No Exit

Preface: This post is a bit of a mess. There are several ideas and thoughts that are in my head, and this is the best way I know to get them out. This blog was created for selfish reasons; so I can put my thoughts into soft-reality (bits) and post them. It's a way for me to create a record of what I experience through my days. It is not meant to be from the perspective of anyone else. It's not meant to be correct, or incorrect. It's just meant to be. You may pass judgement on it; that is your prerogative. Although, my purpose here is not to create something for you to judge. It is simply to offer my perspective, for whatever it may be worth. (In my view, not much.) In kind, I am interested in learning more of your perspective. I am not interested in your judgements of mine. 

I am at a loss. Frozen. Trapped by an open door. Like a deer caught in the headlights; paralyzed by predicament. It seems there are an abundance of awful things happening. And while I know that reading the state of the world by just reading news headlines trends towards a negative view of the world, I also get a feeling like something fundamental is broken. I don't know what to do to fix it. 

I know how to do some things. Not an incredibly large amount of things, but more things than some other people, and fewer things than some others. I know how to fly planes. I know how to play the french horn. I haven't done either of those things in a while. I know how to steer a canoe. I know how to tie up a bear bag. I know how to build a fire. I know how to ride a bike, and ski, and run pretty far. These things don't seem very applicable to the current situation, at least not if I want to help any number of people. I know how to write. I know how to form ideas into sentences. That seems like the most useful skill right now. 

The problem is that I'm not quite sure what to say. My experience is one of privilege. I go for runs after dark and in broad daylight without worrying about my safety. I don't think twice about many things that many people have to consider every day. 

Shifting Sands

"Most heroes aren't famous, and most famous people aren't heroes." I didn't write that. I wish I had though; it's brilliant. The statement was meant to describe celebrities, I believe. But I think it's applicable to what we're seeing on the news. The heroes of the current situation are the ones that aren't getting attention. The ones fighting for good are the ones that we don't see on the news. The "famous people" of the current situation. By which I mean; the rioters and the looters that are emblazoned on the news are not the heroes.

Real change does not happen in the spotlight. The spotlight tints reality; you can never be sure anything happening in the spotlight is not designed to fool you, or at the very least, tainted by attention. Real change goes by without a second glance. 

We're in a time of real change right now. It's happening. What's not yet decided is whether this change will be desirable or not. Will this change result in more people enjoying personal freedoms, or fewer people enjoying personal freedoms?* At present, this pendulum could end up swinging either way. It's difficult to cut through sensationalized news reports and see what is actually going on. 

* Side Note: Maybe this isn't about personal freedoms. Maybe it's about safety and happiness. What does it mean for something to be positive in the world? Positive for everyone is an impossibility. Positive for the largest amount of people could leave a potentially huge minority of world citizens suffering while a slightly larger majority gets their way. Currently, I think that "positive" should mean the more people get to enjoy personal freedom to do things without repercussions based on anything but their actions. (If you choose to kill someone, that should be punished regardless of race or anything else.) Ultimately, those freedoms would be attained without diminishing the freedoms currently enjoyed by anyone. 

The thing that is most alarming is that we have sides. You're either with us or against us. You're part of this team or that team. There are so many possibly ways to view things, and we willingly throw out all but two. Maybe we really don't have the patience for complicated things. I'm not sure. But putting the advice of medical experts on a side is dangerous. Not wearing a face cover in public as a political gesture is dangerous. I don't know how we come out of this, how we get through it. 

I'm not quite outraged yet. Probably not a popular thing to say right at this moment, but it's honest. I'm incredibly frustrated. Witnessing people that I've known for years taking sides is frustrating. Seeing people that I love dearly not taking COVID-19 seriously is frustrating. There seems to be no place for the reasonably centrist voice; where do we go to acknowledge that we have a lot to learn? Where can we exercise the patience that is required for complicated things. Certainly people that came before us, and those of us that are alive now have fucked this up badly. But an eye for an eye is not a sustainable recipe for longevity. Where is the high road now? What path leads to de-escalation? 

I write these things as a straight white male. I have all the privileges there are to have. I didn't do anything to earn them. I happened to be born that way. Does that make you hate me? Is that something worth punishment? I can not answer these questions. There is a responsibility for me, and others that are in the same position that I am in, to scrutinize our behaviors. Consensus bias is an awful thing. My experience is not that of everyone. The things that I need to do to be a mindful, global citizen are not the same things that the person next to me needs to do. 

Outcomes

I think there are a few possible outcomes right now. I'll start with the least optimistic. It is possible that racism is so fundamentally part of the human condition that we will engage in it as long as we exist. There may be reprieves in the divisiveness, but after Black people and White people learn how to get along, another divide will rush in to fill the void. Perhaps we are so engrained in the Us And Them way of thinking, that we will gravitate towards it no matter how well intended our thoughts and actions. Ultimately, it may be the case that if we were to start tomorrow with literally nothing, and then come into existence as an entirely new universe, that these divisions would become apparent again, and there is nothing we could do about it. 

The second possibility is that this is not the case. We are capable of fundamentally changing the way of things. We fell into a trap of racism and sexism and judgement as a results of ignorance. However, we have gone through one enlightenment, and perhaps shall ride through another, one where we accept all humans as they are,  and as they want to be accepted. This will eventually lead to us acknowledging animal life, and then plant life. We will one day live in a world where having a relationship with a tree might be as ordinary as friendships between humans are now. This is the possibility that I favor. 

Either way, the actions taken right now will affect the outcome. I do not believe that it is predetermined, I believe in free will. I do not think that the first outcome is likely, because that would imply a greater order to things, set by a higher power. The humans that lived before us chose to make life this way, and we are living in the aftermath of their decisions. 

What we are dealing with currently is a complicated issue, and not a binary one. Some things have two sides, some have one side, and some have many. There are many perspectives from which people are shouting, and the fact that we are living through a global pandemic, peaceful protests, violent riots, police brutality, and authoritarian behaviors from the President of the United States does not make it any less complicated. 

To continue on the theme of the week, a truth of reacting to the world around one's self is that more time is better. An extra handful of seconds might be the difference between an event that is known only unto those directly involved, and one that sparks global protest. These same seconds might also be the difference between a potentially relationship ending rash remark, and the temperance of compassion whose fingerprints are all over long-term partnerships. Things will not get easier on their own. This situation will not fix itself. Over the next few months, these extra seconds could make all the difference in our lives. Big changes happen in small moments. A few seconds is all it might take to forever alter the trajectory of the world, or our isolated bubble-worlds. 

And so, as I go forward into the vast unknown, the void spaces that lie before us, I will bring my handful of seconds, and for all that I am, I will use them. As a tool, as a weapon, as a safeguard. Perhaps the deer in the headlights is wiser than it first seems. For that fatal flaw of paralysis might give the animal a more clear understanding of its demise. We stand on the shoulders of giants. Our progress is but an inch more than the sum of our ancestors, all living things, that have traveled ten thousand miles. Let our improvement be that we finally move. We break free of the burden of observation, and step out of the way of the impending chaos. 

Let us walk through the open door.