Divided We Fall

As a kid, I spent a lot of time with my grandparents who believed in this country, not in some blind, flag-waving, divided kind of way, but in a steady, deeply rooted way. They were proud Americans.

They believed in helping their neighbors and didn’t question whether someone deserved kindness. They just gave it.

They believed in dignity, in giving a hand up, in standing for something without tearing anyone else down. They believed in this country’s ability to grow, stretch, and include.

We’ve drifted into a culture where it feels like you have to choose a side, and if you see things differently, you’re often seen as dangerous & wrong.

I worry that we’re raising a generation where discomfort is treated like harm. Where anything that causes discomfort is pushed out of the classroom & the conversation. I worry about the erosion of dialogue. The silencing of nuance.

We used to teach kids how to think. Now, I wonder if we’re just teaching them what to think, and punishing them when they question.

As a Gen X mom, it terrifies me that my daughter, at 17, now has fewer rights in this country than I did at her age. That is not progress. And it is not about left or right. It is about forgetting what freedom actually means.

Freedom to speak. To think. To wrestle with ideas. To disagree with compassion. To be uncomfortable and to grow through it.

We have been tricked into believing that we are on opposing sides; we are divided. We won’t find our way forward by choosing sides. We will find it by choosing each other.