image source.