Tension, Balance, and Maintaining American Unity
One of the criminal justice professors in my undergraduate program impressed upon me the reality that there will always be a felt tension between personal freedom and social responsibility. Up until then, I had never even thought of such a dilemma, but once she pointed it out I began to see it everywhere.
[Image Description: A color block styled painting of two multi-colored (green, yellow, blue, orange, red) hands clasped together with colored rays extending in the background.]
For example, I technically have the capacity to drive a motor vehicle, whether I’m licensed or not. As an individual, I might argue that if I have places to go, I can choose to get behind the wheel and take myself there, because I’m fully capable. As a part of a larger society, however, I recognize that our individual judgments about whether we are “fit” to drive might vary widely, and I happily acquiesce to a system in which the state is allowed to test me and determine if I am, in fact, allowed to drive.
Being required to take a class, pass a test, carry my license with me when I drive, and then continue to maintain my license throughout the years, not to mention the requirement to carry insurance and to subject myself to the loss of that license if I get too many speeding tickets, drive under the influence, or begin experiencing mental or physical health issues that detract from my ability to drive: these could be seen as assaults upon my personal freedom to get myself where I need to go. And yet…
…those checks and balances against my personal liberty are seen as being necessary in order to better protect society as a whole.
In America, we have many rights guaranteed to us as individuals, and yet those rights must also be balanced against the overall good of society. How far is too far? When is an individual more important than the group? When does the collective need to release control to the individual?
[Image Description: White background. Bronze statue of a blindfolded woman wearing a dress and armband, holding the scales of justice in front of her.]
Always, there will be tension. And that doesn’t have to be a bad thing.
I imagine this to be much like the effect achieved by standing on one foot: when I do so, I can feel tiny shifts in the bones and muscles of my feet, ankles, calves, thighs, hips, and core. Everything in my body is called into the act of maintaining balance and keeping me upright, and that requires constant adaptation.
Maintaining the personal liberties we enjoy while also living in a communal society that requires our support and engagement in order to flourish is a balancing act that requires constant engagement, interaction, adaptation, and willingness to oscillate, grow, and change. Too much emphasis on either extreme is detrimental.
This holds true within our individual bodies, and within society as a whole. In her book Bodyfulness, Dr. Christine Caldwell shares about the biological function of cellular semipermeability and notes that:
Our essential nature is built upon a physical foundation of give-and-take, discernment, exchange. We can’t afford to be either impermeable or boundaryless. […] Cellular semipermeability may function as a template for our understanding of relationships, of interdependence and interrelatedness.
As citizens we are each independent, single entities with dreams, goals, hopes, and plans. And yet we are also interdependent & interrelated, as we share the public space, systems, and policies (infrastructure)that influence how likely we are to achieve those things.
If our individual accomplishments mean that we are burning down, destroying, or otherwise hurting the infrastructure we used to achieve those things….it means we are harming the collective, both now and for future generations.
And if, as a collective, we are overemphasizing group needs (or the needs of only some specific groups) to the extent that we are suppressing an individual’s ability to be innovative and creative, expand to new horizons, or live the life they desire, we are harming them, both now and for future generations.
Within the tension, we must learn to honor our individual needs while also supporting the interconnected nature of ourselves as a collective. (This connects to the concept of embodiment I wrote about HERE.)
Caldwell goes on to note that our physical bodies are required to undergo constant small changes. In my understanding, many of these small changes may not be dire in and of themselves (we could likely go on living for some time if some of the minute changes did not occur), but they are absolutely essential over time. Moreover, if our bodies are called to adapt to something large, the ongoing practice of having made many small changes in order to constantly bring our bodies into a state of harmony and balance allows the body to better adapt to and create large changes when needed. Again from Caldwell:
Literally and metaphorically, our body and our being are built to exercise our capacity to change constantly in small ways so that when large change is demanded of us, we are ready for it.
Could this, too, apply to society? Specifically, within American society, it seems to me that the three branches of government (executive, legislative, judicial) act together to continually adjust and adapt in order to maintain a sense of balance and equilibrium within our communal whole.
- What happens when any single branch begins to cling too strongly to their own desires, rather than seeking to adapt, change, grow, and maintain harmony?
- What happens if parts of the system are unjust and unfair?
- What happens if individual needs and desires are allowed to trump collective needs and desires?
- What happens if collective needs and desires are allowed to trump the individual too often?
- What happens if a two-party system creates a false dichotomy that seems to value extremism over holistic wellbeing?
- What are we most afraid of losing if the whole thing topples?
- What do we most stand to gain by bringing things back into balance?
This is the fun part where I don’t have any answers to those questions. I do, however, believe that identifying and celebrating our intersectional identities as individuals will allow us to better empathize, balance, and adjust as a collective. And that seems like a worthwhile endeavor to me.
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With I Am Intersectionality, I hope to provide thought-provoking resources that will help us understand more about our own personal intersections, and what those intersections mean in the historical and social moment we are living in today. If you’d like to get an occasional email with articles and resources on intersectionality, sign up here!
