Unimaginable tragedy occurs every single day on this vast planet. Lives are lost, families are torn apart, nations mourn. The headlines buzz, placing emphasis on the tragedy of white lives lost, and the inevitability of people of color dead from violence. Our history classes have taught us that this is how we value lives, and our prejudices reinforce it. In-between the tragedies of human life lost to terror and war and our inability to act in the deadly face of climate change, there are less notorious acts of violence. This violence is everywhere. It permeates the youngest minds as they act out scenes they have seen on television about suicide missions and gun fights. It seeps from societies carved out of centuries of fighting, where the name of the land changes, but the people within it harbor generations of resentment, revenge, and rage against the white man who conquered their land and then tossed it aside as if it was his birth right, against the army across the water who raped and murdered their women and children in the name of honor, against the neighbor down the street who's religious sect is in conflict with ones own. The violence is written into social norms as women are beaten by their husbands and authorities turn a blind eye, as payment is demanded in the form of bricks thrown after a slur was shouted, as children fight with knives and bystanders proclaim "boys will be boys." Violence is cemented into laws as murders by police are seen as necessary, as children are beaten at school for being late to class, as guns are defended more fiercely than the lives of kindergarteners.
Violence is cyclical. It continues on, back and forth, round and round, as vengeance is sought for each act. It moves down through the generations. Children are taught its value, and they see they have nothing as valuable to use against it but violence itself. It intertwines with power above all else, tightening the bond between the two and the perpetrator so it seems that only greater violence can sever the ties. Violence is taught. It is taught in fairytales, in cartoons, in families, and in schools. It is taught by fathers and their belts, mothers and their hands, teachers and their sticks, peers and their knives, people and their guns, and governments and their armies. It is taught by hate spat from lips void of compassion. For most children, it is inescapable. And then, the cycle continues.
I sit in my head. Paralyzed by the compilation of violence I have encountered. Paralyzed because this violence is new. We become accustomed to the violence of our own country. As Americans, we are upset by the daily gun deaths, but we now expect the tragedy in the news of another school shooting. We are outraged by the racist violence perpetrated by many police officers, but as we watch a confrontation unfold we know what to look for, pulling out our cell phones to document any travesty. We protest the hate speech and assault that becomes common as populations stand up to the discrimination they face daily, but we anticipate it. This, it seems, is the way things are, and one day we hope our actions will creating lasting change, but for now our tattered psyche's are balancing between hope and anticipation.
Here, I sit in my head. Reconciling the outrage I feel at the violence I encounter in my new home for the knowledge that I come from a country filled with it's own devastating and permeating violence. Violence that reaches far beyond the shores that flank it. Wanting to shout at those responsible for the death of 7 students and the injury of 120 more being driven in the back of a truck that should only be used for cattle twenty years after a law banned the practice following another tragedy. But turning with grief to my own countries inability to prevent nearly weekly school shootings from occurring after twenty years of debate following Columbine.
The expansion of my world view that has come from living here is not just about seeing how the less privileged live. It is about recognizing that every country has a vast and rich history, filled with conflicts, enemies, and allies. Encompassed by internal struggles amidst global events. It is seeing that the individuals living within the territory lines drawn by politics are products of their environment, socialized to their own worldview, but struggling with the same emotions and philosophical questions.
But who is to stand up for the persecuted? The oppressed? The victimized? The powerless?
How can we stand in protest without using violence to proclaim our own power? How close to home must the problem be before we make our own voice heard? Where does the cycle of violence end and actions of peace and diplomacy begin? And in those moments the argument that violence must occur, wins, how is it minimized to prevent tragedy? When you fight fire with fire, everyone is scared from the burns. Who will be the first to step across the line and offer help to heal their enemy.
Amidst the constant, overwhelming, suffocating acts of violence permeating our lives, where do we begin?
