What Do You Feel Unable to Speak About?

First published on May 20, 2019

We live in a strange world these days. I went to an event last week which met a need in me I had barely realised was there. Well, that's not quite true. I had realised it was there, but I hadn't realised what a difference it would mean to me to be able to have that need met.

I attended the Rebel Wisdom Summit, an all-day event run by an organisation (started as a Youtube channel) who believe there is a sense-making crisis, and a meaning-making crisis, in the modern world, and host conversations and events to try to help the world work through that. The event featured four fascinating speakers, including Brett Weinstein and Heather Heying, who in some quarters are famous for the fascinating events at Evergreen College in the USA, where what seemed a fairly simple and straightforward interaction between Weinstein and other faculty escalated into some fairly frightening scenes with students' behaviour becoming threatening and, to many outside the university sector, outrageous. But more than the speakers, something else was important: Rebel Wisdom did something really special.

They created a space, primed in various ways, where curiosity and giving people the benefit of the doubt was the default reaction. I hadn't realised how little I feel that is the case, especially when modern social issues are discussed.

One of the exercises we undertook, in small groups (and in the afternoon, once we had had a chance to create an environment of trust), was to allow each member of the group three minutes to speak about 'What do you feel unable to speak about?'. (Take a moment, if you like, to think about what you might speak about. I imagine for most people, like me, there may be quite a list of possibilities.)

What transpired in that exercise was something really beautiful, which was the moment when my unmet need was met: people spoke beautifully, calmly and passionately about things which matter, things which affect our society and our world. And they spoke with nuance. And no one jumped down anyone's throat. No one started calling 'racist' or 'fascist'. Even when people shared something that might sound strange to others - I could feel this happening for me, and see it for others - there was an internal reaction, and then a settling of curiosity and of benefit of the doubt: that sounds a little odd, but I'm going to sit with this and see where they're going.

For a long time I've been someone who liked to look for the truth. I have always deeply believed in right and wrong, and I know that that means sometimes speaking up or saying the difficult things. My favourite scene in the work of my favourite author involves a man doing something heroic - doing what is right - even though he has no chance of success, because it is the right thing to do. That interest in the truth means I hold nuanced views - which I have thought about a lot - on things which certain people would find difficult to hear. They are things I don't feel able to talk about in most company, because I fear I would be labelled a racist for holding nuanced views on immigration, or be labelled a transphobe for having nuanced views on the trans rights conversation. I have been labelled a 'denier' (a loaded term with deliberate holocaust connotations) by someone no less than my boss(!) in an organisation I used to work in because of my nuanced views on climate change.

This does and has happened and it isn't nice. And it happens everywhere. And it keeps people quiet, and it stops important conversations from happening.

Wow, it was a relief to have those conversations, to be able to assume that the people there were likely to listen to you, to be curious about why you hold views, even when you are saying something they disagree with. I didn't know how much I needed that space, but I did.

To change the way the world works, we need to take a stand for truth, for meaning, for sense-making. To do that, we need to have conversations. To do that, we have to do two things. We have to assume that others are doing their best, that they are trying to work all this stuff out, just like we are.

And we have to be brave. We have to speak up, even when our out-dated nervous system slips into fight or flight, thinking we are actually going to die if we are pushed out of the group. We have to tell the truth, as we see it.

It's not easy, but it's important.