Suffering is not new

I keep thinking about a lot of times in history where everything was just horrible.

There are a lot of people who keep saying things like: “it’s never been this bad before” “things COULD NOT be any worse!” “These are unprecedented events and times we are living through.”

While I understand where people are coming from who say these things, I want to push back on that sentiment.

Maybe it feels like these times are so awful because in your specific lifetime this is a time that feels the most challenging for you.

Maybe you have not ever felt so hopeless or helpless or powerless in your own life before.

Those feelings are real and I do not want to minimize them.

And…

I cannot stop thinking about the people during WWII who had to stand in line for hours every day for a little bit of food. People who had ration cards and couldn’t bake with sugar or flour. Milk was scarce and often a single potato would serve as a meal for an entire family.

The Nazi’s occupied a good portion of Europe for YEARS. They literally came into family farms and took all of their animals and made them start growing potatoes or other crops that they didn’t even know how to grow. Then they would come and take most of the food and leave crumbs for the farmer and their family. They would move into nicer homes and set up their offices in people’s dining rooms. They did not pay or offer money. They expected the be fed and allowed to work and they were not kind when the family had needs or asked for the use of their own spaces.

Jewish people were rounded up by the truckloads and told they were being sent to work camps or on ships to another country that would offer them work. Sometimes these trucks and trains took them to concentration camps, sometimes they stopped in the middle of fields and proceeded to shoot everyone on board and bury them in mass shallow graves.

I think about Black soldiers who were drafted in the 70’s and forced to serve in the United States Military in Vietnam. They had to fight for a country that did not consider them to be equal citizens under the law. They had to fight for a country that did not really mourn their passing or celebrate their return. They fought because they had no choice and a lot of them died for a cause they did not believe in.

I think about Rosa Parks, who was only in her 40’s when she refused to give up her seat for a white woman and became a civil rights icon. One that a lot of people still hate. And all she was, was tired. Not just physically after a long day of work but emotionally after years of being treated as second-class to all of the white people around her. I live in a city with a Main Street named Rosa Parks BLVD that is also actively and daily passing racist legislation that will disproportionately affect Black communities while pretending to protect children from indoctrination. Make it make sense!

I think about the people in Rwanda in the 1990’s. 2 factions of indigenous tribes divided. Hutu’s and Tootsies. I think about the hundreds of thousands of people slaughtered in the streets and left in piles. Machetes cutting through the necks and hearts of women, children and men. All because they were told that being one type of person was better than the other and all of the problems of the world were because of one group of people.

I learned about scapegoats in high school. I remember specifically being taught that Hitler used this tactic to create a “common enemy” of the people and convinced them that Jewish people were the reason the country was struggling. Even if something is obviously untrue, people will go along with it if it means they can protect themselves. “Good” People turned on their neighbors so fast and even would just move into their homes after they were sent to death camps. We really do not know what we would do if it came down to it in many circumstances.

The world has always been a scary place. We do have a lot of things now that people didn’t have 100 years ago.

Women can have a bank account, run businesses and divorce their spouses. They couldn’t do those things before.

There are real fears about where we are headed now that He-who-must-not-be-named has been voted back into office.

I guess I am just saying that suffering is not new. We may be experiencing some dark times ahead. But I truly believe that we do not need to let it change who we are or who we can be. I believe that through kindness and education we can help people see that inclusion is the only way we all will be truly free. When we are taking care of the most vulnerable we are taking care of everyone. Trickle down economics has been demonstrated over and over again to be a false idea. But I do believe that Trickle UP equity is a real and powerful thing. When the “least of these” are free and have access to food, shelter and medical care, all of us will have those accesses. Plus we will learn how to get out of our own biases and see every person as a human being with a unique story.

We are definitely better together. I believe the work needs to be led by those of us who are willing to have uncomfortable conversations and lean into curiosity over fear.

We are not special. These times are tough, AND we can still build communities of safety and comfort for the most vulnerable. We must be willing to stand together.

I will not stop standing with you. I hope you will stand with me.

Sending love to you out there in the ether

Stef