Tragedy struck Orlando this past week. There was a massacre aimed to terrorize members of the LGBTQ community, the murder of Christina Grimmie - a twenty two year old singer who I have always looked up to and admired, and a little boy who lost his life to an alligator. My heart breaks for all the families and people who were affected by these terrible events. I am going to focus on the first two - the two that occurred because of a huge issue in today's society. The issue is this: we humans don't recognize the humanity of those around us.
We rarely see other people as human unless we consciously make the decision to see them in that way. We live our lives surrounded by people that we hardly see as anything more than empty bodies. If every human being saw every other person they came into contact with as what they are - which is a human being with a soul just in case that isn't clear yet - then the world would be a much better place with a lot less hate and violence. I didn't even realize that I, too, struggled with seeing others as people until we read two books in a leadership class I took during my first semester of college. The books are called "Leadership and Self-Deception" and "The Anatomy of Peace", both written by The Arbinger Institute. These books changed my perspective on relationships, and I would highly recommend them.
Imagine what would happen if we took time to care about the humans around us. What would happen if we truly considered the fact that the people we encounter on a day to day basis are other people with their own thoughts, emotions, lives, struggles and dreams? I think it would change everything! We need to stop looking at some people like they are more than human. Our favorite actors, singers and athletes are people, too. Oppositely, we need to stop looking down on other people as if they are less than human. The drug addict has just as much worth as the average, middle class man who has the same value as the prostitute who is the same as the celebrity who is equal to the murderer who has feelings like the homosexual who has dreams like his straight friend who has purpose like his black friend who has struggles like his female friend who cries with her children who laugh with their disabled friends. It is imperative that we stop worshiping some people while devaluing others. We also must think of ourselves as valuable. We can't think of ourselves as more or less than we are. We can not listen to the lies of society! No one is greater than or less than anyone else because of their race, gender, sexual inclination, religion, age, beauty, intelligence, past, accomplishments, baggage, talents or anything else! We are all the same and so incredibly different at the same time. That's what makes this life and this world so beautiful! Let's start to look past our differences, and see how we are all the same. Doing that would make loving people so much easier, and it would make hating and killing people so much harder. I know I'm speaking of a Utopia in a sense. I know it's not possible because we aren't perfect, but we can try to love people in this way. Nothing can change what happened in Orlando, but maybe if we start treating people differently, there can be less tragic events like this in the future.
"Rich and poor have this in common: The Lord is the Maker of them all." Proverbs 22:2
