HOW YOU do something is just as important as what you do. Recent events in American politics, particularly the closest presidential election in history, suggest that Americans are more divided and agnostic than ever about whether to consider themselves Democrats or Republicans, whether they favor a liberal or conservative outlook. This space is far too short to attempt to argue for one side over the other. I want to consider the way most of us go about thinking about politics, rather than what we conclude after such thought.
Most people approach their decision-making by asking themselves, "what's best for me?" Most of us, in some form or another, focus on ourselves and on our own interests in an isolating and selfish way. We conceive of our interests as distinct from the interests of human beings in general, sometimes even in opposition to the general interest.
Politics is shortsighted and self-centered. People generally only think about politics in terms of their own lives. They make decisions as residents of a particular area, as members of a specific social or ethnic group, as persons of a given economic status or occupation, or as pursuers of a certain agenda - not just as people.
Many older people, for example, are disgruntled about having to pay high property taxes - which go almost entirely to fund local school systems - because they don't have any school-age children. They don't understand why their taxes should fund something they don't use. Millions of people gripe about having to pay income taxes. "What has the government ever done to help me?" they ask. They miss the point entirely because they separate their own interests from those of everyone else and pursue only the former.
The cause of this pervasive and unjustified mindset is a deep-seated one, embedded in our culture and in our conception of our identities. It is the problem of otherness: the way we perceive others as separate, detached, distinguished from ourselves. Even the term "others" reveals this unconscious preoccupation with differences.
We focus, most of the time, on the things that distinguish and separate us from each other - as individuals, groups, cultures and nations. We talk and think in terms of categories - race, gender, social status, appearance, personality, or behavior - that focus on the ways we differ from each other. Difference is what's interesting to us, what's notable. No one talks or thinks in terms of similarities. By stressing otherness, we fragment our conception of the world. We think of it as a combination of independent individuals rather than as a unified, social collection of people.
This preference for otherness helps explain how selfishness, cruelty, hatred and exploitation occur. By focusing on differences, by seeing those with whom we interact as "others," we stop seeing them as human beings. We stop identifying with them, stop imagining what their perspective or their life is like and instead focus only on our own. Once we stop recognizing our connectedness, we begin to treat people as mere means to an end instead of as ends in themselves.
Then, we become comfortable doing things to each other that shock the imagination. Scan through the pages of history, even just that of this century alone. Two world wars, the atomic bomb, the Holocaust, unquantifiable ethnic and racial hatred and violence, genocide, torture - these are merely the headliners, the tip of the proverbial iceberg. Only the fact that these things do happen convinces us that they ever could.
How could anyone ever do such things to his or her fellow human being? Even worse, how could anyone take pleasure in or be proud of such acts? These horrors become possible because of otherness, because of our trained tendency to put on moral blinders and zoom in on only one part of the picture - the part containing Number One.
Combating our ingrained predisposition for otherness won't be easy. But we must start to shift our focus away from that default. We have more in common than we think. No matter how different we perceive ourselves to be, we share something more powerful and compelling: the simple bond of our common humanity. Each and every person is more like you than unlike you simply because he or she is human. Life is not an individualistic experience - it's a social, shared one.
So while we can disagree on the conclusions we reach when we make decisions, we can - and should - agree on the way we reach them. Make decisions with broad, general human interests in mind, not just your own interests. Support liberalism or conservatism, whichever you prefer. But do so because you think it's what's best in general, not because you think it's just what's best for you.
Recognize your membership in the human race. Appreciate similarities. Acknowledge and support the bond you share with every other person on this earth, no matter how different they may seem. Remember that we are trained to look for differences, to separate and distinguish. Make an effort, instead, to focus on what brings us together. Fight against otherness.
(Bryan Maxwell's column appears Wednesdays in The Cavalier Daily.)
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