Time to Say Good Bye to Bullying

at the personal and the political level

My brother once observed that people in our family are incapable of relationships that aren’t egalitarian.

I thought about it, and realized he was right. Over the years I’ve gotten to know people who feel that they can tell others what to do, or hold racist beliefs (which means they feel superior to some people), or talk down to people, or lie to achieve results.

Nope. For the most part, none of them are in my life now. And, if I meet people like this I tend to avoid them.

It just seems reasonable that we should all treat each other with respect and kindness, and realize that we will have differences. We can broaden our perspectives even when we disagree, and learn why people see things in a particular way.

It also makes me realize that I expect all relationships between any parties to be fair and respectful. And I believe the same same standard should apply to leaders of our nations in the western world as to people in our personal lives.

It seems to me that there is a huge sense of both superiority and entitlement in ordinary people and political leaders who show the repugnant traits I described earlier.

Both tend to vilify people they want something from. When I hear that a country’s leader is another Hitler, or wants to take over the world or something terrible like that, it’s a clue to me that our country or countries want to cause harm to the offending countries for reasons relating to getting access to money, resources or power. And they proceed with wars, coups, sanctions, etc. People get killed and countries get destroyed in this dirty game.

When someone in your life dehumanizes you for their own benefit, a clue to spotting people like this is seeing if they put others down in a dehumanizing way. There’s a big difference between brainstorming ways of solving problems with others, and saying malicious things about another person.

Lying goes hand in hand with manipulation. People or countries (or their mainstream media mouthpieces) who lie want to give a certain impression so that when they cause harm, it seems justified.

When I discover that I’ve been lied to, either by a person or by the media, I feel cheapened and used. When people or leaders of countries have good intentions they’re honest about what they’re up to. Their dealings with others are above board, and they make mutually beneficial agreements with other countries.

How do we recognize and counter these attitudes that have been so deeply ingrained in many of us and most western leaders? This has been done in so many ways, through everything from TV shows like Father Knows Best and GunSmoke to games like Settlers of Catan.

Babies just want to connect with others. They don’t care about people’s race, class, religion or any of the other things that people use as a reason to discriminate. This tendency has been taught. And it goes hand in hand with a mentality of wanting to win at all costs, giving one group an unfair societal advantage.

And I think that attitude is changing, at least at the cultural level. More and more, we’re realizing our interconnectedness, our dependence on nature and each other, and appreciating the peace of mind right relationship brings us.

It’s taking time to trickle up to our decision makers, but these things often do. The closer to the ruling class, the longer it takes, it seems.

Which may be why Israel and the USA leadership were both initially surprised that most ordinary people are appalled at the genocide Israel is committing and the USA and its allies are enabling. Their sense of superiority includes the belief that they’re above the rest of us, and that we will believe their lies, no matter how outrageous.

How do we speed up the process of deprogramming our countries’ leaders so that they understand that genocide is wrong? No one is so far above another a group of people that it’s acceptable to just kill them all, and steal their land.

Yes, that’s what was done in the past, but seeing it daily with our own eyes on social media sickens us. As it should. And as societies, we owe the people who were destroyed, enslaved, massacred and stolen from big time. How do we even begin?

Here in Canada, maybe we can start by listening to this podcast series that combines environmentalism with indigenous wisdom and is highly recommended by the David Suzuki Foundation. Understanding is the first step towards undoing racism.

As for our leaders, we can keep up the protests, boycotts and other actions we’ve been taking to let them know how much we object to this genocide, and find ways to escalate our actions. And at election time we can vote them out and try to find people to represent us who uphold our values.

Unfortunately, bullying is a way of life, especially in the realm of politics, both national and international. On a personal level, it’s unacceptable. And in politics it should be even more so.

The new millennium demands better, and it’s time we and our leaders stepped up.