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winterbadgerI've had a lot of personal struggles with religious belief, and I've travelled a lot of different roads. I find some people's religious beliefs (among which I include atheism) confusing, or sad, or disturbing, or even just silly. (Others I find honourable or worthy or uplifting, but I'm not concentrating on those at the moment.)
I may disagree, mildly or strongly, with someone's beliefs, but I try very hard to remember that they are *their* beliefs, not *mine*. Unless they are trying to force their beliefs on me (or on everyone, by giving them the colour of law), what someone else chooses to believe or not believe is really not my business. It's certainly not appropriate, I think, to mock someone else's beliefs just because I don't share them. And it certainly doesn't behoove me to distort and misrepresent them for the purpose of mocking them further.
Of course, in the same way that everyone has a right to their own beliefs, they have a right to their own opinion and course of behaviour regarding others. But I expect people whom I think of as friends and peers to abide by certain standards of decency and courtesy. And those include not ridiculing people whose only "offense" is to believe something different. To me, that just seems mean and small-minded. As nearly everyone's mother or grandmother seems to have said, "If you don't have something nice to say, don't say anything at all." Now, obviously, there are going to be people who make it all too easy to make fun of them. But unless someone is working hard to give offense to other people, it doesn't seem worthy attack them.
Sometimes I'm going to slip and say or do something that's beneath me, and I expect some of my friends will call me on it. And I will do the same. And if someone's response is not, "Oh, you know, you're right: that was kind of a cheap shot," but more of the same, well, that's going to make me question whether I want them as a friend.
"I know that there are people who do not love their fellow man, and I hate people like that!" Tom Lehrer was joking, certainly, when he said that. But beyond the joke was something deeper. Two wrongs don't make a right. An eye for an eye leaves the whole world blind. And if someone seems foolish or misguided, but is doing you no harm, is sneering at them really going to make the world a better place?
I may disagree, mildly or strongly, with someone's beliefs, but I try very hard to remember that they are *their* beliefs, not *mine*. Unless they are trying to force their beliefs on me (or on everyone, by giving them the colour of law), what someone else chooses to believe or not believe is really not my business. It's certainly not appropriate, I think, to mock someone else's beliefs just because I don't share them. And it certainly doesn't behoove me to distort and misrepresent them for the purpose of mocking them further.
Of course, in the same way that everyone has a right to their own beliefs, they have a right to their own opinion and course of behaviour regarding others. But I expect people whom I think of as friends and peers to abide by certain standards of decency and courtesy. And those include not ridiculing people whose only "offense" is to believe something different. To me, that just seems mean and small-minded. As nearly everyone's mother or grandmother seems to have said, "If you don't have something nice to say, don't say anything at all." Now, obviously, there are going to be people who make it all too easy to make fun of them. But unless someone is working hard to give offense to other people, it doesn't seem worthy attack them.
Sometimes I'm going to slip and say or do something that's beneath me, and I expect some of my friends will call me on it. And I will do the same. And if someone's response is not, "Oh, you know, you're right: that was kind of a cheap shot," but more of the same, well, that's going to make me question whether I want them as a friend.
"I know that there are people who do not love their fellow man, and I hate people like that!" Tom Lehrer was joking, certainly, when he said that. But beyond the joke was something deeper. Two wrongs don't make a right. An eye for an eye leaves the whole world blind. And if someone seems foolish or misguided, but is doing you no harm, is sneering at them really going to make the world a better place?
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Date: 2013-07-17 07:47 pm (UTC)Tangent: I was thinking about this recently in the context of tattoos, actually (not that a tattoo and a religion are decisions of the same magnitude, but still). I have a strong knee-jerk reaction myself against tattoos I consider trashy or unimaginative, or poorly-done. There are whole categories of tattoos I’d never consider for myself. But one the one hand, I have a new respect for people who commit to them (I raise my glass to every lady out there who’s got a tramp stamp; holy crap that’s a painful area to get inked!), and I’ve also become more tolerant of the idea that people do stuff I would never do for their own reasons. Whatever tattoos you have -- even if they’re ones you yourself come to regret, completely aside from others' judgment -- are part of who you are, because they’re part of who you were when you got them. And they don’t need my approval. Religion's a living, evolving thing, so it's not the same kind of irrevocable decision, but the whole "they don't need my approval" idea is one I'm trying to apply to all the things I get my knickers in a knot over.
