Humanity
Why You Should Not be For or Against a Group
Belonging to a group is part of life, but being for or against a group is lockout a group of people you even don’t know.
Harmful comments and sayings towards others make them insecure and not for feeling to be heard.
It makes them against you, as well. Because they feel you’re against them.
We have to stand side by side, and we have to stand hand in hand, instead of being against someone or against a group. It will make you smaller.
These days we place people into a certain group, whether it is to look you better, whether it is to make you feel more worth, whether it is to make someone else feel low. Why on earth do you want to place people in a certain group to be against?
Everything we do and must do and what we say, we must look at how the other person feels. Our actions towards another person could make them feel unheard or belittled. They could go against us. Then it is the other way around: they will treat you badly. Then you will feel being belittled, then you will feel angry. Think about what you feel when someone says something like that to you.
This commenting and sayings will have a huge effect on someone. But what we say and what we do, is because we place people into a group. That could be a group you’ve heard about, that could be a group that has been onto the news for days, that could be a group you are in. It doesn’t matter. And sure there are groups.
We shouldn’t be for or against a group.
Why should you be for or against a group (of people)? Because they don’t meet your standards? Because they don’t look like you? Because they don’t agree with your thoughts? Because they are another color? Because they come from a different planet?
We should stand next to each other, hand in hand and side by side. We are all humans beings with our thoughts and with our flaws, but also with our good things.
We are human beings after all. Black, white, purple with a golden line around. Color doesn’t make any sense at all.
No, as said, we should be standing hand in hand and side by side in this world. Especially in this time, no always, the rest of your life!
We should be for humanity, no matter which color or to which group of people you belong to: we should be helping each other, we should be treating each other the same way as to how you want other people to treat you.
You should treat others as you would like to be treated by others.
You shouldn’t be for a group because you are with them, on the same planet.
You shouldn’t be against a group because you’re with them. You're with them on one planet, as we should care for the people on this planet. What is really going on in people’s lives? We truly don’t know.
What if a police officer got orders from his boss when doing his duty? What if this police officer got threatened by his boss if he is not doing his orders? What if this officer wants to stand side by side and walk hand in hand with the other culture, but he is not allowed to? How has this officer been raised by his parents? How taught his teachers about history?
I am not saying I am talking it right what police officers are doing at the moment, but I also want to let you think that they could be in a split with their thoughts and beliefs: ‘Do I want to lose my job? Do I want to be still an officer and yes then I have to listen to my boss, even if that will be against my own beliefs. Or do I say to my boss I’m not going to do that?’ Maybe they want to be different…
I am not an American, but I try to stand in one other shoe to try to understand the system. To try to understand another human being. To try to understand why things happen as they happen, try to understand why people think as they think.
Why I believe you shouldn't be for or against a group is because we stand side by side and we stand hand in hand next to each other on the planet, to make this planet work, to make this planet wonderful, without fear, without anger, without violence, without being judged, without being stuck in manners, in ways to think, in ways people think we should live “otherwise you don’t belong to this group”.
But I’m also wondering about black officers:
- Why did you enter the police system?
- How do they look at racism?
- What do they see?
- What do they recognize?
- How do they feel?
- What tasks do they have to do?
- Is there racism at work between the police officers?
- Do you feel split?
Probably there are so many other questions, but I believe we can have these questions for a good conversation.
Police officers are also belonging also to a group: the police officers. People.
Yes, people. Because the group people are a group too: just you and me, your neighbor, your sister, your partner.
Just because of accidents happening in the world, should you be against the police officers? Should you be for the police officers? And yes, I try to understand what you feel about police officers after George Floyd’s death, but can we try to stand in their shoes? To understand why they are doing this? In what system they are working?
You could think, you should not work in this system if you don’t want to be a racist, but what if your father was in this system and told you to be in this system, otherwise he will not be your father (I know that is technically not possible, but the threat could come in hard).
I don’t walk to talk right to what these police officers have done, but trying to be in their shoes is one thing to try to understand what is going on, to do better in our future.
I’m just curious.
I’m just curious as I don’t know a lot about racism, although I am half-Dutch and half-Indonesian.
Agnes Laurens is a writer. She writes for the local newspaper. Agnes lives in Bunnik, The Netherlands, with her husband and three daughters.
Writing is — aside from playing the violin — one of her passions since childhood. She is on Twitter and Instagram.
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