Be Human

Don't stake people to posts, don't build fires; don't light fires.

Photo by John Schaidler on Unsplash

Another codeword, another conflict, another day.  “Diversity Programs.” It almost seems that we can’t wait for the next opportunity to stake the witches in a circle of fire.  Although it often takes friends of the “witches” to light the fire. 

Diversity … Programs. I’m for the former word, if with clarity, and I’m very cautious about the latter.  Once we “program,” we create a vested interest, we take up resources, and we tend to act like bullies. 

To organize as a persisting force, is to build and people structures of privilege, even when the goals seem noble and good.  Add a shake of moral certitude and the program runs the risk of a being a form of personal attack.

Of course, if you know me, I am no friend to “intolerance.”  As it has expressed itself over hundreds of years in the “West,” it has been an axis of evil.  (Leaving aside, the obvious truth that intolerance toward situations like injustice, poverty, and the like, is unquestionably good, if largely on a list of items we cross off by sending donations to worthy causes.)

But I don’t think “programs” are the answer and I suspect they are more often the match that lights a fire, that themselves encourage intolerance.

We don’t yet have the breadth of historical analysis and understanding to know for certain how to fight intolerance.  From what I have read it seems a wave like phenomenon over centuries.  (With similar witches, i.e. heretics, Jews, free thinkers, sexual preference minorities, the disfigured and disabled.) See the historical writings of John Boswell.  It grows in communities that are isolated from each other.  It subsides in places of trade and commerce.  It flourishes in times of economic downturn, where lives have been disrupted by social and economic change.

It cannot be eradicated in any absolute sense.  “Kill all the bigots.” 

But it can be contained, and it doesn’t have to be celebrated.  Law is an ally.  Patience is actually a virtue, as change has always been gradual, often longer than a lifetime.  Read Martin Luther King. 

Tolerance can be intentionally and intelligently nurtured, without programs.  Contact, perhaps, is fundamental.  Casual contact, purposeful contact, the social world of family and friends.   Meaningful travel, soccer teams, bridge clubs, libraires and coffee shops.  All the “third” places of life.  Avoid separate tables.  Oppose housing discrimination (it still exists).  Form political movements for specific purposes other than “tolerance,” but be inclusive—always.

Just be “there” and “here” in the mix of life.  Integrate organizations--societies, churches, charities.

We don’t need “programs.”  We don’t need exhortations.  We can’t leave it to professionals.  And we just don’t want to be “told” we have to do it, whatever “it” is. 

Just be human.  See the world as a place of interesting people (like yourself) and exciting ideas and wonderful opportunities.  See each other as brothers and sisters, as human.  For that’s what “being human” means.   

Commenting is my way to clarify my thoughts. Give it a try.