The language we use is the power we own. It is a weapon, a medication, a numbing or a birthing of what is yet to be.
By listening to the language of others we get a sense of their whole life. Where they have been battered and abused. Whether they are seeking revenge or resolution. This sense, however, doesn't make us experts on their truth, but it can guide us.
That is to say, by listening to a person talk about what he hates, who should be punished and by how much, can reveal the way the world was revealed through his or her earliest experience, who held power over him as a young child, and how he or she was treated when they made a mistake.
A person who is racist is saying that they can't cope with reality - that the world should be full of "me's". People of my faith, my colour, my politics. People that feed me a mirror image of my best self or the way I like to see myself.
A person who feels imposed upon with new ideas is someone who needs to feel that the way they see the world is the absolute truth.
The conflicts of today reveal the brokenness of our society but doesn't reveal what we should do about it.
What we can do is see this as a river to cross and how or where to cross it is the problem that I must attempt to solve.
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