same hate, same love

-on Friday 17^th June 2016

‘Jeez, she was JUST an MP! People die EVERY DAY!’ said the 12y.o. white British boy I look after. It was sunny morning with a bit of cold undertone which makes you shiver after some time and as usual BBC Radio was on with their daily dose of news which my host mum for reasons unknown to me likes to consume together with her bowl of apple porridge. Good morning, aren’t you lucky to wake up alive?

Now this statement of his made me ambivalently upset and pleased at the same time. I chose not to reply to him with anything long or complicated because I wanted him to keep his opinion but I kept on thinking about this topic for most time of the rest of that day. How could I possibly do otherwise anyway?

Let’s start with pleased, shall we? From what I already know about him, his knowledge and feelings but also half from guessing what he meant by these short and sharp sentences is kind of obvious but I can say I’m sure he meant it in a broader and deeper sense. I’m sure he had in mind all those men, women and children refugees fleeing both from Africa and Middle East who weren’t able to make their way to a safer place, all those men and women who stayed in their countries fighting, all those children in Africa dying from combination of hard child labour and hunger, all those being silently murdered by regime in Russia, China or North Korea, all those women around the world dying as a result from rape and so much more. I always mention global issues in our conversations and then just tell him to look up more if he wants to or he doesn’t believe me. So I was really pleased when I heard this as a proof he’s aware of and acknowledging these problems and hopefully even his white privilege. It’s not that bad for a 12 year old, right?

So of course in comparison with all these alarmingly high numbers of deaths happening simultaneously all around the world, this in a way is ‘just one’ of these numbers but there’s something really disgusting about reducing every person into just number of statistics (I’ll get to that later on) or into just few generalizing labels, don’t you think? Probably because then it’s way easier to forget they were living and feeling human beings exactly as we are. And that will always be really efficient for certain someone. We should start thinking and talking about it in a way numbers will become people again.

Now we’re getting to what made me upset which was exactly this way he degraded her whole life to one label and the problem here is she was firstly obviously way more than just an MP which she had have been for around 13 months. A bit more than one year should not define the whole person and neither should their race, gender, sexuality, religion etc. You get the point. She was also a person like him or me or hopefully you - person reading this – in comparison with others very privileged white people but at least we’re aware of global problems. 

And she was not only aware of them but she was also trying her best to do at least something about them. She was trying to do her bit of making the world better place every single day. It’s very easy to look up all the things she did and I highly suggest you do it for yourself if you do not know it already. She deserves few more minutes of your reading, learning and a bit more thinking about the legacy she left for the rest of us. I admit since I’m not that much interested in politics and she was serving MP not even close to my living area I didn’t know anything about her right up until I started noticing the afternoon news pouring in on Twitter. Learning she was such enormously loving and helping woman from her death backwards was and still is shockingly devastating and I honestly hope it will not stop outraging us. It’s a great shame and loss when lives of committed people with such a good heart are so drastically cut short.  

But, as I believe, so there are way too many good people with potential lost among all the others who then are just reduced into a number for statistical argument or a headline. 

Where do we go from here in comparison with other events? Why dismiss talking about her or deaths of 49 LGBTQ people? And what about the classical ‘Things are not serious until white people get killed?’ It’s really obvious you can gather that feeling from the way mass media write about world event or from most of the politicians but that doesn’t necessarily mean this way of caring about world around you just in your personal interest has to be applied in your life as well. It doesn’t have to be this way and personally I think people shouldn’t live in such a bubble. We just need to listen, think and learn more broadly. Why argue about whose lives matter more? We all feel as equally devastated when we lose someone we love. Why shame others for feeling grief out of empathy or compassion when you cannot even know whether that person wasn’t just reminded of someone who they knew or lost? Why shame others for being capable of such basic but very important human emotion as grief or sadness?

I think instead of dismissing it you should use it in a gentle way to remind these people what else is happening around them and make them see everyone is or was somebody else’s significant other; through their own pain make them feel compassion for everyone else as well. Make them remember we’re all the same living beings.

Start with talking about how and who was she helping to. Use this horrible unfortunate example in respect to her life and to open up a conversation and other people’s ears, minds and hearts at least to encourage them to listen more and to see what’s happening beyond their garden’s fence so we can slowly stop this disgusting epidemic of selective hearing in which everybody infected doesn’t want to acknowledge life situations and feelings of people from countries that are further than just his or her own homeland.

...

