"I Can't Even": How One Incomplete Sentence Defined a Generation

I cant.  I literally cannot.  I can't even.

Our generation is so distraught that we can't even form complete sentences.
We "can't even" what?  Nothing?  Everything?  We "can't even" so much that we literally can't EVEN!!!
That last sentence made no sense.  Include it in an English term paper and you'll receive a failing grade in return.  However, most of my peers will understand exactly (or most of) what that statement meant.  "I can't even" has become the phrase of 20-somethings (and some 30-somethings) across the nation.  I've seen it transcend the counter cultures of the US.  You will hear young people lamenting this from Texas to New York City.  Mostly, it is young women who will use the phrase, but from time to time, you'll see the occasional male who "simply cannot".  Such little words, but yet, it is understood within this age group.  We understand it and we identify with it.  In a way, it has defined us.

So lets' break it down: When someone says "I can't", "I can't even", or the most extreme, "I literally can't even", what are they really saying?  First, lets' start with the most simple - "I can't."  Whenever someone says that they cannot do something, they usually mean that they are incapable of either physically, mentally, or emotionally dealing with something.  It may be a task, person, or situation.  For example; if I say that "I can't drive," I am saying that I have declared myself incapable of operating a vehicle (whether this is actually true or not, because people can say they cannot do something when, in fact, they are fully capable).  The phrase, "I can't" is usually said by individual in response to a situation, statement, or any sort of stimulus that they find ridiculous or subjectively "difficult" to deal with.  So to speak, the state of being in "can't" is a subjective experience.  If I am watching a show on television that is so absurd to me, I may exclaim "I can't", in response to the absurdity of what I am witnessing.  Another example of the use of "I can't" may be in response to a certain stressor in one's environment.  If I am having a hard time with a course assignment, complaining to a friend that "I can't" with this class, is another way of saying, "the class is hard for me to mentally deal with at the moment."  Essentially, "I can't" is more of a feeling.

How are you feeling today?

I Kan't.

The phrase "I can't even," is similar to the former, however it kicks up the English language a notch by adding the adverb, "even."  The addition of this phrase turns the complete sentence, "I can't" into an incomplete one: "I can't even."  And older person may ask in response, "you can't even, what?"  This phrase is also just another way of expressing one's frustration or disbelief in absurdity of a certain stimulus they find difficult to deal with.  Another adverb that is added to the "can't" phrase is the word, "literally."  Many experts (or "experts") of the English language will audibly groan every time they hear a Millennial use this word incorrectly.  The word "literal" means to interpret something in its most basic sense without means of metaphors or allegories.  For example; if I take Homer's Odyssey literally, I will actually believe in the real-life wrath of Poseidon.  So, if I tell my sister that I will literally kill her if she eats my slice of cake, thinking in terms of the dictionary, she should never eat that cake because I said I would literally kill her.  Here, the word "literally" is indicating that I am not using the mention of murder as a metaphor.  However (and thankfully), many young people now use the word "literally" as both a means for emphasis and something that is a precursor to a metaphor.  For instance, saying that I will "literally" kill my sister, means that I am serious about the state of my cake slice.  I may not really kill her, but I may do something like yell at her or fight her (or just hold a short-term grudge).  In other words, "Do not eat my cake Dora, or I will be really, really, really, really, mad at you."  But, since we are Millennials I speak like this: "Don't touch my cake, Dora.  I swear, I will literally murder you, if you touch it!"  We don't intend literal murder; only figurative.

I literally could not resist this meme.

So now that we've defined the meaning of the phrase, "I can't even," now we must determine how this relates to our generation.  It appears as though the current mental state of 20-somethings may be a bit disgruntled.  We face the frustrations of struggling to enter the workforce with our freshly obtained college degrees.  Some of us are over-qualified, working for jobs that we may have just settled for.  Some of us can't even find jobs in a field which we worked 4 years in school for.  Many more of us can't get hired for a simple job.  Period!  We are constantly having the most expensive gadgets advertised to us, each company proclaiming that we need their product, yet we can barely pay this month's cable bill.  In addition to financial woes, we also struggle with basic companionship.  Many say that the dating scene is crumbling; that it is uncertain, confusing, and stressful.  Not to mention, the music industry is messing with us...  One week we are exposed to the smart lyrics of Twenty One Pilots, then the next week we are expected to believe that people actually enjoy listening to "Anaconda."  On top of all this, the VMAs will never be as good as they were in the 90s.

