Belonging, Part 2: Us versus Them

Who are “we?” When do choices to belong become toxic?

When I think about the topic of belonging, two popular phrases immediately come to mind.

The first is, “I’ve been thrown out of better places than this before!” The funniest example comes from an old I Love Lucy episode. The retort is directed toward Tallulah Bankhead by Lucy, following Tallulah’s reaction to a personal insult.

The second one: “I don’t want to belong to any club that would accept me as one of its members,” the oft-quoted line from comedian Groucho Marx’s resignation letter to the Friar’s Club of Beverly Hills.

In both instances, humor serves as a vehicle for transmitting something which seems basic to human nature. There are insiders and outsiders, those who belong and those who don’t belong. Sometimes, it’s a matter of personal choice on the part of the joiner: Do I want to take out a membership in that gym? Or the choice is made by someone else: We don’t want your kind.

As a child, I had a difficult time fitting in with the “cool kids.” Experiencing exclusion from cliques made me want to try harder to fit in. I was never the Lucy Ricardo or Groucho Marx who gloried in being an outsider. I wanted in, wanted to be included in the reindeer games. Luckily, I couldn’t or wouldn’t give up my quirkiness in order to be someone I wasn’t. My childhood predated Sesame Street, but I would have sung along with Kermit the Frog when he crooned, “it isn’t easy being green.”

In my previous post (Belonging: Roots) I mentioned my decision to reunite with family I hadn’t seen in decades. My reluctance to connect was partly a result of choosing to stay away rather than risk being hurt. I “othered” myself before they did that to me. My avoidance of them was a way of saying I knew didn’t belong and just didn’t care.

Growing up and growing older has given me a new perspective on inclusion, exclusion, and how to think about both. I look at the homophobia, racism, sexism, nationalism, and all the other “isms” which are creating violence and oppression all over the world. How is it that the human need to belong can turn so ugly, so “us versus them"? How can our nation and our world foster more “we” than “me?”

Fictional characters display their flaws when an author is creating conflict in a story. In my debut novel, a group of book banning haters threaten my protagonist, a Japanese American lesbian. Under the cover of anonymity, they feel safe to push their exclusionary agenda on this woman, a small town librarian. This is an example, all too real, of needing a “them” in order for there to be an “us.” Hatred takes root when people—in this case, book banners—feel that their way of life is threatened.

In daily life, we each make choices about who we want to hang with. I love my online writing communities, my spiritual family, and my own close friends. We share common interests, common values. I root for Ohio State over Michigan, because, well, I’m a Buckeye. But belonging can become toxic. When we consciously or unconsciously tell others they can never be one of “us” only because of who we perceive them to be, toxicity enters the room. Are they too dark, too light, too straight, too gay, too rich, too poor to belong? Do we unintentionally—or deliberately— imply that someone else’s equality jeopardizes our own?

john a. powell, the director of U.C. Berkeley’s Othering and Belonging Institute, contrasts belonging which bridges with that which breaks. “It is not surprising that the Constitution of the United States starts off with the issue of addressing who belongs: “We the people.” And while most people in the land that was to become the United States of America were not included in that we, in many ways the history of the country has been about continuing to both address and define who is in the we.”

“…Being outside the we was to be othered: without the recognized right to participate in the constitution of the country, to give meaning, and in many cases even be seen as fully human. The country’s relationship with indigenous nations, women, and enslaved people from Africa was very much bound up with the issue of who was in the we. It still is.”( Bridging or Breaking? The Stories We Tell Will Create the Future We Inhabit).

Tibetan Buddhists speak of conventional and ultimate reality. Conventional Reality acknowledges that we perceive a separation between one thing and another, that tables are tables and chairs are chairs. It is our everyday way of operating in the physical and social world, dividing things like a dichotomous key into “this” but not “that.” Likewise, humans perceive they belong or don’t belong, that others belong or don’t belong. Ultimate Reality allows the distinctions to dissolve. It acknowledges that nothing permanently exists in a particular way. Once the veil is lifted, everything is seen to be in a state of constant change(Two Truths).

In a similar way, Maya Angelou provokes me to consider that I must loosen the strings of my identity. She describes freedom as knowing that one belongs to both no place and every place.

This speaks to a letting go of boundaries which exclude.

If “we” is all there is, can peace reign?

These are highly charged times. Sharp divisions between “us” and “them” are seen everywhere. Wars are raging between those who espouse rival ideologies and seek to stake their claim on land and other valuable resources. The very worst of human nature is on display, and the results are devastating. The distance between “me” and “we” seems nearly unbridgeable at times. I pray for solutions.

The question, it seems, is how can we make a difference, spread peace in these tumultuous times? In America, there are two major political parties. It is easy to dismiss, even demonize, members of the “other” party. There is a world of difference between taking an opposite position on issues and believing that someone who disagrees is hopelessly lost. Accusing an opponent of sanctimony, it’s a small step to becoming sanctimonious myself. It’s so easy to become entrapped in divisiveness.

I hold out hope that “we” will find ways to expand our circles in all the ways that count. Staying open to those unlike myself needs to be a daily practice. It isn’t always easy. I don’t imagine it’s supposed to be easy. And the more of “us” that take up the practice, the fewer of “them” there will be. I celebrate our efforts to include one another in this journey toward wholeness.