Answering Hatred with Compassion
50 Years after James Baldwin, being in the public eye. Byline Amita Swadhin
This excerpt is from social media, with author’s consent.
I’ve spent the last 3 days watching the world get to know my partner just a little better. @team_patricio_manuel is the best person I know (I’m biased, but I also see him inspiring so many just by being himself). .
Sometimes it’s hard not to read the comments. Sometimes it’s hard to realize for every person expressing their admiration and support, there’s another person publicly challenging my love’s intelligence, strength, humanity, even threatening his life.
I feel so grateful to learn so much from Patricio in these moments about what it really means to have the heart of a champion.
I feel grateful to revisit James Baldwin’s writings on answering hatred with compassion, and if we can manage it, love, even while feeling rage, even while soaring to the fullest heights of our brilliance while being grounded in the resilience of our ancestors. I pity people who have so much self-hatred in their hearts they cannot honor others’ humanity. I can only imagine the great harm people who are driven to write hateful messages to complete strangers online must cause to the people with whom they are actually in relationship. .
The best I can muster in terms of love for all today is to remind all those transgender, non-binary and gender non-conforming people who have been raped, tortured, abused and disowned by the people close to them: what people say or do to cause you pain says nothing about you and everything about them. Until we live in a world where children of all genders are treated with love and respect, until we live in a world in which children have the autonomy they deserve to be their whole selves, there will always be networks of queer and trans adults like myself who are here to love you and thus to help you survive. I invite you to reflect on Baldwin’s “A Letter to My Nephew” with me:
“If the word ‘integration’ means anything, this is what it means,
that we with love shall force our brothers to see themselves as they are,
to cease fleeing from reality and begin to change it, for this is your home, my friend. Do not be driven from it. Great men have done great things here and will again and we can make America what America must become.” ~James Baldwin
