The Mercury Rule
The Battle between Good and Evil
The term may be often used, but the battle is not really between Good and Evil: We don’t have a universal standard of “Good” and all parties in a conflict naturally believe that they are the good ones and the enemy is the evil one; so effectively this is really just a means to justify a conflict.
The real battle is actually inside us — between Love and Hate: can we, instead of reacting with (righteous) hate, respond to those that may hate us today with love, so they will not hate us tomorrow?
As a first step — to understand the causal factors that contributed to the series of decisions that led them to hate us, as well as the emotions that clouded their decision making ability?
To perhaps empathize that in their shoes we might have done exactly what they did? And… if you are thinking “but i wouldn’t do that” (pick an atrocity, any atrocity) that’s because you haven’t actually been able to take your own shoes off. Not yet.
To Hate a Hater
This reflection arose from a discussion on FB where homophobes (amongst others) were labelled assholes.
I was mildly homophobic (just fear, no hate that I can recall) when I was younger: this was in the era where it was thought that only gay sex transmitted AIDS. I don’t know widely accepted this view was back then, but when my mother told me “don’t do it with men, you will get AIDS”, I believed it, even if I wasn’t quite sure what “it” was. I don’t think I was an asshole though; at least, not any more than I was for anything else.
I recognize that my journey — from being mildly homophobic to someone speaking up for LGBTIQ rights — was heavily influenced by the experiences I had. For example, I was actively involved in AIESEC for many years and that made non-discrimination on sexual orientation “normal” for me; I have several good friends who are gay, and — possibly most importantly — I didn’t grow up in a family/community with strong homophobic views.
I can also speculate on the possibility that, with a different set of experiences, my homophobia might have increased.
I find it unlikely that there is some inherent characteristic in me that would guarantee that I would never end up homophobic regardless of my circumstances and experiences.
I also believe that there is nothing inherently homophobic about most (if not all) people — although maybe there is some psychological/psychiatric basis for it, in which case they deserve to be helped to cope, just as much as anyone else facing mental health issues.
Understanding that homophobes are victims of their circumstances helps me to be (or at least, try to be) compassionate towards them.
If you are thinking, “I would never be homophobic regardless of the circumstances, because <insert reason here>”, stay tuned for the next installment: The Illusion of Choice.
If “they” are racists, maybe you are too
Reflections arising from how some people are explaining the recent unrest in Ampara (as well as earlier accusations of infertility causing toffees, gels in bras, etc.) as the work of Racists…
I saw a post on Facebook that said 98% of Sri Lankans are peace-loving, and 2% are Racist. I wonder if the people who came up with that “statistic” realize that they are also practicing Racism, albeit of a slightly different nature?
A claim like this reinforces the practice of categorizing things using discrete (often binary) states. For example, we can describe objects as being opaque or clear, and it is often convenient to do so, but a more precise description would be to specify the transmittance (the percentage of incident light passes through) of the object, like when specifying legal limits for tinting car windscreens. And because the opacity of the glass is a physical property of the glass, it doesn’t change regardless of how you choose to describe it.
Likewise, it is convenient to categorize people as Racist and non-Racist, and this can be very comforting for those who think they are latter, because it puts the blame squarely on the other without recognizing ones own complicity. And using the categorization in a derogative way makes it even more comforting:
It could be more precise to recognize that each of us is has some degree of Racism in our behaviours, like this, although it isn’t necessarily the case that there is one linear scale that accurately describes the range of racist attitudes and behaviours.
We also need to recognize that people tend to move around the scale over time, and that our position on the scale may be different based on the issue at hand (people are much more concerned about Muslim women covering their faces than about Muslim child marriages) and how triggered we are feeling at the time. Most importantly, it also depends on what the people around us are saying and doing, because:
Racism is not an individual attribute, it is a collective coping mechanism.
When people come to believe (more often than not, led to believe) that “we” (as grouped by whatever classification that carries meaning for them — nationality, race, ethnicity, religion, caste, pedigree of citizenship, gun-ownership, sexual orientation, etc) are under threat because of “others”, they will tend to unite against their “common enemy”. As Goering put it during the Nuremberg trials, “tell them they are being attacked and denounce the pacificts”.
This makes the “enemy” feel threatened (at least, makes it easier for them to be led to believe that they are threatened), they unite to defend themselves, which makes “us” feel more threatened, and the conflict escalates with each party justifying their actions as being “reasonable responses” to the other’s — without any willingness to recognize ones own complicity, lest it give fuel to the other’s arguments.
And let us not forget that who is “us” and who is the “common enemy” depends only on which side of the divide we situate ourselves on:
One way of responding to this situation when the conflict spans ethnic and/or religious boundaries, is for at least one side to call the other Racists, with demeaning adjectives like stupid, simple-minded, hateful, inconsiderate, and unempathetic thrown in for good measure.
Unfortunately, unlike the glass, people do care what you call them. Calling someone a Racist, or demeaning their identity, makes it more likely that they will stick together with those who value their existence, appreciate their concerns, and give solace to their fears. So they harden their stance and get further attached to, and expressive of, their identity — and the vicious cycle continues.
So, tell me, how is ignoring all of these complexities (intelligent? sophisticated?), and using a derogatory label “Racist” (kind?), without understanding their fears and concerns or caring how they feel (considerate? empathetic?), really different to what you are accusing them of?
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