Reflections on the Reflections (Or: Some Not-Particularly-Original Bonus Content That Nobody Asked For)
By Caspar Montgomery
Tuesday’s session was my favourite so far, a perfect atmosphere of openness, playfulness and sincerity.
It was inevitable that we would wind down productive rabbit holes and collectively carve out only a few of the infinite aspects of what might be encompassed by ‘Us and Them’. But I think we were onto something, and the themes that sprung up that mighty fine evening have been chasing me ever since, especially in politics.
For instance, this was at the top of my YouTube feed the next day…
… and this was in my inbox, regarding the counter-protest protecting immigrants from right-wing protestors, which took place earlier today.
And when I arrived at said protest, I couldn’t shake off an icky sticky feeling, the words of a Listener on Tuesday ringing in my ears.
This Listener had expressed a felt tension between, on the one hand, wanting to strengthen the ‘Us’ in order to serve a good cause, and on the other hand, trying to be better than the divisions and othering that are causing so much suffering and oppression in the first place.
Anyway, being the good little tofu-eating, Ecosia-using lefty liberal that I am, I went along mentally prepared to find a small group of lobster-coloured football fans called Wayne drinking Stella cans and wailing incoherently about Muslamic Ray Guns.
Instead, when I walked very close to the small group of no more than 50 people holding Union Jacks and a few placards (“no more immigration, we want deportation” and the like - delightful), I saw middle aged women, some families, folks of all ages and dress codes, walking along in what in any other context would have felt less dangerous than a sunny stroll in the park.
A few minutes later, while performing the unquestionably beautifully Bristolian work of physically shielding these ‘protestors’ from the hotel housing migrants, we were enthusiastically chanting that we should “get these scum off our streets”, “throw the racists in the sea”, and that our enemies behind the line of police should “stick your fucking flags up your arse”, and, most uncomfortably (both morally and musically)…
“Follow the leader, shoot yourselves like Adolf Hitler.”
Uuurmmmmmmmm
Is this… Is this the best we’ve got? A large crowd on the streets of Bristol, shouting at a smaller one to take their own lives? Is this how we get out of this mess?
Afterwards, I again walked past a few of Them milling about in Castle Park.
I wanted to go and talk to Them, to learn why they were actually there, what intentions they had for coming to the hotel, what beliefs they hold and what brought Them there - like the Listener who passed a bus journey talking to someone with opinions they found uncomfortable.
I wanted to - but I didn’t. Not this time anyway, much to the chagrin of my Hero Complex and sense of moral superiority.
Again - keeping those migrants in the hotel safe was fantastic. But in the bigger picture, will any of those right-wing protestors go home questioning themselves, their group identity, their beliefs? (Will any of Us, the counter-protestors, for that matter?) Was anyone persuaded, expanded, or brought a little closer to the lived experience of someone they disagree with?
I somehow doubt it.
Which is why they should come to the final Listening Circle of the summer series, on Wednesday 20th August!
Because this is it. This is how we save the world. One slice of watermelon at a time.
Who’s with Us?