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Vision of Division

Why the name-calling? Why the finger pointing? What is it with all these generalized terms and categories? You’re a liberal. You’re a conservative. You’re a Muslim, Christian, Jew, anti-Christ. If you’re not with us, you’re against us! You really believe there are only two sides to the (political) coin? Maybe a sliver of a third? Wow. How generous of you. No, really, you’re too kind. If you gave me free will I wouldn’t know what to do with it. Just, please, stick me in the left box or the right box where I belong. Stick me in the American box, or the Un-American box. The terrorist box, or the revolutionist box.

It makes perfect sense to waste our time calling people out, instead of doing something ourselves. If capitalism is consumerism, then we vote with our dollar, and do you have any idea what you’re supporting when you make a purchase? How many people do the kind of research that could help them make more informed decisions on their every dollar (every vote), instead of pointing the finger and saying someone else has got it all wrong? You’ve never been president or in congress, so how can you say you could/would do their job any differently? They are supposed to be representing us. If we’re living life blindly buying, our vote is, “We don’t give a shit. We have shit, and that is what matters. Feed. Me. More. More. MORE!” We’ve literally bought and bulged our bellies into capitalism and consumerism. We are a better representation of our government instead of the other way around.

Mentally, take yourself out of your comfortable, well-defined box for growth on a different perspective. Do you ever put yourself in another person’s shoes? Can you even get your big clown clodhoppers out of your mouth to try and see where someone else is coming from? Look at me, name-calling. I’m sorry. You don’t have clodhoppers. You have feet, just like the rest of us. You have friends and family, just like the rest of us. You have beliefs, just like the rest of us. You want to be treated fairly, just like the rest of us. You want to be heard, especially if your arm is trapped between two boulders so you don’t have to die or cut your own arm off (and maybe die anyways, if you don’t know what you’re doing). Do you feel like you’re being heard? Even if your cries are on the web for the world to see, do you feel like anyone who can help is listening? When you vote, how often do you feel one is “the lesser of two evils?” Are we so different, you and I?

Instead of seeing people as face-to-face, opposing each other, see us from a shoulder-to-shoulder perspective. We need to quit pointing the finger and drawing lines of separation between each other. One state vs. another state. One land mass vs. another land mass. One physical distinction differing from your physical distinction. What is the difference? A better question: What are the vast similarities? To bring this into a seasonal light, the whole point of religion was the Ethic of Reciprocity:

Ancient Eyptian

“Do for one who may do for you, that you may cause him thus to do.”

Ancient Roman

“The law imprinted on the hearts of all men is to love the members of society as themselves.”

Buddhism

“Hurt not others in ways that you yourself would find hurtful.” ~Udana-Varga 5:18

Christianity

“And as ye would that men should do to you, do ye also to them likewise.” ~Luke 6:31

Confucianism

“Do not do to others what you do not want them to do to you.” ~Analects 15:23

Hinduism

“This is the sum of duty: do not do to others what would cause pain if done to you.” ~Mahabharata 5:1517

Humanism

“Don’t do things you wouldn’t want to have done to you,” ~British Humanist Society

Islam

“None of you [truly] believes until he wishes for his brother what he wishes for himself.” ~Number 13 of Imam, Al-Nawawi’s Forty Hadiths

Jainism

“A man should wander about treating all creatures as he himself would be treated.” ~Sutrakritanga 1.11.33

Judaism

“What is hateful to you, do not do to your fellow man, This is the law: all the rest is commentary.” ~Talmud, Shabbat 31a

Native American

“All things are our relatives; what we do to everything, we do to ourselves. All is really one.” ~Black Elk

Shinto

“Be charitable to all beings, love is the representative of God.” ~Ko-ji-ki Hachiman Kasuga

Sikhism

“Don’t creat enmity with anyone as God is within everyone.” ~Guru Arjan Devji 259

Sufism

“If you haven’t the will to gladden someone’s heart, then at least beware lest you hurt someone’s heart, for on our path, no sin exists but this.” ~Dr. Javad Nurbakhsh

Taoism

“Regard your neighbor’s gain as your own gain, and your neighbor’s loss as your own loss.” ~T’ai Shang Kan Ying P’ien

Unitarian

“We affirm and promote respect for the interdependent web of all existence of which we are a part.” ~Unitarian principles

Wiccan

“An it harm no one, do what thou wilt”

Yoruba

“one going to take a pointed stick to pinch a baby bird should first try it on himself to feel how it hurts.”

So grow up. Better yet, stay young where your instincts only sense pain or pleasure, not learned “differences.”