It's "us" and "us", not "us" and "them"

Thanks to all those who read my first piece trying to look over what brings people out onto the streets in a manner we have seen in the UK over the last few weeks. If you didn't get a chance to read it, (1) Bigotry doesn't start on the streets | LinkedIn will take you right there!

In this second piece, I want to start to explore the similarities, some which we may feel uncomfortable with and some which we may vigorously want to deny exist, between "us" and "them" and argue that there probably isn't a "them" at all.

?

To start with I suggest we look within what we perceive to be our own societies. Not necessarily through the lens of racism, but instead let's look at some more general examples of othering which we are all exposed to in one way or another:

A good current example: The "battle" of the sexes -

"What men need to realise is..."

"Women should understand that..."

We can re-write the above into any myriad of scenarios, race, sexuality, mode of commuting to work, music genre choices, religion, you name it, we all do exactly what is quoted above. We shove the other side into a box and indirectly or directly, declare that there is a fundamental problem with that group and they really need to get it fixed.

We nearly always do this by employing a combination of two fallacious actions:

?

The first is probably the most telling, the grouping of people into a homogenous mass based on one single facet of their being. A good, fairly banal, example is those who drive cars, or those who cycle to work. Those of us who happen to be driving cars often speak of cyclists and how they need to adapt their behaviour as a whole, forgetting often that most of the people we see riding bikes also drive cars, just like we are when we are making this supposition. (The same things happen in the other direction too!) But when we do it with phenomena like immigration, it becomes even more ridiculous, because to attribute common experience, cause and thought to people from all over the world, some of whom have experienced famine, war or oppression relating to their person and so on, experiences which have no commonality whatsoever, the concept that people travelling to this country for shelter have any substantive common basis on which their behaviours can be predicted and their outcomes predicated is rendered farcical.?

The second position, which can be more variable in its extent is that of benign ignorance relating to what anyone in the nominated group experiences day-to-day. Unabashed we all fill that knowledge void with preconceptions, which, miraculously, always seem to fit with and re-enforce our own narrative.?

I think it's fair to say, we do this whilst re-assuring ourselves that we are not bigots because we have thought about this (maybe even applied something we learned on an unconscious bias course run by a self-appointed expert) therefore our position is demonstrably reasonable, and if only everyone else could see this, all would be well. We assume that bigots wear brown shirts (nowadays black jackets and facemasks or balaclavas), we assume they wield machetes or set fire to Holiday Inns, most crucially, I think we forget that they aren't doing it just to be nasty. Like us they are motivated to solving a genuine problem as they see it.

In short, what we don't do is recognise any common ground between us.

?To realise that the beginning stages of what we call bigoted behaviour are formed around us, by us and thus we all inhabit that unseen hinterland of bigotry is, to my mind, a crucial step in seeing where these feelings and behaviours foment, in understanding where dissatisfaction starts and can grow into disaffection and onwards towards what we have seen recently.

We all set fire to metaphorical Holiday Inns when we want to figure out ways to remove what we see as obstacles. But we are, naturally, uniquely justified in how we create and judge whatever or whoever forms those obstacles. It may be that we would never act in a way which was murderous, and I expect for most of us that is true, but it may also be that we have just never got to a point where we felt like we had no alternative.

So what should we do then? Do we stop coming out against racist groups? No, absolutely not. We must continue to show, with great vigour and conviction, that this is a country who welcomes anyone who wants to come and live peacefully, even when we don't understand or completely agree with how they do it. We must continue to show people that racism, sexism and religious bigotry will not be tolerated, but I ask that we take time to look at ourselves and what is going on around us a little differently:

1. Take time to understand that bigotry against groups who we perceive to be stronger than us is still bigotry, we are still dehumanising them even if we perceive them to be the stronger, more aggressive group. Remember every bigot is entirely justified in their minds, and that means us too and remember that there is a very good chance, people we have put into that group are looking at us in exactly the same way, with every bit as much justification.
2. Realise that by allowing us to be taken in by transparent excuses for why something which looks like, sounds like and feels like bigotry isn't actually bigotry because of some excuse; nonsense such as "they have all the power, therefore I am not rac/sex ist" is never ever true no matter how strongly you feel it and no matter how eloquently people may argue differently. Othering is bigotry, and it always leads to inequality and conflict. Howsoever justified in our minds.?

Then finally, that having been done, let's all remember that we are all in the same place, trying to do the same things. Human needs come down to three simple things: Food, Sex and Security. We are all trying to ensure we have sufficient access to each of them in the manner and to the extent we feel necessary, and by understanding that those we distrust/hate/fear are doing the same thing that we are, probably coming at it from a very similar emotional standpoint, we realise that the division is simply that we are (both) unable and unwilling to acknowledge the fact that they are significantly more like us than we want to admit, and that there are far more uniting experiences and feelings between us than we are comfortable with.

We realise there is not really an "other", we're all pretty much the same.

?In part 3 I want to explore how realising that we aren't so separate after all might start to give us some clues as to how we can cure and solve the problems, and to ask if we are currently solving problems or simply putting them out of sight.