Get over yourself.
People have been saying that the coronavirus is the great
equaliser. To some extent, they are right. Covid-19 has affected our whole world:
rich and poor; young and old; educated and non-educated; those in good health, those in poor health; men and women; white, brown, black…
However, not everyone has been affected to the same extent. Let’s
make no bones about it.
I think finally, some people that wanted to pretend inequality
does not exist, are waking up to smell the coffee.
This post is not intended to make you comfortable. Get
over yourself.
Oh don’t worry, that phrase – which you are going to see
again and again as your eyes follow the trail of these words – is one I have
used for myself, too - and continue to check myself with. I am not picking on you.
The fact is, most of us live with some kind of privilege.
It is comfortable to be privileged.
As a black Christian woman who lives with a long-term condition
and speaks with a Northern accent, I’ll admit that I’m not usually the most
privileged person in the room.
However, I do live with privilege. I am from a middle-class
home. I have never spent a night on the street. I have never had to worry about
whether or not I could afford pads for my monthly cycle. I went to good schools
throughout my life, and then went to one of the top universities in the world.
None of this is my fault, nor am I ashamed of it. But it
would be stupid to start an argument with someone that has known a life of
being homeless by stating, “Well, I used to tour with a Christian drama
company, and sometimes we didn’t even know if we would have a place to stay
that night!”
Erm… That would be an extremely dumb thing to say, and would
be utterly missing the point.
Likewise, it would also be incredibly foolish for me to say
to someone who grew up on an estate where all the local schools were poorly
funded and were filled with students unwilling to learn, that I know exactly
how they feel “because I didn’t go to Eton, I went to a state grammar school”.
If I said that, I would feel an overwhelming urge to slap myself in the face.
Privileged people are generally quite inept at seeing their
own privilege. My guess is that it makes them feel uncomfortable. Recognising
that they are at the top of the ladder leaves room for someone to topple them from
the highest rung. It also means they might have to do something to turn the tables. And they don’t much like that idea.
Actually, it’s not a guess. I KNOW that it
makes us feel uncomfortable to see our own privilege.
I have a lot of amazing friends. And many of them are
involved in social justice causes. I have a number of friends who champion the
needs of the homeless. At university, many of my friends were involved in “homeless
outreach”, where they would get up close and personal with people on the street,
provide them with food and talk to them about Jesus.
I never got involved with homeless outreach. Not because I don’t
care about the homeless, or sympathise with their plight. It was more because
the idea of getting involved made me feel uncomfortable.
To be fair, I was involved with a huge amount of societies
at Oxford and I generally needed some time to rest on a Friday. However, I could
have gone just once. I never did.
Why? Because the idea of making friends with homeless people
made me uncomfortable. I had given small amounts of cash to people before, and
I came to realise they were almost certainly using-it for drugs. I also felt
uncomfortable because I was a young 18/19-year-old woman and most of the
homeless people I would be helping were older men.
However, in dwelling on these realities, I did not leave
much room in my brain to consider the needs of these people. When we
focus on our comfort, we often do not consider other people’s humanity. The
first step in recognising privilege is recognising that we are all the same, in
essence: therefore, none of us has a right to believe themselves any better
than anyone else. The next natural step is to do something to give a leg
up to those squashed by the status quo. Unfortunately, society rewards those
higher up on the social ladder, meaning that this can be counterintuitive.
We want a world of peace. However, peace can only reign where
there is justice.
If one us is suffering, we all suffer.
Covid-19 is finally forcing us to realise this reality.
People are dying. I’m not interested in your comfort.
If you know me, you’ll know that I get very angry about
injustice.
The forms of injustice I see used as ammunition against
people based on the very essence of who they are, get me the most het up.
Racism and sexism are some of the big ones.
I believe that every human being is made in the image of
God. Therefore, when you treat another human being as less than – based on an
attribute that is in their DNA – well, you are not just insulting them, you are
insulting God.
Get over yourself.
I have friends of many different hues. I love it. I love that
the colours of our skin are not a barrier in establishing meaningful and
lasting connections.
I therefore have conversations with my friends about race
fairly often. I don’t shy away from it. I most certainly do not apologise for
talking about an injustice that is causing death to many, and ruining the lives
of countless people.
Some of my white friends actually will begin these
discussions themselves – they care about injustice, and therefore, racism is
not off limits. They also LISTEN when I talk to them about my experiences, and
enlighten them on elements of my culture that they may not know about.
Conversations with some of my other friends do not quite
follow this pattern. I’ve found myself in conversations with white friends
where they start CORRECTING me on racism. Better yet, some seem to think it
doesn’t exist. Excuse me, but as a white person born and raised in a
white-majority country, how do you really think you can invalidate my lived
experience as a black woman who has lived in several white-majority countries?
It took all the grace of God and strength of Jesus for me to
not say something VERY RUDE back to them. Instead, I would politely tell
them that were completely wrong.
https://media.giphy.com/media/OUzJPYHSblGKI/giphy.gif - press play on this video.
I am fully aware of when people get uncomfortable about me bringing
up racism in discussion. They do that thing where they shrink back in their
seats and take an audible breath in, looking around as though they would rather be
anywhere but THERE.
Ohh, I’m sorry, does this make you UNCOMFORTABLE??
Well, how do you think it feels to get pushed on the metro with people muttering horrible words about your skin tone? How do you think it feels to be beaten up on the street because you are black? How do you think it feels to be attacked on the street just because you are Chinese; people accusing you of bringing the coronavirus into the country? How do you think it feels to be KILLED just because you are a brown Muslim? Do you think that the thoughts of these people at the time they are attacked is, OH MY GOSH, I FEEL SO UNCOMFORTABLE RIGHT NOW?!
Get over yourself.
People of colour, don’t sit there looking so smug. Sometimes
we need to get over ourselves too. You think black or brown people can’t be
racist? So why is it possible that some of my family members might never speak
to me again if I were to marry a white man?
WE ALL NEED TO GET OVER OURSELVES.
If you feel uncomfortable as a man when a lady starts talking about how difficult it can be to be a woman, and how sexual harassment and assault is a common evil we learn to live with, you need to get over yourself. I know some amazing men who will actually listen, but I know of those who will immediately feel as though their masculinity is under attack – “Not all men do that!”
Did we say so?
Why don’t you try saying that to the woman who has been physically
and mentally abused, raped and much more by a string of men in her lifetime?
Are you really trying to tell me that toxic masculinity is not a thing?
Sure, you might not be a toxic male. I recognise that not all
men are. Thankfully. However, to get offended when someone makes the point that
toxic masculinity is a thing is completely missing the point.
Get over yourself.
I Got Over Myself.
Where I might have once been uncomfortable around homeless
people, now when I see the homeless man that is a regular outside a nearby supermarket,
I stop and talk with him. Sometimes I buy him food, if I have anything to spare.
A few years ago, I would have given him a quick smile and rushed past, before
he could ask me for anything. Now I know his name. Last time I saw him, I
prayed for him.
What changed? I got over myself.
I recognised that the cause of the homeless was not solely
the job of my friends, already doing a great job championing those on the
streets. It was mine too.
It is not just MY (or any other black / brown person's) job to raise awareness about racism. Nor
is it just Ruth’s (or any other woman's) responsibility to talk about sexism. Have you been thinking, Oh
Ruth is an ambassador with Press Red, so I’ll leave it to her to address issues
like domestic abuse?
Any form of injustice against humans is a HUMAN problem.
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