Thanks for your kind words and I hope the appointment went well
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You're welcome, and thank you. :)
Now, I consider myself the opposite of a chauvinist, in fact I don't really believe in nations. We are all different and it's a good, interesting thing, but in the end we're just humans on the same planet, citizens of the world.
You are certainly not alone in believing in human beings' inherent citizenship of this entire planet. I think one of the reasons we fail to be proper stewards of the earth is because we are entrained to care only for “our” corner of it – and to ignore (when we're not actively hating) the good majority of the rest of it. We are also perhaps entrained to form an identity, which actually necessitates the eclipsing and “othering” of anyone else with differences (from “us”). That goes for nationalism, for ableism, for sexism, for racism, and you could probably think of a few more “ism's” as well. And never forget “classism”, either.
That said, objectively speaking, Ancient Greece was indeed a "jewel upon the world" as you put it, arguably the most important and influential civilization in history. Modern Greece? It may sound harsh, but I'd consider it an example of how not to build a society. It hasn't been all our fault, we've had occupations (Ottomans, Nazis) etc., but for roughly 200 years now we've been playing catch up with the western world, and it has been sloppy and in all the wrong ways.
I think the wrong thing for me to do would be to tell you how to “fix” your own country – even if I knew. But do you think it would be good, if not great, if Alexander could come back to life?
Anyway, sorry about that, I could go on and on, but it's tiresome, especially for someone who isn't Greek. With the crisis and the depression we've been dealing with, every other conversation here is about economics, the closest thing to a rock star we've had recently was the former minister of finance :P
Wow, I was in Thessaliniki during one of your elections, and I remember seeing what looked like a bar patio, filled with people, all of them talking with each other, and the big-screen patio TV showing the election candidates; this happened in Kelli as well, and I said, y'all don't have sports bars here – you have “election bars”....lol. Every home I went to had the candidates on the television. The people seemed excited and involved. But that's just an outsider's perception. I can tell you one thing: all the big-screen TV's in the bars here are showing football or baseball – no politics. I really had the sense that the people of Greece have got it going on when it comes to public discourse.
* Changing the subject. From what you've said so far I get the impression that you're a feminist, advocating for women's rights etc.
***Jumping ahead a little to what you talk about above, and also your paragraph below:***
I used to think feminists were too angry. I also used to think atheists were too angry. And I used to think black people were really angry. And I was a person who got turned off by people's anger; I found it intimidating. And being intimidated was a sign to myself that it was somehow then “OK” for me to stop listening to whatever people were trying to tell me.
My listening was thus conditional; my understanding had a price. But observe: it was ***me*** who was setting those terms; it was me requiring that oppressed people should make MY comfort their priority, before they could even begin to speak to me. Put yourself in any of their places. Wouldn't you be angry, too?
If you broke your leg in the street, yelling in pain, and the ambulance pulls up and the attendants say, “Now, we're not going to do a single thing to start helping until you lower your tone, Mister...” - wouldn't that make you just blow your stack? What if it happened every time you needed someone to listen? Like, every, single, time?
I'll just say this:
There is nothing that begins to abate a person's anger more effectively than to show that you are really listening. I can almost guarantee this. And as you listen, you'll begin to hear real pain – pain that has been made so much worse from not having been heard in the past.
Before I really began trying to publicly step up to the plate to push back against misogyny, I entered the field of helping in the disabled community. As an able-bodied person, I'd given little, if any thought, to the barriers that people with disabilities face when trying to move about in public society. I spot some of these barriers now, pretty much every day (and the province of Ontario is really pushing for 100% accessibility), but having said that, I can never really know the perspective of a person who uses a wheelchair all of their lives. But. I can listen, and I can advocate for them when and where I can – most especially if I am asked to do so. People in the disabled community also advocate and speak very well for themselves – and so sometimes advocacy is all about listening to people who are experts in their own lives – and hearing them when they express what they need from others in order to thrive in society – as opposed to able-bodied persons telling THEM how to “fix” their lives.
I couldn't tell how active you are, but that's the sense I'm getting. I don't know if a man can be one, but I consider myself a feminist too. Admittedly, not a particularly active one, but in the same way that I was saying that I don't believe in nations, I think gender, sex orientation, race, creed, etc., are not reasons for any inequality.
You and I have talked about how women can and do participate in misogyny and rape culture, and I gave you my opinion for their motivations for doing so. Conversely, many men may find it difficult to stand up against misogyny if they perceive that doing so will lessen their own power – and their esteem – in the eyes of their peers.
But as a man, you have more pull with your peers when you stand up; more pull than a feminist woman would have with misogynist men, anyway, that's for sure. Therefore, it is important for there to be feminists who are men, – just please keep in mind that you can never really know what life is truly like from a woman's perspective – just as I cannot know, as I mentioned, what life is like from the perspective of someone who deals with a set of challenges very different from my own. Sometimes it's not a matter of being “right” or “wrong”; it's a matter of perspective – but people with less privilege's perspective is often ignored, and that's why listening is so important.
Whenever I push back against some misogynistic piece of garbage that shows up on my FB feed, or confront a person in real life for using the word “retarded” in a derogatory way, or teach my children that they have rights AND responsibilities to respect their fellow human beings, whenever I have the emotional, intellectual, and psychological resources to not only push back, but to withstand even MORE pushback to MY pushback – that is when I am “active”. You don't have to be a woman, or a person of color, or a person with a disability – to do these things in your everyday life: you just have to have the best interests of all human beings in your heart – and you do your best, whatever and whenever you are able.
I can't see how anyone can ask for anything more, of themselves, or each other – or, for that matter.... anything less.
All that said, I've noticed activists, whether they're feminists or for social justice or whatever, who become aggressive in their approach, so much so that it looks as if they hate those who they consider to be privileged (usually men, and in particular, white). I hope that made sense, my English is far from great :)
Peaceful protests happen all the time.....but you don't hear about them until things start getting really ugly and violent. For example, people marched peacefully in Ferguson (USA) for quite some time, but the news crews didn't show up until they could get themselves some great footage of the black community's emotions beginning to boil over.
And why would that be, do you suppose? Could it be that news outlets have been directed (by a handful of white dudes who own 4 or 5 corporations which own most if not all U.S. media) to capture only the narrative of the “angry black person”, as a way of reinforcing white people's perception of black people as inherently violent – and therefore easily dismissed (again)? I'd like to perhaps direct you in a PM to a website I visit that deals with these kinds of issues and many others; it's made me re-think how media presents and packages “reality”. I also consider it to be the gold-standard of websites; its contributors are incredibly articulate. They inspire me to expect more of myself.
Now, I was saying that because I think they're hurting their own causes, even if they don't realize it. Have you noticed what I'm describing or am I way off?
I've cetainly noticed, and like I said, I used to be easily turned off by anger. But do you know what? Once I worked very hard to get past my own personal feelings (and stopped prioritizing my own comfort) – once I pushed past all of that....I really began to hear what people have been trying to tell me for years and years. It's like stepping through the looking glass, as it were. (Do they have that cultural reference in Greece? If not, google it.)
And, if you don't mind me asking, what do you think should be done, what should be the steps if we are to achieve equality?
The first step begins with yourself.
*OK, that ended up way longer than expected, sorry!
Ditto!
**Have an A1 day**
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