Remember when we all used to live together in a shared country? (Together being the operative word) We didn’t always get our own way and we had nearly infinite shades of grey, anatomically and otherwise. Now we have the most abrupt, bruising, and brusque form of non-nuanced conversations in all the years I've been carrying around this belly button.
We have clenched jaws and hard eyes and hardened hearts, but that doesn't mean we can't talk-it just means we won't, I guess. Somewhere we decided two diatribes equal one dialogue and I GET TO GO FIRST! (sorry).
If we yell AT one another long enough, from a distance somewhere in space it will look like we are talking to one another. Respectful disagreement has gone the way of the dodo bird. If you don't agree with me you are the most awful person in the history of the planet, as is everyone else related to you, everyone else related to them, and everyone any of you knows. Wait a minute! When I do that much finger-pointing some of the fingers on that hand point back at myself. Hmmm.
Labels such as 'liberal' and 'conservative' are now pejoratives hurled like discount store invective at opposing viewpoints, appropriate or not, and the reaction to the labeling obscures quite nicely any opportunity to see the person we've just tagged. Now, all we are is disagreeable when we disagree.
And we engage in preemptive shouting matches with one another in forums supposedly designed to let us exchange ideas and views. The longer the meeting, the louder the yelling and don't even get me started on the understanding.
Back in the day, we talked things out and arrived at a consensus through reasoned discussion and debate. We need to learn once again to speak in complete sentences and respectful tones to one another, one at a time, and then move on to larger groups.
Eventually, we might get the hang of how we used to do all of this, back when we all lived in the same country at the same time. History needn't be a mystery.
-bill kenny
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