Fate and Choice – Friendship #4
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Xenophobia
One of the reasons people are xenophobic (fear of foreigners, people of other cultures) is because they only have friends who are exactly like them. Maybe they are the same color, maybe the same economic status, maybe from the same town or city, maybe the same religion, maybe the same age or the same gender. They may look a little different on the outside, one is bald, one like bright clothes, etc. But in truth, their friends are actually just themselves in other bodies. People who are outside this homogenous group are the ‘other’ and since you don’t know them and they seem so different, they are feared. This can easily be the case with the refugee or immigrant, the person from the north side of the city, the person who speaks another language, the retiree, the person from another religion.
Periscope
The question is, how do you get to be friends with those people? Astonishingly, one of the best ways is online. You can find everyone online, and if you join groups, chances are the group will have all sorts of people. Get to know them.
One of my favorite things about doing live streaming on Periscope app is I never know who is going to come into my broadcast. Sometimes it’s a dreadlocked African-American from Chicago, next moment it’s a Putin-loving person from Russia. Then in comes an Australian housewife living in Germany, a Latina actress from LA, a stay at home dad from St. Louis, a single mom from Paris with a bi-racial son, a teenager from Spain, a hardworking artist from Philadelphia, a famous blogger from the UK, an intellectual from Hawaii, a Native American from Oklahoma. They may be online, but they are all my friends and I get to know them and do my best to understand them.
Of course that is not the only way to know people different than you are. Joining an interest group in your town might be a way to do that. Volunteering for a cause could work as well. There are many ways, but it takes a decided effort in many cases to make it happen.
Knowing
The point is, we live in a diverse world. It’s more interesting and fun to embrace it. It is healthier to embrace it as well. Because when you have friends who really ARE different than you, then you will come to see them as multi-faceted people, just like you are. And that in turn will allow you to think about all other religions, races, ages, genders, orientations, etc. with the sensitivity that comes from seeing them as real people, just like your friends.
Drawing and commentary © 2016 Marty Coleman | napkindad.com
Quote by Jacque Delille, 1738-1813, French writer and poet