Dear dominate culture humans,
– yes that means you, white & cis people (especially you, white-cis-males), you are representative of the main cultural lens of our shared Western society. I’m not blaming you, nor am I shaming you, we are just talking about facts. The fact is that all things pass through this lens, meaning thatdemographic is the litmus of acceptability. It is the yardstick of normalicy. Meaning that *our* culture is (in some shape or form) represented in the majority of media, the majority of society, and as the majority rule. Meaning that *you* are able to sit at a cafe table, in middle-of-the-road clothing, in any Western country, and pass as almost invisible. That is an amazing privilege, to be so representative of what is normal, that you blend in almost anywhere to the extent that you don’t really exist. What a delightfully free and relaxing experience.
Now — yes, yes — that is quite ableist of me, and it isn’t taking into account the spectrum of social stratification within the dominant culture, though even when we adjust the above statement for such stratification we are still presented with the power of privilege that comes from the dominant culture. Largely we are able to mask those differences, and if (through an overt identifier) we are unable to ‘hide in plain sight’, we are still holding place in the unfolding list of otherness (meaning anyone who deviates from the perceived cultural norm) with whiteness featuring heavily in our benefit.
What does that mean though? Any why am I talking to you about it?!?
Well, it means that this is *our* area. Think about it, it literally means that. It means that ‘we people’ dominate this area of the planet, that we cultivate the status-quo here, and that we have held power for significantly long enough that all of this appears to be ‘just the way it is’. So it is — again no blame, no shame. No difference in how dominant culture works when sitting at a cafe in London than sitting at one in Tokyo, that is how it works, majority rule.
- Caveat — when I say *our* area I don’t mean nationalistic pride, or ethnostate nonsense, fuck that. I simply mean predominant demographic, with no connotation of purpose, superiority or value-over-others implied.
I often find (meaning that I often read) dominant culture peoples getting prickly and defensive when their power and privilege is brought up. That is not my intention not at all, I mean look at me (literally look at my profile photo) — I’m right at the top of the list of who got lucky by birth. I know this. But what does it mean?
That is what is meant when we talk about privilege, it is the ability to belong FIRST AND FOREMOST, with all other things coming AFTER belonging to the dominant culture. It means being afforded the ability to blend in, and to be taken as belonging on face-value, regardless of who you actually are.
Ok, OK — but what does that mean, and what do you want?!?
I would like to suggest that we have a wonderful opportunity, one that is tied into the concept of privilege. I would like to suggest that we become gracious, that we acknowledge the history of how we got here (literally here in genealogy, migration, imperialism) and that we give up a little on rehearsing (and reinforcing) that narrative.
I think we should aim to become small, to become less as a consequence of joining with a larger demographic within the 7.5 billion of us here. Quite different to become wonderfully almost insignificant amongst the vastness of humanity vs. being almost invisible within *your* culture.
Having had the privilege of existing through the dominant lens it would be rather nice if you took some time to understand other lenses, other perspectives, other experiences of other people… not ‘others’, none of that — just other people, who may or may not happen to look/speak/love/act/think/believe like you.
In this way I believe that we can become small, that we can become humbled by the magnitude of history and culture that is all around us. Literally, all a-round us on this planet.
We live in a wonderful time, the internet offers all kinds of access to research papers, to lectures, to documentaries, to forums, to books — audiobooks even.
The thing is, if you don’t take some of your OWN time to learn about the rest of the world, about the rest of humanity, then you can’t really expect other people to do the work for you. It is uniformly-rude to just ask people of different groups to inform you of their experience — there are many, many people from all kinds of groups who have taken it upon themselves to create information for you to consume, and they do so with the express intention of making themselves heard, understood and appreciated. These things exist so that we might come to understand each other more, so that we might come to acknowledge and welcome each other more.
Please – respect the work that people have done, take some time to read and research the great lengths that wonderful humans have taken in order to explore, and explain, some of the most vibrant and interesting matters about our shared existence. You have spent so long, perhaps up until this very moment, entrenched in the dominant culture of your birth — I humbly suggest that you spend time wading into the depths that exist just past your comfort-zone.
If you don’t do this then that is OK, it is your time, your life, your choice — we all have choices… but, if you don’t then I would respectfully suggest that you should. Not that you must, or that you will be made, but that you should — because if you don’t then you are missing out.
I challenge you: measure the distance from where you are to the experience of someone from another culture. How far is it? Is it next door to you? Is it in your town? Is it in the bigger city? Meditate on that distance, what does it mean that someone unlike you is so very close to you (relatively speaking)? Pay particular attention to the thoughts that arise, especially to the thoughts that you edit — here the specific invitation reveals itself — seek understanding based upon that arising thought.
I wonder what language they speak? I wonder what their food tastes like? I wonder what music they make? I wonder about their faith? I wonder about their culture…
Knowledge is power, and power is an odd thing indeed. If you have ever felt disempowered, or subject to having your power challenged then reading about why that might be happening is an excellent thing to do. Similarly if you can comprehend how someone else may feel disempowered, or unrepresented then reading (or researching) how that might be is a loving act. It is also an exciting way to expand yourself.
It might just make you feel better, or at least more able to relate — that would be what is currently being referred to as intersectional inclusivity — adopting a perspective that acknowledges and gives value to experiences outside of yours as a pathway to gaining a greater understanding of experience itself.
So why the lethal part of this headline? How are we causing harm by not pushing outside of our own narrative and being more inclusive? Because we dominate the shared-cultural narrative, and collectively we contribute to how that unfolds — thusly we must take responsibility for the consequences of the status-quo, and how it impacts those we share our experiences with.
Broadening our own horizons lends itself to breaking larger social trends that cause harm.
Some examples below:Very Low Birthweight in African American Infants: The Role of Maternal Exposure to Interpersonal…Objectives. We determined whether African American women’s lifetime exposure to interpersonal racial discrimination is…www.ncbi.nlm.nih.govWhy America’s Black Mothers and Babies Are in a Life-or-Death CrisisW hen Simone Landrum felt tired and both nauseated and ravenous at the same time in the spring of 2016, she recognized…www.nytimes.com‘Unconscious’ Racial Bias Among Doctors Linked To Poor Communication With Patients, Dissatisfaction…Primary care physicians who hold unconscious racial biases tend to dominate conversations with African-American…www.medicalnewstoday.comFacts About Suicide – The Trevor ProjectSuicide is the 2nd leading cause of death among young people ages 10 to 24.1 LGB youth seriously contemplate suicide at…www.thetrevorproject.org