I dedicate this piece to Jo Cox, incredibly amazing woman who I shall now carefully place among my other female role models and to whom I’ll stay grateful simply for who she was and what she stood for. I can’t even begin to express how sorry I am you gave me the reason to write this but at the same time you gave me courage to eventually say some of what’s on my mind out loud. 

Thank you greatly for confirming my beliefs in better world and goodness in people despite the way you left. 

I’ll never forget you, Jo.

message for our generation

Just a day after my return from Czech Republic - my native country whose social environment has become quite hateful and hostile in lots of ways in the past few years - my boyfriend and I visited a local records shop here in the United Kingdom and as my boyfriend is used to he started to chat with an older salesman behind the till. I kept on browsing through the vinyls but listened very carefully and joined one or two sentences now and then. The important part of his talk kinda started after comparing British young females' drinking habits to other youngsters in Europe. The conversation then shifted from how horribly some British people behave when visiting other countries to what a nonsense the Brexit is in such a time of globalization.
The man started talking about how much he enjoys traveling and seeing different cultures. How important it actually is for him to have a freedom of travel or living abroad. How some members of previous generations didn't have this privilege and how the ones nowadays wanting to close borders or build walls don't actually realize what a privilege that freedom is.
He said he truly believes in our - younger generation because despite our parents' generation somehow we do get it right. Somehow we see doing things the way our parents did is not working or it just doesn't feel right and we're not afraid to do it our own way. Somehow we do realize the importance of freedom and integration of all people and cultures no matter the race, gender, religion or any other factor. He said he puts his faith in our generation because he can see our enourmous determination to change the world for better. He talked about what an undestroyable weapon the internet is in our hands. How hard it is to control both it and us. How awesome it is that you can spread an important message with one click; how one photograph of injustice being done to someone shared all around the world can raise people from their chairs and start a revolution. He believes in us so much because that's exactly what we're doing; during the conversation he called our generation the change-makers several times for we're so often using everyday tools to make others aware, to make a change in other people's thinking and in general. 
He talked about an example how shockingly bad the regime in North Korea is but even there something's already happening - people are determined to risk and smuggle informations in and out. He mentioned how in every other decade when there was some sort of important revolution, it was started or done by the young people and that's why he's got so much faith in our generation. He also said what an important role music played in most of revolutions - though it's often been under a surface - the music and the need to relate to it is greatly important for us regardless of who we are, where we come from or what we do. Music is another powerful weapon in our hands and that's why the most oppressive regimes are so strict about the culture from the outer world - music is dangerous for it connects people so much. Just remember the generation of Woodstock and Vietnam War, Czechoslovakian Velvet Revolution, The Singing Revolution across Baltic states, The Peaceful Revolution that led to the fall of the Berlin Wall and so many more!
It seems to me there's so much more to share with you - I'd like to quote for you the things he said, be able to describe the way he said it or the amount of hope in his voice to encourage everyone who needs it. Because this article's purpose is not to question whether he was right or wrong in his judgements or predictions. All I really wanted was just to pass on his message of encouragement. To pass on his trust in young generation that he puts in all of us around the world. Because when I was in Czech Republic for these two weeks even I felt quite hopeless about current situation to be honest. I really wonder how all of you, dear fellow people of my generation, cope with the hate outpouring from what seems to be like everywhere. I damn right bet you must feel hopeless as well. But it's important to always remember it's not just this one random guy's hope and trust in us. Just think about how many such people are there all around the world and especially in the countries where the oppression, hate or violence is the greatest. Think about what they are putting up with and what they are staying strong and fighting for, trusting us and knowing that younger generation - our generation - will not stay silent and will spread the word until there's a fair share of freedom for everybody. Just keep on doing your thing the best way you can and stay strong.

How could you know?

There are certain traumatic experiences in our lives that we think are necessary for other people to know about. The problem is they are very personal and we actually don't even want to talk about them.

But it could mean hella lot if people just knew. It could mean a little change in people's attitude towards more compassionate behaviour. Our pre-set ignorance only makes the distance between people bigger.

In case it haven't crossed your mind yet, I'm talking about abuse or rape. I'm talking about bullying. I'm talking about domestic violence. I'm talking about sudden death of your loved one. I'm talking about all these things you simply cannot just bring up because it makes people uneasy; they will usually go "Oh..." and then don't know what to say next. Then they want to change the topic as soon as they have a chance. And that's just the best case scenario not mentioning all these know-it-alls.

If only people were less ignorant and less self-centered.

"Till it happens to you

You don't know how I feel"