Dividing lines
The diversity of people
Today in the United States of America, we once again find ourselves divided. As a large country, populated by people from very diverse backgrounds, we are easily assailable to polarizing influences. We are culturally and ideologically separated into a groups and myriads of subgroups. Two of the most common delineations we refer to are the “left” and the “right”.
What does this mean? And how did we get here?
Those who study history find there are circular progressions to the machinations of humans. As nature cycles, so does society. There are periods of growth, acme, and decline. New life and new systems burgeon out of what has decayed. We, along with our creations, are a part of the natural world. The patterns can be seen everywhere. Even our markets are fractalized, like the Mandelbrot Set based Fibonacci numbers.
According to the eastern wisdom of the I Ching and Tao Te Ching, things possess the ability to turn into their opposites due to everything containing its opposite within. A recent example of this manifests itself in our politics with President Lincoln, a progressive Republican. During the Civil War, democrats were generally pro-slavery. After that war, it was Woodrow Wilson and then Franklin D. Roosevelt that changed the face of the Democratic Party with their more liberal policies, It is the southern democrats that came to form the basis of what is now the Republican Party.
There is great wealth of wisdom to be found in studying history. It informs us to how we got into the situations of today. The repeated ravaging of Europe, The Middle East, and North Africa over the last 5,000 years is what could be looked at as the beginning, in some aspects, of the story of the west.
Many factors play into the ethos that developed here, some of which I hope to barely whisper at. The land upon which some peoples, in those regions, lived was harsh. This severity forged perceptions of God. These were some of the earliest literate peoples, and it was their traditions that got passed down through the generations, formulating the basis of the religious ideology of the west.
Another important thing to note is the colonialism beginning in the 16th century. It was born out of many factors, including greed for resources and a desire to dominate trade. Colonialism used the relatively new Christian religion as a “moral” backing for the powers of Europe. Providing a sick irony, the religion they used was founded by followers of Jesus, teacher of love, to justify their extremely violent conquests of lust and exploitation. And thus, the horrors of modern history unfolded.
The Europeans, with their infectious diseases, wiped out nearly all of indigenous peoples on two continents. Since the Europeans needed labor for their exploits, slavery was a “convenient” option, to which they later applied the same erroneous interpretation of Christianity to support.
Enter today, some people are quite advantaged, possessing substantial wealth that may have accrued in their families for generations.
Why? Where did it come from?
On the backs of the poor and the enslaved.
This was merely a skate upon iceberg of history. In future articles I wish to explore these issues in greater depth.
So people find themselves in different categories, largely based on their family histories. In the United States, most have some, many have little, a few have a lot, and “1%” have control over virtually everything. Throughout history, those in power have come nearly exclusively from what fantasy author Terry Pratchett called “the upper crusts”. This fact conserves the status quo over time, it is only the players that change.
So back to the various divisions of people in America today. Fighting injustice and hatred with injustice and hatred is becoming the very thing you lambast, no matter how “good” your cause.
We tread on dangerous waters, and risk transforming into our opposites. I think it is important to discuss how we got here, talk about trauma, and come up with implementable plans to disassemble injustice.
We are all humans, and in the end we want to be a member of a community and to be loved.
Some people have been so damaged by their surrounding that hate and darkness appears to have suffused their entire being. They may die in this dismal state.
We can not bring anyone out of the shadow who is unwilling to step forth. But for the rest of us, we can talk and listen to those of opposing viewpoints, and open the space for communication.
When we truly hear one another, we may discover similar underlying fears, emotions, and even values, though these manifests in wildly differently ideologies and ways of being.
I am you, with a different life. Let us share together, and make the world better today than it was yesterday.
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