"The constant assertion of belief is an indication of fear." - Krishnamurti
I see this everywhere.
Ideas become ideologies become identities.
An idea looks at something that's happened and says, "I wonder if that might mean ______. Hrmm. Maybe."
An ideology looks at something that's happened and says, "That absolutely means ______."
An identity looks at something that's happened and says, "Anyone who doesn't agree that this happening means _______ is the enemy."
It starts with an idea, a possibility worthy of consideration, but, if a great deal of care isn't taken, that idea becomes an ideology. It moves from consideration to conviction.
And it seems like the finest idea. It feels strong. But, it's actually a feeling of constant fear and anger. Ideologies only become harder, more rigid and ossified over time. They lose any suppleness to them. The people carrying them become increasingly uptight and intolerant. They become become strident. No matter what conversation you bring up, it finds its way into this topic.
I recall talking about #BlackLivesMatter with someone I knew who was a dogmatic vegan and somehow... we were suddenly talking about factory farms.
I recall sharing with a fundamentalist new age friend my wonderings if there ever was an historical Jesus and her immediate, emotional, vehement response that she knew there had been because he wrote The Course in Miracles.
This is rampant in the activist world. There are certain ideas that, should you even deign to question them, it will be your entire reputation that is in question. Even asking the question will end with you on the floor, your clothing in tatters and with the clear message that those wonderings are not welcome there.
Ideologies concretized until there's no capacity to listen to any other perspectives.
Convictions are celebrated like they're some great accomplishment. We wear them as badges of honour until people mistake them for nametags and, suddenly, it's how we're referred to. And we feel so proud whenever someone calls our name. But a conviction is a piece of plate mail armour. If we have enough of them, we're untouchable. Nothing can get in. We're protected.
But from what?
The armour might be fine for fighting, and certainly there is a time and a place for that, and, perhaps, these are those times. But sometimes the armour is too much and it gets in our way. It makes us slow and clumsy.
Convictions are the end of learning. They are the end of curiousity. We already know.
An elder I have studied with once said, "If you've got a conviction, burn that shit. Make tea over it." As he, again and again, pointed us away from the easy road of already knowing towards the harder road of a more fluid path of learning.
As the good Caroline Casey says, "Believe nothing. Entertain possibilities."
If we let them, ideologies can, with surprising speed, become identities. And then it becomes us against them.
"Are you a _________?" they will ask.
And it becomes a 'yes' or 'no' answer. There's no quibbling here. You either are or you aren't. Their eyes will narrow and they will wait. If you aren't with them, you are against them. If you don't define that word the way they do and if you aren't willing to tattoo it on your arm, you must not be one of them. Are you friend or enemy?
But identities based on ideologies are different than place-based, tribal identities. These are identities based on abstractions which we imagine have always been true, will always be true and are true everywhere now. Indigenous identities tend to have a certain fluidity and suppleness to them as do what we might call their ideologies.
Once an identity is created, there's a certain amount of blindness and deafness that occurs. I've seen people presented with incontrovertible proof that the ideologies they've based their identities on are wrong... and still they won't budge. They become checkmated with logic and yet still, they can't let go of their identity.
Because they are terrified.
If they let go of that ideology and identity then... who are they? How will they stay safe in the world? They know that their social status is based on how well they uphold and spread their ideology. If they are seen speaking and defending it, they rise in status. If they are seen as silent or questioning it, they fall in status.
Ideas turn into ideologies turn into identities.
You can always tell when it's an ideology by the level of fear they seem to have around it all and by how urgently and vehemently they work to convince you that they are right. And this is how the conversion game begins. People in ______ group are more worthy than people in ______ group and so, to save their soul and the world, I must convert them. We do this to each other all the time.
When we encounter this in others, it's good to remember that they aren't an asshole, they're just terrified. They're trying to be a good person. They're trying to keep themselves and the world safe. They're trying to belong somewhere.
And so the response to others, it seems to me, is to be informed by this deeper understanding of what's going on - like a road sign telling you to slow down - and, in the words of Hale Makua, "Love them even more."
That love might take the form of clear boundaries.
It might take the form of listening and seeing if you can stand still enough inside yourself so that the terrified, wild animal inside them can approach you to see if you are safe, to sit next to them, instead of across from them, so that you can try to see the world as they see it. Empathy and human candour does more to help ideologies crumble than just about anything.
Shaming people for their dogmatism only seems to entrench it and reaffirm the core fear that underwrites it. They are terrified. We all are when we build an identity around our convictions.
The best response we can give to these ones is to create a world in which they and those like them would never have a reason to be afraid.
And the response to this in ourselves, is to see if we can slow down and begin to question the conviction, dogma and ideology. Not to try to get rid of it (in order to protect our identity as a 'good, open-minded person'). Just to question it. This is immensely hard work. The goal, if there is one, is to keep becoming more and more supple and clear seeing; to avoid being stuck in seeing the world through only one lens but to be informed by a multiplicity of lenses. It means confronting the fear that, if you were to question your ideologies, that you would stop doing anything useful for the world.
Throw your identities and ideologies into the cauldron and boil them back to what they wanted to be, a community of useful ideas offering themselves to you so that you might become wiser by your capacity to see the world in so many different ways and from so many different points of view.
Believe nothing. Entertain possibilities.
Reading your posts make me realize how much I miss these kinds of conversations. I asked my son once what was the best part of my parenting and he said, "you were fluid." Somewhat alarmed as I had always striven to be consistent, he explained, "whenever we had a situation, you did not teach us to fall back on something we knew. Instead, you had us consider the situation, what was at hand, and develop a solution for that particular situation."
Entertain possibilities. For me, anything else feels stuck.
Shaming people is terrible. Maslow posited that people act out not because of issues, but rather because of lack of having their needs met. Indeed, I have found that when people get their basic needs met, including those of being honored and loved, they transform. Easier with children than adults though!
The ability to hold a new information and examine it even if it doesn't fit your thought framework- or your box - is how we are able to think creatively and flexibly!
This is why thoughts, art, books, movies, music that are innovative have the capacity to confuse or create controversy-
they don't fit into my box of understanding, the information isn't formatted in a way my system needs to see it, therefore they don't match my identity, therefore I reject them, and maybe are angered by them because they challenge me.
So maybe the key is not making your identity be your thinking, but your values and actions?
And then there is just something in us as humans- we crave a simple story, black or white makes us feel we own the information, and at our worst we take this thinking to actions- flag waving and us vs them positioning ..
Love these Tad thanks!! -Tina