Reaching for Someone I Disagreed With
I would like to share a story about reaching for someone I disagreed with.
In the county where I live, there’s a statue of a Confederate soldier in front of the county courthouse. [Confederate soldiers fought in the U.S. Civil War on the side of the Confederacy, which was fighting in part to retain the institution of slavery.] Last week our county commissioners voted to remove it.
Many people, including white working-class people, support removing the statue. And there are also many working-class white people who are deeply upset about removing it.
After the county commissioners’ meeting, some angry conservative white people gathered in a nearby parking lot. As I walked to my car, I saw a white man quietly sitting on a wall. He looked working class, and I guessed he might be conservative.
I sat down and asked him what he thought about the situation. He told me he was sad that people were acting in an angry way but thought it was okay for the statue to remain in front of the courthouse. For him, the statue was about honoring soldiers who had died in the Civil War, and he wanted that history to remain visible. I mentioned that not all people saw the statue in the way that he did and that some of them were very upset and hurt by it.
After some conversation I asked him, “Could you agree that the statue represents one sliver of history but that many other slivers of history are not represented by it?” He said he could agree to that and had some ideas for making the situation more inclusive. That led to a good conversation about what might be good for all people in our county.
When we stood up to leave, I thanked him and asked if he would shake my hand, which he did. He then asked me if we could hug. I was a little surprised, but I said yes, and we had a big hug. I told him our conversation had been very hopeful to me and the highlight of my evening. He told me he also felt hopeful. We both agreed that it had felt very human and we wished people would treat each other better.
Chatham County, North Carolina, USA
Reprinted from the RC e-mail discussion list for leaders in the care of the environment
(Present Time 198, January 2020)