Response: "Other"
Here's another quote from my calendar:
"The 'otherising' of women is the oldest oppression known to our species, and it's the model, the template, for all other oppressions." ~ Robin Morgan, Sisterhood is Powerful scribe
While I hesitate to call the otherising of women the oldest, seeing as I don't want to presume on human history, I could say, yes, 'otherising' is definitely the model for oppressing others.
To make someone the Other is to make them different - since difference frightens the normal human, the proper reaction is to attempt to make this Other inferior, so that there is an excuse for oppression and imposition of one's own ideals. Making someone else the Other, and hence inferior, also gives one a sense of control - "I am the True One, they are the Other and must be made True, or close to it."
As a child from a colonized country and having studied my own history (Yes, you little Malaysian runts, I liked Malaysian history), I understand being an "Other". The British made Others of the Malays, Chinese and Indians, even to each other. Even today we see each other as Others, even though we don't care to admit it (that's why affirmative action is in place).
When I came here to Canada, I was the Other as well, and hung out with other Others until it became quite apparent due to my language skills and thought-patterns that I was not quite so Other.
It is the idea of Otherising that makes so many people forget that we are all, in the end, human.
But what do we do? The idea of the "us" and "them" makes people so comfortable, they sit in their comfort zones and forget to acknowledge one another until their neglect of understanding turns into fear which breeds hatred.
It takes so much effort to care about the world, because there's so much to care about. It's just easier to dismiss the rest of the world - it's someone else's problem, it doesn't concern me. That's a kind of oppression too - failure to take action against oppression breeds even more oppression.
If we recognize we are all someone else's Other deep down inside, what then? Do we feel adrift from the rest of the world? The rest of humanity? Do we not have one common shard deep inside, that even though we are all Others, perhaps - perhaps it's the Otherness we each and all individually own that we have in common?
Are we such an Other then?
"The 'otherising' of women is the oldest oppression known to our species, and it's the model, the template, for all other oppressions." ~ Robin Morgan, Sisterhood is Powerful scribe
While I hesitate to call the otherising of women the oldest, seeing as I don't want to presume on human history, I could say, yes, 'otherising' is definitely the model for oppressing others.
To make someone the Other is to make them different - since difference frightens the normal human, the proper reaction is to attempt to make this Other inferior, so that there is an excuse for oppression and imposition of one's own ideals. Making someone else the Other, and hence inferior, also gives one a sense of control - "I am the True One, they are the Other and must be made True, or close to it."
As a child from a colonized country and having studied my own history (Yes, you little Malaysian runts, I liked Malaysian history), I understand being an "Other". The British made Others of the Malays, Chinese and Indians, even to each other. Even today we see each other as Others, even though we don't care to admit it (that's why affirmative action is in place).
When I came here to Canada, I was the Other as well, and hung out with other Others until it became quite apparent due to my language skills and thought-patterns that I was not quite so Other.
It is the idea of Otherising that makes so many people forget that we are all, in the end, human.
But what do we do? The idea of the "us" and "them" makes people so comfortable, they sit in their comfort zones and forget to acknowledge one another until their neglect of understanding turns into fear which breeds hatred.
It takes so much effort to care about the world, because there's so much to care about. It's just easier to dismiss the rest of the world - it's someone else's problem, it doesn't concern me. That's a kind of oppression too - failure to take action against oppression breeds even more oppression.
If we recognize we are all someone else's Other deep down inside, what then? Do we feel adrift from the rest of the world? The rest of humanity? Do we not have one common shard deep inside, that even though we are all Others, perhaps - perhaps it's the Otherness we each and all individually own that we have in common?
Are we such an Other then?