Saturday, October 21, 2006

R-E-S-P-E-C-T

Angry Black Bitch doesn't want you to tolerate her, but to respect her. I've read/heard these kinds of arguments before and they make me terribly conflicted. (Me? The Ultimate Libra who sees at least ten sides to every argument, so much so that I can hardly choose a position? Well, I never!)

On the one hand, what ABB says is absolutely correct: to indulge in hyperbole, tolerance is really, "Well, we don't like you at all, but we'll refrain from beating you with a bat. Cheers!" No one wants to be reviled, even if allowed to go about life not (generally) being beaten with sticks. It's just not quite enough. And why settle for tolerance when respect is your natural right?

On the other hand, I sometimes want to say to, for instance, gay rights activists (though it applies to most other activists, too), "Yo, my LGBTIQ brethren/sistren/non-genderedren/multi-genderedren, it doesn't happen overnight! Respect and acceptance take time and are hard to get! We're going against thousands of years of history and socialization." Sometimes, then, tolerance is the best you can hope for. But then that just sounds like, "Oh, thank you, society, for giving us a few crumbs and not the full meal that is my right! You're so kind! We'll know our place from now on."

So, like a lot of things in life, I'm of two minds. *sigh* Any thoughts?

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

While we shouldn't -expect- to be respected, we should -demand- to be. As with other forms of pushing the envelope, progress will be slow, but it will stop entirely if it's not pushed forward as vigorously as possible.