“We as a word opens our mouths, maybe even with smiles. It’s an expression of welcome, of ease, of
receptivity…. It’s a word that gathers in an identity while it also asserts
one…
They as a word involves figuratively sticking out our tongue. It’s
a word of expulsion… It draws a boundary, a perimeter, a distinction, a
separation, a distance. “They” is a kind of anti-identity, and
anti-definition of I or we.”
-Mark Labberton, The
Dangerous Act of Loving Your Neighbor
Well friends, the saga of the animal drama is not over. The competitive cats I wrote about last month
are now melded into we. It took the presence of “they” to overcome
the internal drama. They came in the form of an energetic fur ball with teeth and a
genetic disposition to chase – a six-week old puppy. The day Archie moved in the feeding ritual
changed dramatically. The cats didn’t
meet me at the back door or race each other.
In fact their paws hardly touched earth.
I went into the barn and found all three huddled together on the highest
point possible. What a change occurred
in the presence of a common enemy!
I am delighted that my feline friends made peace with each
other. I am disappointed though, that
the incentive for this peace was another war.
As Mark Labberton articulates in the quotes above, the word They draws a solid line between
people. The word signifies that we are in, as much as that they are out. Such language not only divides, it also
dehumanizes and it devalues. We can
quickly justify violence done to them. Ironically, even as such language divides it also
strengthens the bond between us and
draws us together.
There’s got to be better ways to build community than
creating a common enemy though! After
all which of the communities symbolized below is stronger?
The question then becomes; how encompassing is our
definition of community? Or according to Sue Monk Kidd in The Dance of the Dissident Daughter:
“…‘The question is: How big is your ‘we’?’ Who
knows, our future on this planet may hang on how we come to answer that
question.”
This topic even made it into the National Geographic this month.
Laura Spinney wrote an article titled “Karma of the Crowd” which analyzes the benefit
experienced by the people in crowds along the Ganges during the Kumbh Mela, a
Hindu festival. She writes,
“The psychologists
think the cornerstone of the effect is shared identity. ‘You think in terms of we rather than I’ … and that in turn alters your relationship to other people…
Support is given and received, competition turns to cooperation, and people are
able to realize their goals in a way they wouldn’t be able to alone. That elicits positive emotions that make them
not only more resilient to hardship but also healthier.”
I encourage you to listen for the words we, they, us, and them. To whom do you apply this language?
In consequence, how do you behave toward them?
Who are you trying to protect and draw closer by drawing
such defining lines with language? Are
there other ways to strengthen those relationships?
I invite you to join me as this year I hope to expand my “we.”
