“Why imagine what else you would be?” You are basically saying you see no purpose in practicing empathy, in putting yourself in the shoes of another human being, of imagining how you might react in a very similar way to the particular circumstances of their life, which might be very different from yours.

You believe that? Seriously?

“Would you have not been addicted to meth and gone to prison had you been a black straight woman?”

I could have been 11 million different black straight American women, by definition none of them with the same experiences, family, or genetic make-up of myself. Of course I wouldn’t have been my “self.” The very question is so bizarre. Do you really believe that race, sexual orientation and gender have nothing to do with the life we turn out to have? Of course there are no blanket experiences that apply across all categories, but the fact is that woman have a 1 in 3 chance of being victims of sexual assault in their lifetime — do you believe that was part of the life they “decided” to live? Do you think that all of the gay men raised is Bible Belt households who get married to a woman or kill themselves “decided” to live lives like that? Do you think that a black kid raised in the foster care system, suffering from dyslexia, “decides” to do shitty in school? Do you think poor kids of any race exposed to violence in their homes and on the streets “decide” to be violent themselves, or just have a normal human reaction to what they are seeing?

What an extraordinarily impoverished conception of human beings you have.

By the way, I’m not “blaming” anyone from my addiction. You have to work so hard to read that into my piece.