Perhaps the incomplete sentence, "I can't even" serves as an allegory for the state of our generation as a whole.  This is what it is; an incomplete sentence.  First, it is incomplete in the sense that our lives really have only just begun.  We are only in our twenties.  Granted we have good health, we have so many more years to look forward to.  The phrase may also represent a general incompleteness in our lives.  Many of us may be lazy; never completing anything.  Many of us may have voids in our lives; absent parental figures or friends.  Many of us may be missing elements within our love lives.  Any of these situations reasonably illicit the emotion: "can't!"

We are a generation of weirdos stuck in between that time where it was necessary to go to an actual library to complete a research paper, and using Google; between the AOL dial tone and 4G cell phones; between bunny-ear antennas on the television set and flat-screen, high-definition televisions.  Let's face it, we've seen quite a bit of development in our lifetimes and we aren't even halfway through our lifespans.  I'm not saying we are the only generation to experience so much societal stimulation, but we definitely have found some type of way to convey the feeling.  Through the frequent use of this phrase, "I can't even," it seems that we are constantly exasperated.  Some of us may be over-exaggerating our frustrating experiences, but the feeling still remains.  So much is going on that we can't.  We can't even.  We literally cannot.
  

The Diaper Full of Sh*t

Imagine, for a second, a diaper full of hot, stinking, poop.  For lack of a better description: shit.  The diaper is full of shit.

Imagine that diaper is full of someone's shit.  They take this diaper and throw it in your direction.

Now you have seen most people dodge this diaper when it is thrown at them.  They quickly move out of its way.  They look at it with disgust.  They glance at it after it has fallen to the ground, shaking their heads.  "I'm not touching that shit," they say.

However, when the diaper comes flying your way, you catch it.  Not only do you catch it, but you hold it in your hands, and you look at it...  You start having feelings for that diaper of shit.  You start caring for it.  It now becomes your baby.

So you take your baby (shit) with you everywhere you go.  The smell is so pungent, so you can't ignore it.  Everywhere you go, you are constantly thinking about your baby (even though it's a diaper of shit).

You try to live your life as you normally would, but you keep worrying about your "baby."

You try to go to work, but you can't concentrate because you're always thinking about your baby.  Even though you have tons of paperwork in front of you that needs your attention, you keep thinking about how you need to get back to your baby (the shit).

"I've need to go; I need to go take care of my baby!"

Everyone else looks at you in confusion.  "You mean that diaper full of shit?"

"It's not shit, it's my baby!"

"No.  It's a diaper of shit.  You don't need to care about it."

It's a diaper of shit.  You don't need to care about it.

It's a diaper of shit.  You DON'T need it.

It's shit.  You don't have to take it.

Take no shit!  Most people don't.

(Thank you to my therapist for the allegory.)

Why I Care about #Ferguson and #MikeBrown

People are entitled to their feelings.  Everyone is allowed to have an emotion in response to an event; no one else can tell that person their feelings are wrong or invalid.  Sure, the way a person can think and act about something can be adjusted, but a person's feelings can never be wrong.  They just "are".  It's like saying that some heartbeats are more wrong than others; that just doesn't make sense.  Feelings/emotions run deep through the human race.  They run even deeper through closely-knit communities.  This has become evident whenever tragedies happen, such as the recent events in Ferguson, MO.

If you don't know what's happening in the town of Ferguson, or what happened to a boy named Mike Brown, I won't explain it much here.  You can easily do a web search about it, but essentially the issue is about race, discrimination, and police brutality.  Obviously, these are intense issues, and now people are very angry about it.  Mike Brown was a Black, American, teenager who was unarmed when he was gunned down by an officer.  I wasn't there, and there is no way I could have been or will ever be inside the mind of this particular officer's head when he decided to pull the trigger on this boy, so I can't know his exact rationale for shooting him.  The Black (and supporting) community has their views on what happened here, and the reason Brown died, according to them, is evident: Racism.  Discrimination.  Irrational fear of minorities.  Misinterpreted threats.

The last four points I listed are all problems people are seeing when it comes to the police force in the United States.  These kind of things keep happening:  Black men and women are being unfairly judged when it comes to the system of law and order, and for what?  It's because of the color of their skin.  The color of our skin.  I am a Black female, and while I have personally never felt the sting of racial profiling or blatant racism towards me, I keep seeing it happen around me to a race I am a part of.  It's honestly disheartening and grossly unsettling going through life knowing that the country you live in had a history of brutal enslavement of your people; that ONLY 50 years ago it wasn't uncommon for my mother to walk through her hometown in Arkansas and face possible assault or death just because someone hated her skin color; that a random stranger may or may not HATE you just because you look different.  Some people like to believe in the power of colorblindness and that racism is some kind of ancient practice that is dying out.  While, I appreciate that this tries to aim at a positive view, we still cannot ignore the power of racism today.  It's alive and real, and it's becoming more and more evident in our world.

