🙂 You can listen to or read this blog article.
A few years back I wrote a piece entitled “why I no longer call myself a feminist”. It came from the realisation that I am more than the earthly identities or even the biological and DNA structure I was born with. I was more than my race, my sex, my nationality and my social class. I was a human and wasn’t that enough?
Wasn’t that enough for you to stand up for me and for me to march with you when discriminated against?
It seems as if our world chooses who they love and that my friend is not love. Instead, it is the same divided and distorted vision that brought us to the rally in the first place.
We each feel like a minority based on things we are physically born with [race, sex organs, dis/different-ability]. And then also like a minority based on physical changes due to an accident or health conditions [amputee, changed senses etc]. And then also like a minority based on things given by ‘man’ [religion, nationality or social class]. Only an acceptance of all of the above by everyone without the insane and insistent need for others to be like you is the only solution. And this is love.
The solution is not to look through the lens of ‘blackness’ or ‘women’ or ‘poverty’ or ‘immigrant’ or ‘aboriginal’ or ‘disabled’ but instead through the lens of love.
Years ago if ten out of ten people scoffed at this idea and laughed at me, today, only 4 are laughing. And I suspect in some time to come no one would be laughing. Or maybe we slowly see it on an individual level where for e.g, a well known celebrity said white people have always been killing us, to then realise that 2 of the officers involved in George Floyd’s death were not white. What statement would be said now? What shall we now be screaming since it’s not entirely the triggering race issue?
The protests across the world will continue for many many many years until we each recognise and accept humans as they are and without the eyes of superiority (or inferiority). That. Is. All.
So while you demand more of others ensure to demand more of yourself because a different “identity” for the march you’re in, may have you on the other side of the fence fighting against another “identity”
If we cannot accept this truth then we are rushing without thought and we are refusing to do the necessary work for there to be a fundamental shift and we will tell our children and grandchildren about the global 2020 protests. But maybe by then our children and grandchildren will see thousands of years of what did not work. If we rush through this thought and roll our eyes it is very highly likely that we ourselves are guiltily of discrimination.
At times I feel like an alien on earth. There were some things I saw as a teen, in particular how women were treated. I saw that it all began in the homes. Legislation, treaties are bandaids. Reconciliation and open dialogue and healing is necessary along with appropriate policies but the latter is secondary.
No person who hates another or loves another cares about laws.
No person who hates another or loves another cares about laws.
Those who are loving will love whether a law tells them to or not. Flip coin – those who hate will hate whether a law tells them to or not.
It is the heart of man that matters most. Our buildings, our laws and institutions are fictitious and we are blind if we assume they have an identity all on their own. They are simply a reflection of the heart of man. Legislation cannot effect change unless the man who created the legislation has changed and unless the man who the legislation was created ‘for’ has changed.
Please keep that in mind while you demand for more and see if your focus can gently shift to demands that can create change and not necessarily the external trappings and decorations of a thing called “law” and “policy”. And is it really a demand? The things that can create lasting change, love, kindness, are those things demands? I believe the call for justice is a call for love.
Opening one’s mind to a certain wisdom would help us better decide on policy and representatives for example. I smile at those of laughed at Presidential hopeful Marianne Williamson. Some of my friends rolled their eyes at the idea of love and dialogue. They in fact were more convinced of the Washington prototype who will unlikely help to create real change. When, (granted) in my view, Marianne was the best representative for their very pain. They did not even see that. And that was sad.
In moving away from the triggering topic of politics directly, no person who sees “your” issue and then announces they want to help “your” issue or be an “ally” to help has healed. They still are ‘othering’ you, they still see themselves as separate and THAT is the problem. You cannot be a ally for yourself can you? But we will commend it because we are not yet seeing the real issue. Only when we do not see it as a “your” issue have we gone past the pains of the past. Only then can the seas calm. But until then, there are more waves to come.
Did you for a minute think I am suggesting external ‘non-action’ ? If so, I invite you to read again.
