To whom are we "The Other?"

Probably because of some of what I've been reading over the past few years, and, before that, the fundamentals of sociology course I took in college, and, especially, the way politics have been going both nationally and internationally, I've been thinking more and more about binaries. I don't particularly care for them although I can make choices when needed. Back in my college days, I came across a psychologist named Fritz Perls. He crafted what is know as the "Gestalt prayer."

I do my thing and you do your thing.
I am not in this world to live up to your expectations,
And you are not in this world to live up to mine.
You are you, and I am I,
and if by chance we find each other, it's beautiful.
If not, it can't be helped.
(Fritz Perls, "Gestalt Therapy Verbatim", 1969)

Simple concepts that many of us find hard to remember and even harder to live by. It depends on the existence of a you and an I. But, how does a Gestalt prayer fit with the Native American concept that the world, indeed, the universe, perhaps, is made up of each of us and "all my/our relations" [Lakota or Ojibwe].

Minnesota Goose Garden near Sandstone

Photo by J. Harrington

In sociology, "Otherness" is a fundamental concept. It is also a major theme in literature. So, it would seem that, depending on our cultural background, we may find ourselves focused on what makes us different or what we have in common. Is it clear how much either focus is a matter of choice? Not often nor entirely. It seems to me more like the emphasis on nature versus nurture.

Much of what we do is based on the kind of world we live in and the kind of people we live with, more so than on the kind of world we would like to live in and the kind of people we would like to live with. I know that, on an off day, when I try to envision living in a world full of people just like me, I shudder. I couldn't stand it. Not that I don't like myself, but that I've watched one too many times the "Dirty Harry" movie in which Clint Eastwood says "It takes a good man to know his limitations." Change, variety, unlikeness, other, is the spice of life, isn't it?

I don't have any clear answers to offer in today's ponderings. In fact, I'm not even sure I've got the questions right, or is it the right questions? I am sure that we need to transform our culture and, especially, our politics, into a celebration, rather than a condemnation, of our differences because the differences increase our options and are facets of that diamond, still in the rough, that is our common humanity. I think it was good old Ben Franklin who warned us "We must, indeed, all hang together or, most assuredly, we shall all hang separately."

A Ritual to Read to Each Other

By William E. Stafford

If you don't know the kind of person I am

and I don't know the kind of person you are

a pattern that others made may prevail in the world

and following the wrong god home we may miss our star.

For there is many a small betrayal in the mind,

a shrug that lets the fragile sequence break

sending with shouts the horrible errors of childhood

storming out to play through the broken dike.

And as elephants parade holding each elephant's tail,

but if one wanders the circus won't find the park,

I call it cruel and maybe the root of all cruelty

to know what occurs but not recognize the fact.

And so I appeal to a voice, to something shadowy,

a remote important region in all who talk:

though we could fool each other, we should consider—

lest the parade of our mutual life get lost in the dark.

For it is important that awake people be awake,

or a breaking line may discourage them back to sleep;

the signals we give — yes or no, or maybe —

should be clear: the darkness around us is deep.

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