Difficult Conversations II

Over the past couple of weeks, I, along with most Americans, have been pondering the recent election. And, like all arm chair jockeys, I have been second guessing, looking through the crystal ball and post-interrogating several issues. I believe that the turning point in this election might well have been associated with Hillary Clinton's castigation of Donald Trump's followers as "deplorable". While she quickly retracted the statement, the damage had been done. For no sooner had the news reported the statement, campaign signs began popping up all across America "Deplorables United For Trump". This comment, in the heat of an already fractious political climate, only served to add gasoline to the fires. I would argue that if we interrogated this moment and these words, it just might shed some light on our basic human character.

 Let me begin by acknowledging and to some apologizing for being in a profession that often has misrepresented the human condition, misunderstood the social fabric, and misdiagnosed the problem. Often, in our effort to be social "doctors" we fail to take the creed "do no harm" to heart. For we blindly do harm, as we carelessly wade through the milieus in our attempts to understand, diagnose, and remedy. But unlike our medical brethren, we fail to acknowledge that we are merely "practicing" the sociological arts. And that much of what we think we know is far from what could be known. This is particularly true with it comes to race and racism, sex and sexism, and class and classism.  All too often in our blindness we attempt to tell others what to believe, when our best efforts is to try to understand what it is that we believe. 

When we meander through these contentious terrains, often we fail to acknowledge that we are first embedded within the very stuff that we are trying to analyze, critique, address, interpret, and remedy. And so blinded, we fail to see the forests that so blur our eyesight. Consequently, rather than heal we harm, rather than cure we inflame, and rather than facilitate solutions we become part of the very problem that we are trying to deal with. Even worse our solutions become the source of even more damage, as we create language and systems that thwart any real progress. Let us return to Mrs. Clinton statement, as it provides a clear example of this in process.

All too often, when faced with someone that we find difficult, different, or even divisive -result to labeling, marginalizing, and dismissal. So rather than fostering deeper conversations, we foster alienation. Such destructive dialogues, often in the name of diversity, do not encourage diversity. Rather they discourage it, as we engage in what I choose to call Neo-McCarthyism, what others call politically correctness. Ether term works, as we construct those we differ with as racist, sexist, homophobic, classist...deplorables. The use of such rhetoric is a sure fire way of ending any real conversation as we have effectively utilized the nuclear option in discourse. And rather than building bridges we have erected walls. 

 Having real, meaningful conversations is difficult. It starts with the observation and the confession that we are all defective, humans socialized in communities which are inherently racist, sexist, homophobic, and classist. I would be a lair if I were to say that I was devoid of any, no all of these tendencies. And, I would be dishonest if I were to even suggest that I have somehow found sainthood and can avoid thoughts, actions, and deeds that reinforce these behaviors. No, the truth is that every day, I must confront these within myself and my immediate environment. Confrontation, however does not begin nor end with condemnation. Rather, it begins with the acknowledgement that they are present, and that I have work to do to understand them in my own identity. As my Christian friends would say, I acknowledge that I am less than perfect, that I have sinned (erred) and come way short of what I could be. As I continue on this journey, I hope to discover how to engage more critically with others in these difficult conversations.