We Need to Know This
We Need to Know This
(by Tirien Angela Steinbach, exec. director of the East Bay Community Law Center, Berkeley, CA)
We got here because of fear and hate and anger – powerful motivators. They drive our economy, our media, our consumption culture, and our laws.
We need to know this.
We got here because of the continued legacy of bigotry motivated by power – real and imagined, held and craved. When people have privilege – even a thin thread of it – equity feels like oppression, and people will clutch that thread so tight even as it cuts them to the bone.
We need to know this.
We got here because we have been fed on a steady diet of spectacle and cynicism and braggadocious bigoted bullies and fear-mongering megalomaniacs and “reality” TV that has created a Grand Canyon-sized cultural divide in our country.
We need to know this.
We got here because we have stripped resources from public education, housing, healthcare, jobs, economic opportunities and forsaken sane and compassionate immigration policies – all of which are required to build a just society.
We need to know this.
We got here because our legal and political systems were designed to protect the status quo and to defend the financial interests of the 1%. Even as we fight to “level the playing field” and increase “access to justice,” we need to recognize the fundamental fact that in our history thus far, law and politics have more often been a barrier or bludgeon than a bridge for most people, especially those pushed to our margins.
We need to know this.
I am still reeling – not from shock but from the unfiltered, raw and naked reality of what we have wrought as a nation. I have not cried because I am too busy trying to breath, too close to drowning in the deep sea of racism and sexism and xenophobia and homophobia and fear and hate and anger that has led to this day. I can’t yet wrap my brain around what this will mean – for the Supreme Court, for the government, for the country, for our communities, for our families. I can’t yet take comfort in some of the local and statewide victories – the reminders that progress is possible.
We need to know this too, but I am not there yet.
I am not planning my exodus to Canada or Costa Rica. I am not curled up in fetal position under my comforter even though that is where I want to be right now. I am at work with the remarkable people of the East Bay Community Law Center, because we have work to do. We ALL have work to do. And the work will be harder and scarier and more urgent and necessary than ever.
We need to know this.
We need to fight for people and communities and still work to change lives and laws. We need to call out cultural and racial and economic inequality ALL THE TIME. We need to run towards the discomfort that is necessary for meaningful and lasting change and growth – the discomfort of recognizing the ways we are complacent or unwilling to make space for true inclusion and equity. We need to ask ourselves each day, “what am I doing today to create a more just and compassionate community?” (And, as important, “what am I NOT doing – because of apathy that preserves existing hierarchies that benefit me and prevent true progress?”) We need to be creative and messy and hopeful and committed and focused and inspired as we work to change the dynamics of power and privilege in our society.
We need to know this.
We need to align our own intentions and our impacts, and demand this of our institutions. We need to love and support each other and treat people with dignity and respect. We need to be brave in the face of fear and compassionate in the face of anger, including our own. I don’t know how we will do this, but I think that we are prepared for the work ahead… And I still believe that it starts with love – love that looks like justice.
We need to know this.