Here’s a confession, and I’ll try not to put too fine a point on it:

I loathe people.

Now, I realize this could be taken as the acerbity of a crank or a sociopath or, say, Alec Baldwin, but walk with me for just a minute.

The Rifleman: A Person of interest.

People are dangerous. People vote for prom queens and American Idols. People, for the love of god, burn the churches of persons of color. People gerrymander. They bundle mortgages. They throw stones – and not only those people who live in glass houses. Christ, it was people (putatively full-grown television executive people) who spawned the Disney Channel. Power to the people? Uh-uh. Unplug ‘em.

People, if we’re being honest, are groupthink echo chambers of unionized stupidity.

Persons, on the other hand? Persons are just dandy. Persons are my peeps. It’s a person who commits a silent, senseless act of kindness. A person stops by to pick up the mail and check on the house while you’re out of town. And who best personifies the spirit of creativity, the virtue of self-reliance and the status-quo-shifting might of just one individual?

Besides, who doesn’t prefer a personal touch? Think about it: No one delivers good news in people. We learn from one another – we connect – in person.

A people divided, sadly, is par for the course. But persons? Persons, alone or aligned, are the better angels of our nature.