I Stand With Humanity

I often get annoyed and frustrated with the way the media shapes what we care about at any given time. Right now it is “Free Palestine”. Before that it was “I stand with Ukraine”, before that it was “Stay safe, get vaccinated”, before that it was “Get rid of Trump”, before that it was “Black lives Matter.” And on and on it goes. It annoys me to no end to be told what to care about. And then social media creates a sort of hive mind that, if you’re not touting the same thing, you’re cancelled or censored. It’s so infuriating to me. There are so many things to care about at any given time. There is no “one thing” that should be cared about more than another. There are children, every day, being tortured and sold into sex slavery. There are children, every day, mining cobalt in the Congo that is fueling the so called “Green Revolution.” There are children being molested and abused every day, domestically, and otherwise. Right now, there are children in Palestine dying every day. There are children in Africa dying every day. There are children dying everywhere, every day. There are children in each of our communities suffering from abuse and domestic violence. None of these examples are “worse” than the other. There is no hierarchy of horrors. They are all terrible, and this list is (obviously) not exhaustive. There are the millions of people dying of hunger as we speak. All of this is heart-breaking. All of this is worth caring about. And all of these are unspeakable truths in our world.

Do you ever notice how we are always encouraged (or forced, or coerced) to “take a side”? And that one side is always “better” than the other, so we had better be careful which side we choose? Does it make us feel better about ourselves to take a side? It must soothe the ego in some way.

However, instead of taking a side, what if we all stood beside our fellow brothers and sisters? What if we all simply stood with humanity? No one deserves to be left out. No one is better than another. There is bad behavior, yes, and bad behavior needs to be held accountable. But in the end, we are all brothers and sisters, and we have more in common than we have differences. And our differences should be celebrated. Abuse, killing, violence, should not be tolerated, ever. And yet these things happen over and over again each and every day.

For me, I stand with humanity. I stand with the souls of all beings on this planet. I stand in peace, I stand in truth, I stand in freedom, I stand in love. I will not fall into the trap of hating the other, simply because I do not understand their perspective. May all perspectives be respected, and honored for their unique and important contribution to life, to the world, to the pursuit of knowledge and truth. May all perspectives be free to change, as new information is presented, so that there continues to be more and more clarity as we strive to come closer to the truth. May we all stand together in peace, and in love.

Amen.