I'm still trying to make my peace with the way a post like this applies to politics; I have such a hard time seeing past the hatred and fear and small-mindedness of the vocal right. It makes it hard to get to the point of "Oh hey, your belief system is different than mine, and that's cool," even when the person isn't the kind of extremist that I flail about. There's a difference between the kind of belief system that does active harm to the world (what I'm talking about here) and something that's intensely private, but with politics I feel like the two are pretty tightly entangled.
Anyway -- long post, summary: thanks! very thoughtful.
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Date: 2013-07-17 08:23 pm (UTC)And what you say about tattoos is very apt, and very thoughtful. We don't all have the same values, so we don't all make the same choices, and even when we do, they may have different meanings for each of us. Something that to one person might mean desecrating a sacred temple we've been given by god might, to a different person, be a way of celebrating that body and the beauty and the creativity of mind that god gave us (or that we are born with, without any outside agency at all). What is beautiful to me may be ugly to another.
One reason that diversity is hard to celebrate and to even accept, for many, is that it often runs against a fundamental pattern of human society--that we are part of communities that share beliefs and practices and values. By accepting a diverse society, we throw that out the window and say, "People think and value things that are different to what I do, and that's OK." Very, very tough. And it's not a conservative/liberal thing either. I see a lot of liberals who are very smug and self-righteous because they feel superior to intolerant conservatives. But they don't see that there are also plenty of conservatives working hard to find ways to be tolerant. Or that they themselves are often highly intolerant, just of different things than the people they criticize.
But, yes, when it comes to politics in particular, it is very hard. Because its where a lot of fear gets manifested on both sides, and manifested primarily in anger and hatred and scorn. And its hard, when you're on the receiving end of those, to look past them and see the good in the person who's sending them out. And it's easy, so very, very easy, to react with an attack of one's own.
I love the points you bring up about how your tattoo is giving you a different perspective. You are literally living, at least a little, in someone else's skin. And you're using that experience to grow as a person. Another of the (many) things I admire about you. :-)
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Date: 2013-07-18 03:15 am (UTC)A few years ago, someone was recounting to me something that one of their mentors had told them years earlier, and it's one of those things that's stuck with me, hard: “I believe that people are doing the best they know how." And that's precisely what I want to believe, even though it's often not easy. Given their mental and emotional resources, their experiences, their baggage, their traumas, their culture, their skills, their weaknesses -- even if I (from my position of privilege) don't think it's very good, even if it's in a situation where I feel like I have to take steps to counteract whatever they're doing, they're doing what they are because it's the best they can do.
I've tried to remind myself of it when working with students, when looking at huge and horrible current events, when thinking about people who've hurt me, when dealing with people who infuriate me with their complacency and thoughtlessness -- even when I can't always quite manage it, that's what I'm working towards believing. At the very least, reminding myself of it will generally jar me our of my frustration and get me into a more compassionate frame of mind. And I've found that it doesn't really matter whether or not I end up agreeing or approving; I'm happier when I try to understand.
Anyway, more rambling. Sorry. But thank you for the thoughts; I've really enjoyed your perspectives, as always :)
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Date: 2013-07-18 03:31 pm (UTC)But I agree: it's better to try and understand *what* is motivating people rather than go with instinctive reaction. Exactly *because* reaction is how most people (IMO) respond--unthinking, instinctive reaction. We are, at root, despite all our evolution and our attempts at civilization, animals, and reaction is what saved our ancestors on the savannah and int he forests, so it's what our body instinctively resorts to.
But those reactions are rarely based on severe antisocial or amoral patterns of behaviour. At worst, they're usually founded on selfishness and fear. And trying to see where *those* come from can turn an evil, wicked person with whom one cannot compromise into a frightened person trying to protect themselves and their family from the unknown and dangerous, with whom it may be possible to find some mode of cooperation and understanding.
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Date: 2013-07-18 05:23 pm (UTC)Ha, and now I've turned our lovely conversation into whining about how being a good person is haaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaard, wah! ;)