Why ‘Rage’ Is the Word of the Year
The word—and the feeling—became ubiquitous in 2018
If you were to ask me what were the five biggest stories of this year, I would look at you with glazed-over eyes, paralyzed with stupor. I don’t remember. My amnesia is not because I made a conscious decision to look away from the news. It was impossible to do. For one, my work would not allow it. I’m on the Internet, particularly Twitter, several hours a day, and even when I’m not, my phone will notify me of the nation’s biggest scoops — a ping that I do not recall ever enabling.
I had no choice but to watch Dr. Christine Blasey Ford risk her life and her family’s lives to testify on an alleged sexual assault by Brett Kavanaugh, who still became the nation’s newest Supreme Court Judge.
I had to watch President Trump say, “Maybe he didn’t, maybe he didn’t,” when asked by a Washington Post journalist whether Saudi Arabia Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman had ordered the murder of Jamal Khashoggi.
I had to watch Central American refugees get tear-gassed at the U.S.-Mexico border; First Lady Melania Trump wear an “I Really Don’t Care, Do U?” jacket when visiting immigrant children; I saw voter suppression in Georgia; watched the unfolding of the Facebook and Cambridge Analytica scandal; read about the Trump administration working…
