The Ever-Changing River

on the danger of blanket statements and the lost ability to see the individual

We can know this truth about rivers: they are never the same body of water from one moment to the next. As the snowmelt rushes to fill them, as the rains fall and enter their fluid body, as gravity and currents guide them along their way over rock beds, cutting through the land, the river is never static. It is ever-changing and permeable. We can name a river for convenience, just as we name our children, but the Buffalo River is not the same as it was yesterday, and my parents’ daughter, Kateri, is not the same as she was when she woke up this morning. This truth gives me hope. 

One of the most debilitating cultural diseases of our time is what’s known as the blanket statement. We are all guilty of spreading it out across our laps at one time or another, when our insecurities propel us into labelling the object of our fears, and needing a little comfort to protect us. Usually it evolves from something that is different from our own beliefs, habits, appearances, preferences, our own perceived fixed identities. We make judgements about the “other” because “they’re just women; or they’re gay; they’re Muslim, Jewish, Christian, atheist; they’re Walmart shoppers, posh elites, smokers, vulgar loud mouths, obese, feminists, transgender, black, white trash, woke, welfare recipients, liberals, Republicans.” In other words, “they’re not like me.” Pick any kind of dehumanised label that we place on groups of people that we consider different from our own selves, and you’ve got yourself a blanket statement. This labelling can lead us to prejudice, the inability to see truth and reality, cruel behaviour and even violence. It also hinders us from making progress.

Most of us don’t make a habit of this. It’s a rare behaviour for us and it’s not extreme when it does occur, but I’m thinking that if you gave it consideration, you could probably come up with a blanket statement that has escaped your lips in the recent past. I know I can. But what I also know, what that truth about the ever-changing river tells me, is that there is a different way to look at the “other,” without having to change ourselves or our beliefs. It begins with understanding that we are not static. We are, all of us, capable of letting go of our fixed ideas and simply becoming curious about the possibility of ignoring the limiting stories and perceptions we have created about ourselves, and about others, and about anything that exists in the world. We are all capable of changing the way we regard and treat the other, even when we disagree with him or her.

There is a story that I once read about this very thing. It has to do with a Jewish couple, Michael and Julie Weisser, who moved to Lincoln, Nebraska, in the early ‘90s, and right away began receiving threatening calls from a member of the Ku Klux Klan. At first it terrified them. They called the police and were told it was probably a man named Larry Trapp. He was the Grand Dragon of the Klan in Lincoln, and was known as a man filled with hatred. The Jewish couple soon learned that he was also a man in a wheelchair, the result of injuries suffered in a beating years before. 

After enduring weeks of Larry Trapp’s calls, where he threatened them and their property if they didn’t leave Lincoln, Michael and Julie decided to try a different approach. The next time Trapp called them, at the end of his threats, Michael Weisser offered him a ride to the grocery store, because Michael knew Mr. Trapp had a hard time getting around. After some silence, Trapp refused the kindness. But the Weisser’s didn’t give up. They made similar offers each and every time Trapp called to harass them. Eventually they decided to pay Larry Trapp a visit; they brought him a home-cooked dinner––and ended up staying several hours while they talked and got to know one another better. Over time, Trapp changed his mind about his hateful beliefs and actions and renounced his affiliation to the Klan. He came to realise that his old habit of hating entire groups of people was based on fear, and imaginary threats from the“others.” And after he got to know the Weissers he decided to let go of his rigid perceptions. Larry Trapp and Michael and Sue Weisser became life-long friends; he died in their home after Sue cared for him during a long illness. Even the most entrenched kind of fears and hatred can be broken.

The question that I try to ask myself when I am feeling my thoughts become rigid is this: How can I see this person, or this group of people that I disagree with, with an open-mind and hear them in a way that is bigger, more open than my fixed ideas? How can I accept something different from myself, in a way that is not threatening to me and in a way that does not compromise my own beliefs? This is the hardest part. Because sometimes we do feel threatened, if not personally, then in our ideals. It’s not easy, but I believe it’s the only way we will ever begin to solve some of the problems our time and place is afflicted with.

Each and every time our fears kick in and we are confronted with the labelling of the “other” into a group that we set ourselves against, we have a choice. We can open ourselves to the reality that our way of thinking, looking, being in the world is not the only way and we can choose fluidity, or we can become even more rigid and closed, the dam that keeps the river from flowing . I want to choose fluidity. I don’t want to be the person who says, “I can’t stand all those pro-life protestors,” just because I’m fearful after I’ve heard about a few situations where certain pro-life protestors have committed violent acts. I 

It’s no different than watching Marjorie Taylor Green spew her stunted views in her well-branded and offensive way and think, wow, if all Republican women think like her, I don’t like Republican women. I use this example because she has been in the news again recently. There are examples a plenty from both sides of the political theatre madhouse, but Marjorie Taylor Green does the Republican party no favours, and I shudder to place her in the same “blanket” group called “Republican women” with the wise human being and class-act, Condoleezza Rice. And there you have it; one rotten egg cannot be allowed to putrefy the entire basket. If I don’t like how Marjorie Taylor Green acts, I can say “I don’t like how Marjorie Taylor Green acts,” and stop identifying her as a representative of anything other than her own self. There will always be Marjorie Taylor Greens out there, on every extreme side of any issue, but they are merely one measly drop in the otherwise big and plentiful sea. 

I think what happens, in my own experience, is that when I’m prone to make blanket statements, it is usually because somehow I feel threatened, or fearful of seeming wrong about something, and all of a sudden my focus becomes intensely narrowed. Instead of seeing a bigger picture, the walls start caving in and I’m going to fight with everything I’ve got to keep my walls rigid and standing. If I realise that I am reacting in this way, I try to quiet that rigidity. I want to soften those hard walls and see the huge blue sky rather than my own myopic view. I want to remember that I am always changing; everyone else and the whole world is, too. I need to be aware that the labels society has given to each and every thing under the sun are only convenient ways to compartmentalise and organise them, and that the qualities that make up those groups are always changing, also. And mostly, I need to remind myself to relate to people as individual human beings, not as a label. Our beliefs and ideologies, our race and nationality, sexual preferences and religions are secondary attributes to our humanity. We must each know when an issue is truly threatening to the well-being of others, and always stand up for what we believe in, but this rigid thinking that so dominates our society will be the demise of any school of thought, any way of being in the world. Fluid and permeable thinking can save us. We will never make progress until we learn to stop seeing one another under the blanket of a label instead of really seeing what we’re each all about. I have found that there is almost always some common ground.

We can know this about rivers: They are never the same body of water from one moment to the next. As the snowmelt rushes to fill them, as the rains fall and enter their fluid body, as gravity and current guide them over rock beds, cutting through the land, the river is never static. It is ever-changing and permeable. We are all capable of fluidity and change. This truth gives me hope.

---

Would love to read your thoughts.