These statements come from a place of privilege. For people who are not white, straight, able-bodied men, the personal is political. Your life might not have changed when Brett Kavanaugh was put into the highest court in the land, but many lives were.
I envy people who can watch the news or a sexist, transphobic TV show without even flinching. The sort of emotional turmoil that comes from being woke is an unbearable weight on the body and mind. My mom always asks me, "Do you have to make everything about gender?" But the thing is, everything is about gender because the world is a gendered place, and we're all paying for it.
They say that ignorance is bliss, and they might be right. But the first step of disrupting any system, is understanding the nuances of that system. That system being the patriarchy and how it uses binaries to control people and things. You see, the opposite of othering is not sameing, it's belonging.
Cameron Bailey was given an honorary degree at my graduation, and he spoke about his time at Western and what it means to belong. He explained how his time at Western was plagued by a professor who tried to validate the idea that Blacks were intellectually inferior, Asians were intellectually superior, and whites were conveniently right in the middle.
In this process of belonging, he talked about how stories build belonging. They are what connects us but they can also divide us. They can be a drawing on a cave wall or Nazi propaganda. I am thoroughly interested in using stories to unite people.
He ended his speech by saying: “We can’t call ourselves human if we can’t explain our existence through our stories. Stories are our most relevant analytical tool when facts are becoming less and less relevant. Facts don’t seem to be enough to combat hateful ideas but stories might just be able to do it. The more you deepen your understanding of the world we share, use your stories, belong.”
Watch his full speech:
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