It is not just the non-acceptance of any particular group or nationality, ethnicity, race, sexual orientation, faith, gender, age, etc...it is the belief, or sometimes the uncomfortable fear, that someone who is different is somehow wrong, or astray, or frightening, or dangerous, or inferior/superior. we (the pronoun here is not aimed at anyone in particular, rather speaking in general) do not understand different. different scares us. different closes the door the mind is so slowly, if ever, trying to open.
in my nascent 14th year in these united and divided states of America i am experiencing everything with the fullest possible thirst to see, learn, know, improve...
i have been recently told that i am severing my ties with my homeland, that I am pulling away. a note on this as well...it took me 14 years to get to know what different looks like and to be OK with it! YES! I am different and I am OK with it! there are plenty of things in the politics/policies of this country that i don't like. in my home country's too ...however i am not holding the people, the nation as a whole, responsible, because to do so it'd be prejudicial.
when i began seriously studying history and criticism of art I met with an educator who opened my eyes to possibilities. in order to understand art, even the most hideous creations or the ones that erroneously receive the label "not-art", we need to spend time analyzing them and then accepting them. Accepting them as possible. But why? But why not?!? Accepting does not mean liking. Accepting does not mean endorsing... Accepting means finding common ground, a starting point. Accepting is acknowledging someone's presence, the right to existence...Finding a positive start, then critically assessing that which needs critiquing has proven to work better than outright denying it or denigrating it.
in the case of people diametrically opposed to us, the case is more so evident - it is not that certain people are bad, good, admirable or despicable, it is that we haven't accepted them as different. please don't misinterpret my words regarding criminals and murder. the actions of people are often illegal. they cause harm. we do not accept the actions of people who cause harm and we have a way of penalizing them by the measures of the judicial system. it is not that these people turned bad and were once good . it is that they chose to do something bad...and that is a very delicate difference...
but to go on and claim from faulty and misunderstood patriotism, tradition or upbringing that WE (all who think and act similarly) are better/right and that THEY (all who think differently) are worse/wrong is simply ignorant and ushers in a destructive competitiveness. moreover, it is dangerous. diversity breeds tolerance. division, holding on to allegiances, traditions and heritages in a mistaken way causes pain and suffering, war and destruction, disappointment and aggravation. it is OK to be different, diverse, multicultural, pluralistic, pacifist. it is not a sign of weakness, or anti-patriotism, or nihilism, or atheism...one needs to be able to laugh at one's own self/ heritage/tradition/beliefs in order to be free...if one chooses to be free. again, very delicate difference...
Why not be who you are, striving to be a better human being if you can, without worrying to who, to what or where do you belong? why not belong to YOURSELF first and foremost, and then through empathy understand the other side?...that there IS another side... why necessitate the calamity of prejudice by trying to fit, at any cost, yourself and others, into oppressive, disrespectful pigeonholes? Einstein himself asked us why build our "inner equilibrium upon such insecure foundations" as the "opinions, habits, and judgments of one's fellows"?
And all that being said, i divorce myself from the labels "you XYZ"/"us ABC". I refuse to belong neither here, nor there. I choose to not belong. But I, I belong to myself.
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