It can be helpful to put the time in which we live into perspective. Is there anything new under the sun?
In 1910 a group of 500 prairie farmer delegates marched onto Parliament Hill in Ottawa and actually into the House of Commons where they took over proceedings.
I know this because of an article in the Globe and Mail, published a couple of weeks ago.
The article discusses, at length, another protest, a trek, a convoy to Ottawa that took place in 1935. The protest was comprised mostly of young men who had been employed in workers camps set up by the government in the shadow of the unemployment that resulted from the economic depression. There were over 200 of these camps, many of them in British Columbia, and the men were paid 20 cents per day. There was some fear in government circles that a disenchanted population might turn to communism and so the work camps were intended to prevent such an outcome. At first, the camps were received as a positive, but there were not clear projects and the conditions were often difficult, at best. By 1935 many of the young men walked away from the camps, making their way to Vancouver. Having not found a listening ear in Vancouver, some decided to head to Ottawa. The article is interesting and the reception in various towns was varied and, arguably, quite positive. In the end, they stalled in Regina. Through government intervention, their trek was kept a long way from Ottawa.
When you read a story like that, you wonder what the people were like who took on such a protest journey. They were young. They were trying to find a way to provide for themselves and, perhaps, others. They were frustrated. Some were, no doubt, scared.
Today is Canada Day. As I wrote this submission on June 30, I am not yet aware of how the announced “protests” of 2022 on Canada Day in Ottawa materialized or failed to materialize. There had been a declaration, some days back, that the convoy of the recent winter was going to form again and, this time, stay for the whole summer. We have heard also, that some judges in Canada have had to accept police protection because some people, perhaps associated with the winter convoy, have issued threats to their safety.
There has also been the predictable reaction. I sometimes call it the “these people” reaction. Who are “these people”? People who are against a political, cultural, or social view often describe the view as associated with “these people.” So, as violent threats are directed at judges, some voices say things like, “That is what ‘these people’ are like", referring not only to the people issuing the threats, but to ALL of the people sympathetic to the convoy.
It might help to recall a helpful note in thinking about or making statements about other people. “Don’t compare their worst to your best.” A person is never “these people.” A person is a person - not a group or an idea.
In the gospels, we come across various groups that might be labelled as “these people.” One such group is the Pharisees, the religious leaders who so often sparred with Jesus. Jesus clearly and consistently spoke against the groupthink of the Pharisees, against their way of seeing the world, and other people and God. However, he did not dehumanize them with “these people” type tags.
Remember John chapter 3? Nicodemus was a Pharisee, but when he came to Jesus to seek guidance, Jesus saw him as Nicodemus, not as one of “these people.”
Hopeful Christian theology is not a “these people” theology. That is, even as it is willing to speak against hateful rhetoric and fearful, controlling structures of religion and politics, it aims not to dehumanize by casting an entire group according to the worst of its expression.
I am confident that, in 1935, those young men who felt compelled to travel to Ottawa (only to wind up in Regina), were labelled as “these people.” From the vantage of history we can consider that they were much more than a crowd.
This Canada Day, there is so much more that can lead us to see other as “these people” if we like doing that kind of thing. I have read about some municipalities who are not using the name “Canada Day” due to concerns over colonialism and residential schools. Just this fact alone brings up various groups that we can call “these people” if we are so inclined. Are the people who refuse to say “Canada Day” the offensive people? Are the people who insist upon saying “Canada Day” the offensive people?
How about we try not to “these people” others? How about we try to see people as people not as symbols of ideas that we either love or hate?
So well put. It is easy to put others into various camps and ideologies and forget we're all just people doing our best to make the trek through our life. Sometimes we agree and sometimes we don't. But we don't have to "Otherize" each other! Thanks for your writing.