We are angry because this keeps happening.  Why do innocent Black people keep becoming victims of misguided violence?  Why do we keep assuming that black = dangerous?  What's the need to shoot first?  Why does the media continue to portray us as "scary, thuggish, and ignorant" even though everyone working in a media outlet KNOWS EXACTLY what they are doing?  TEXTBOOKS have been written on the impact the media has on society and culture, so why do they keep painting us as Neanderthals???

While at work, I heard my coworkers discussing the protests going on in Ferguson.  Their focus was narrow; they talked about how the protesters just want the name of the officer who shot Brown to be released.  They likened the protesters and rioters to a "lynch mob".  This is a linear point of view which made me angry that they didn't even consider seeing it from a different point of view.  The way I see it, these protesters aren't just looking for a name or somebody to blame.  Mike Brown is dead, and there is nothing we can do to bring him back.  Yes, the people do want justice, but even more so, they want a permanent resolution.  All those problems with society, the police force, and the justice system that I listed earlier?  Yeah. They want those to be fixed.  One way we can fix this is by raising awareness and attempting to open people's minds in public and through social media.  Taking action.  This is exactly what they are doing by protesting.  They are reacting and taking a stand for something they believe in.  Now, the violent rioters and looters have a separate and selfish agenda, but as for the protesters whose hearts and mind are in the right place and all of you posting messages of solidarity, I support you.

Whenever I think about what happened to Mike Brown, I think "that could have been my own brother."  My brother is the same age as Brown was, and coincidentally will also begin college this Fall, just as Brown would have.  So, whenever I think about a young Black man being treated unfairly by police and others, it makes me fear for my little brother.  I also have an older brother; I have similar fears for him.  They can both easily be seen as scary, big, tall, Black males.  In reality, they are the sweetest things you will ever meet.  Stereotypes should never be our primary basis for how we decide to act in life.  I don't care how much you've seen or read about Black men or women.  You know nothing.

So I guess I feel a connection with the community of Ferguson, and the friends and family members of Brown in the sense that we feel pissed off that our community of Black individuals keeps being unfairly judged.  Yes, we are causing a ruckus about it now, but how the hell else are we supposed to get the world to LISTEN?  Heck, most aren't even causing uproars, they're just peacefully protesting.  Yet, Ferguson looks like a war zone...  Like I said before, people are entitled to their feelings.  Feelings are never wrong.  You can't tell us that we are wrong for feeling angry about this.  Similarly, I can't tell anyone that they should feel angry, as well.  If they don't, they don't.  Human experience is an individual thing and (unfortunately) we don't have enough power to tap into people's minds, flip a switch, and make them think like we do.  We can only raise our voices loud enough, write enough words, and display enough images in hopes that others will see the way we do.  I care about the problem of injustice in the Black community because this is my community.  Just because I live in Illinois doesn't mean it's not affecting me.  NEVER think that just because you are geographically removed from a situation means its not going to affect you.  It can always connect back to you.  Everything is connected and everything travels and catches fire.  If you don't already, I hope you start caring.


Also, CLICK HERE to sign the petition to help stop police misconduct!

P.S. - If anyone knows the artist who created the picture above, can you let me know?  And I totally give them credit and kudos :P

Things I Loved Today: 8/7/14

• A message from a mass email at work

"Does Osbaldo have a hard hat and safety goggles?"

"He has a hard head and safe eyes." 

• The fact that I actually know a person named Osbaldo.
• There is a Mermaid School in the Philippines, that actually manages to exist without being creepy!  I kind of wish I could go there (If only I could swim...).
• Paul McCartney's retro "WTF?" face:

We just wanted to make music and hold your hand!


• Driving to work without coffee and NOT feeling drowsy FOR ONCE!  Hashtag-winning.
• Discovering that "Thunder Clatter" by Wild Cub is the perfect morning song.
• Working on breaking my cycle of fear.
• Eating lunch then reading a book in "my place" in the park.
• Realizing that the power of prayer really does work.  It's great when I actually recognize the changes I know that I prayed for.
• Deciding to eat lunch by myself at my favorite Indian restaurant.  (This actually didn't happen today, but it will tomorrow, and I am very excited to eat and read alone..and also very hungry.)