Let’s Stop Flinging Poo, Shall We?
There was recently a post wondering how and why people feel entitled. The comment had to do with entitlement across gender lines, but it could be equally applied across racial lines. Once you see that it isn't about race or gender, you can ask what it IS about.
Lack of empathy. Fear. Flawed theory of mind. Lack of maturity.
Here are some attitudes and values that underly this behavior:
"The world revolves around me/my tribe."
"They know how I think/feel"
"I know how THEY think/feel, even if they say differently"
"The world is hierarchical, and me/mine are at the top"
"The heart wants what it wants."
"Life is a jungle. Kindness is weakness."
"The world is unfair."
"You have to take what is yours"
And of course, every one of those has instances of greater and lesser justification. When you see a negative behavior from a person or group, you will have the choice of asking "what kind of fear creates that anger, creates that violence?" (and yes, calling the police on someone is violence--simply indirect or "yin" in that sense).
Why do people exhibit privilege beyond the bounds of reasonableness or "common sense" or social mores? Well, partially because the definitions of these things change from time to time, instance to instance, generation to generation. What you see is, PERHAPS, the difference between STARTING with the assumption of equality and humanity and slowly altering that position as specific information or experience demand…and starting with the assumption of INEQUALITY and slowly altering THAT position as specific social pressures, information, or experience demand.
The easiest, simplest survival position is “we are better.” And you can see this in people no matter their race, gender, nationality. Anything they are born into. You CAN see some differences in philosophies and religions…things that can be chosen and actually are expressive of the way we see the world.
I believe the safest position is to awaken the survival drives, take TOTAL responsibility for ourselves, just like any other natural animal. But then to open our hearts, and create connection, tribe, and society to protect us all. These two drives: to survive as individuals and to connect as a pair or a group…are at war with each other within wounded hearts. I think they explain a huge amount of the personal, racial, gendered or political divide. No real connection to our own individual survival drives, no resolution of the fear within our hearts toward others, no real connection to the spiritual reality that we are all part of the same living force.
This is why I have always been willing to discuss racism…even with racists (although I don't let them discuss race on my pages. I will discuss it personally). Because I see them as human, but trapped in illusions of separation and fear.
This is also why I am interested in creating a book for the Involuntarily Celibate. Because I see them not as evil, but as desperately lost and fearful, having no idea how to find the peace and joy that every human being really desires.
And those two drives are tightly linked. I literally COULD NOT change my attitude about one without changing my attitude about the other. Seeing violence as anger, and anger as fear, is my go-to. It allowed me to see those who had hurt me, threatened me, dehumanized me…without having to dehumanize them. Yeah, it hurt. But it was nothing personal, and just the way humans use "othering" to justify their horror. Tribes really do exterminate each other. There really are "Zero Sum" games. Ask the megafauna or other hominids that are no longer around and vanished suspiciously soon after encountering homo sapiens.
And yeah, I agree with Dawkin's The Selfish Gene that the real game between men and women has been to produce the maximum grandchildren, even if that meant death and misery for the individual men and women shoehorned into those reproductive boxes.
I’m not asking you to throw away your own perceptions and agree with me. I’m asking you to ask “what if this is true? Would it explain the past? Current events? Point a way to a better more loving future?”
I think it a fine tool for such growth.
Frankly, I see how we got here, over tens of thousands of years, without guilt, blame, or shame. I also see that the late 20th century was a massive pattern interrupt. Do you remember the "Persuasion Framework"?
Get rapport. The person whose behavior you are trying to change needs to believe you love and respect them.
Interrupt their negative pattern by shifting their language, focus, or physiology.
Connect the desired behavior to their own higher purpose.
This works with animals, children, life partners, employees, societies. If you can see the way MLK used this, or Gandhi, or any number of other leaders, you'll see how incredibly wise they were, and why they are remembered when most leaders have faded away.
We have, in the 21st century, the first generation of human beings who have finished a complete cycle of growth and interaction and maturity in some critical ways. We really CAN move beyond the survival drives that controlled us prior to instantaneous communication and air travel (connecting the world, and tribes isolated by terrain and distance) and effective birth control (and some would say firearms and industrialization, as well as max population…totally changing the gender dynamic for the first time in human history.)
Our ancestors were not fools or warped beings. They were just trying to survive. And some of those memetic patterns have outlived their usefulness. Each and every one of us, of whatever race, tribe, or gender really DOES have the right to shake our heads, come out of the survival trance, and ask "who am I?" "What is true?"
I believe the answer is "all is one." And that the way to this is to really investigate things like the Three Gates and Three Centers, the question of equality, of understanding that the human beings we consider adversaries and enemies are just as human as we are, and that the average member of our tribe would behave just like the average member of theirs if positions were reversed. That most violence stems from anger and its root, fear.
The implications of equality are painful. And eye-opening. But resolve that duality and you will see things in a way that is dangerous to those trapped within it. You will seem like the enemy. Remember that those who sought to move us beyond that often get nailed to crosses and shot dead on balconies.
It is safer to stay within the dualistic tribes. But those who move us forward must move beyond that, or we remain at eternal war.
So…no, I cannot change my belief we are all children looking for love, that anger is fear, that taking personal responsibility for our emotions, actions and results is the way out, the way to build a world in which it won't take such superhuman control to get normal human results in life.
Human society, for all its flaws, is kinder than the natural world. And we have the capacity to be kinder still. But first, we have to really, really see how we are all connected in a skein, stop pointing the finger, and join with others who believe in love and light rather than blame to find a way to the future we all want.
But it will take ADULTS to do that. Awake, aware, autonomous adults. THEY can, together, build a society with high safety nets and protections for all.
Those who insist on flinging poo at each other like monkeys in the zoo will certainly reap the benefits, but they will not be the builders.
My commitment is simple and clear: one million awake, aware, autonomous human beings. I believe that is enough to change the world. And any man or woman, black or white, who sees the same mountain and has the same urge to climb it is welcome at my side.
Namaste
Steve
