Editor’s Note: This is an edited version of the recent baccalaureate address at Thetford Academy.
Class of 2017: As you prepare to stream toward the proverbial exit, I’d like to ask that you think for a moment about what I call the “Diversity Paradox”: As we become increasingly more adept at identifying discrete differences between us, there is a corresponding urgency to strip those differences of their power to divide us. Allow me to explain.
I graduated from a big high school in New Jersey, 39 years ago, in a class of over 500 kids, and here’s what I knew about diversity: People were male or female, Christian or Jewish; everyone belonged to a distinct racial group, but everyone was heterosexual; and we all rooted for the Phillies. So in the years since then, my understanding of the arbitrary nature of the categories into which we sort each other and ourselves has evolved quite a lot.
For one thing, I found myself living in New England, where this team called the Boston Red Sox seems to get a lot of attention. And at some point I realized that the prospect that of the 500 kids in my class, there was not a single gay person, was mathematically absurd.
Then there’s the idea of race, which serves as the foundation of some of the most shameful parts of American history. It was over 100 years ago that American sociologist W.E.B. Du Bois observed that race was being used as a biological explanation for what he understood were in fact social and cultural differences between different populations. He spoke out against the idea of “white” and “black” as discrete groups, claiming that these distinctions ignored the scope of human diversity. And geneticists today agree that race is not a biological phenomenon, but rather a system that humans have devised to categorize and (I would add) control each other. And in your lifetime, our understanding of gender and sexuality have evolved too, so that the language of either/or is no longer adequate to describe the diversity of human experience.
What does this mean for you? It is incumbent upon you, our new generation of artists and scientists, parents and teachers, voters and leaders, to reject the power of the lines that for most of human history have divided us, and recognize that, as an activist named Peace Pilgrim once said, “We are all cells in the same body of humanity.”
Recognize that our connections with each other are what, on an individual level, make life worth living, and as a species, have ensured our survival. Reach out to others, especially those who seem different from you.
Let me give you an example: In the late 1980s, I went to law school, at night, in blighted Camden, N.J., taking the train to and from Philadelphia. On the way to Camden, there would be a few hardy souls riding the train and scurrying on the streets, but when classes let out at 10:30 p.m., the only people left in that part of town appeared to be up to no good. And there I was, this little person wearing a cheap suit and sneakers, lugging my textbooks on my back. I’d walk purposefully down the subway stairs, scare away a rat or two, and arrive by the tracks, often just in time to witness a drug deal or an angry exchange.
It seemed like the world’s most desperate people hung out by those train tracks. I could run away, but I needed the ride home. … So I tried something else — I sized up the crowd, singled out and approached the most dangerous looking person there, and started a conversation. With something riveting, like “Hi, have you been waiting a long time?” My new friend would be stunned, but would always be polite, and everyone else on the platform would think I was with him, and this strategy got me through four years of late-night classes.
And when I practiced law, I worked for Philadelphia’s biggest firm where we mostly represented wealthy clients, with whom I had almost nothing in common (for one thing, I couldn’t afford to hire myself), and when I practiced law in Vermont, I worked for individuals, many of whom had lives very different from mine, and who needed someone to stand beside them and speak on their behalf in a language most people don’t know. For a few years, I represented people who found themselves caught up in the juvenile and criminal justice systems. Some were appealing sentences, so they were prisoners. But they were also sons, daughters, brothers, sisters and parents. They trusted me with their stories, and from them I learned about experiences I wouldn’t otherwise know, and I carry these people with me today.
I don’t know what my life would have been like if I had found a tribe and hidden with them, but I suspect that I would suffer from a sense that I had missed something important. As Mother Teresa said, “If we have no peace, it is because we have forgotten that we belong to each other.”
To experience the power of reaching out to someone who seems different from yourself, you need not ride the subway or visit people in prison, although I recommend both. But you do have to overcome our tendency toward tribalism. We seek out people whom we believe to be most like ourselves, and this provides us with some comfort. But in so doing, we deprive ourselves of some great experiences and insights into our common humanity.
Instead, see as much of this world as you possibly can. Go places where people speak English with a different accent, and places where people don’t think in English at all. Really listen to people with viewpoints that are very different from your own. We live today in a nation that is described as split into two — the red Republicans who celebrated the election of an outsider president, and the blue Democrats and their pollsters who simply couldn’t fathom this outcome, or most of what has happened since election day.
I wonder who profits from this division — is it the media? Or the leaders who know that dividing comes right before conquering? When we fight with or dismiss each other, we forget that we have far more in common with each other than we possibly ever could with leaders who have never had to worry about racism, sexism, xenophobia, homophobia, poverty, or the cost of health care or higher education, and who don’t seem to care about the future of this planet.
I trust you to call out cynicism and opportunism when you see them, to reach out to others and to recognize that it’s one of life’s greatest privileges to be able to help someone else, and that you will on occasion have the challenge of graciously receiving help. All the while, I hope that you will draw on the values that you learned from the people celebrating your accomplishments this week. I trust that you will strive for a nation that is neither all blue nor red but brilliant purple, and that you will do your best to be an informed citizen, that you will vote and make it count, and better still, you’ll work for issues and candidates who pledge to work to protect this amazing planet and the rights of everyone on it, and best yet, you’ll run for office, and make your corner of the world a little better.
There’s some free advice — in a few days, we’ll release you, to go forward and figure out everything else. So go on, have a life full of adventures and friendships and great love and big ideas and purposeful work. Congratulations on a great start, class of 2017.
Kelly Welsh teaches history and psychology at Thetford Academy.