Somehow, after centuries of Western imperialism, there remains a great deal of difference in the world. There are still humans who uphold and adapt their cultural traditions, and, really, thank goodness for this. The fact of this stubborn difference is good for all of us. For as long as these differences remain, we can say at least one good thing for ourselves as a species: there are many ways of being human.
Now, in saying such a positive thing about cultural difference, I am not being some sort of White Lady Saviour, here. I am not saying, ‘everyone is marvellous, and I will immediately accept every cultural practice in the world as great, because aren’t those “other” people fascinating!’ You know the kind of White Lady. She possibly eats Fairtrade chocolate, listens to what she calls ‘World Music’ and once met another lady who wore a hijab, and now can’t stop saying to all of her friends at nude yoga, ‘You know, she was actually really nice! Those Muslims are a mystic, gentle people!’
There are still humans who uphold and adapt their cultural traditions, and, really, thank goodness for this.
I mean, bless her, of course. It’s better to be nice than nasty, and if you come to a positive and not a negative understanding of based on a single encounter with just one of them, well, okay. Sure, the fact that there are many different Muslim cultures and many different people living life within all of these might have escaped her attention. She may be very uncritical in her understanding of cultural difference, but, at the very least, she is not offended by it.
Such ladies tend to love difference. Better than hating it, of course. But not as good, I’d say, as finding the fact of cultural difference a source of great instruction.
I was thinking these thoughts about the instructive power of cultural difference a few weeks ago, and I mentioned it to this mate. I said that I felt that the Western White Lady Saviour approach to ‘celebrating’ difference was a bit condescending. She told me, ‘It’s also very Christian.’
“Notice how Christians “celebrate” their holidays and Jews “observe”?’
Yes. Yes I do! You don’t need to celebrate difference, so much. What you might consider doing is observing it. Finding out, perhaps in solemn silence, what understanding cultural differences—just their existence at all— can bring.
So, I sat in silence, which is very difficult for me. And I observed three things.
First, the fact that difference persists at all when so much has been done across the world to assimilate cultures into the Western way of doing things is a testament to human will. We can stick to things. Second, the fact that cultural difference has always occurred is a testament to human movement. We need not stick to things at all times, and no culture is itself unchanging. We always adapt.
Then, I added those two observations together and produced a sum: humans have been proven by their history and their present to be both flexible and inflexible at the same time.
That was my observation. Which might seem very obvious or simple to you, but it felt quite big to me at the time. If we can organise ourselves in many different ways and be quite committed to that organisation, then, I think, it is no longer “utopian” to see the possibility of new and better organisation.
We can demand better ways of distributing food and leisure and shelter to all. We can demand more of our societies. We know that our cultures, if we believe in them, can persist. Then, why not our shared hope for societies?
We need not stick to things at all times, and no culture is itself unchanging. We always adapt.
We are flexible. We are inflexible. We are all very different, thank goodness, but we have this flexible/inflexible quality in common. And we can see this clearly in our cultural difference.
The Western way is to ‘celebrate’ difference, to ask us what food or music or chocolate different cultures can reward us with. Another way is to observe difference. Allow the fact of difference alone to remind us: we really can do things differently, and stubbornly.
