To Be a “We” Again (Musing)

To date, no other political news has affected me as deeply as the SCOTUS verdict repealing Roe v. Wade released on Friday.

Along with every other American who has experienced these past 31 years, I’ve witnessed a number of dissentious and divisive political scenes and events.

Certainly not the most dissentious or divisive of any events in America’s history. This nation has weathered periods of incredible political upheaval in its relatively short 300+ year lifespan thus far.

However, the last years have sorely taxed the fabric of our country.

Concerning the issue itself: I have a lot of thoughts on abortion. I wouldn’t agree unanimously with “either side” on the ways they think about and portray what abortion is and means. But teasing out those ideologies is not the purpose of this post.

What makes my heart heavy today is watching “each side’s” responses both to the news itself and towards each other.

Hey, everyone? I’ll ask each of you to do one thing today. Please listen to something the “other side” is saying. And as you listen, do not take notes for the purpose of strengthening your hatred and ammunition. Please – please do your best to empathize, even for just a moment, with the person behind the rhetoric and principles with which you don’t agree. Hear their words. Feel their emotions. Listen for their fears and hopes and dreams.

David French (make any necessary assumptions about my political leanings, character, and personhood here based on your opinion of David French if you must) has made a strong case for the essential nature of “pluralism” in upholding a democracy. Multiple points of view – even vastly different political beliefs – MUST exist and MUST be able to be shared in an effective, respectful, communal forum in order for this country to survive and move forward.

If both sides were willing, even for a moment, to reconsider what it might look like for us to come to the table and hear each other out, there might yet be hope for America to achieve the things it set out to do.

To date, it has failed pretty miserably and comprehensively at making those dreams possible for everyone. I understand that. Our legacy thus far paints the picture of a limping, war-stained, injustice-stained, hubris-driven, mistakes-filled past that has not yet achieved for its whole population anything it has ever promised or hoped for.

But I think we could still take the pieces we have and turn them into something beautiful. Something truly good. I think we could get there.

And if we continue on our polarized, us v. them course, there will soon be no “we” to speak of.

-LS

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