Take Off the Glasses

The month has turned and this Orff course where the miraculous is the norm is rolling to its final cadence. Last night was the Untalent Show, that always astounding, hilarious and breathtaking showcase of unprecedented, uninhibited, unbelievable talent that went on for three glorious hours. People who you casually have lunch with or partner up with in the folk dance turn out to be quite extraordinary in one thing or another— singing an opera aria and or hot jazz tune, dancing flamenco, playing a dazzling choro piece on flute. Another vote for the capacity of human beings to uplift themselves and others. 

 

In the midst of all this come some stories about committees formed to listen to complaints about unacceptable micro and macro aggressions when it comes to race, gender, sexuality or more. Or those things real? You bet your bottom dollar. Are they worthy of concern? Yes, again. Should we make clear where the lines are of acceptable conversation and behavior? Mostly yes, that’s a good idea.

 

But being the flawed human beings we are, it feels like we’re mostly going about it in the wrong way. Forming committees to deal with complaints that should be handled face to face. Committees made up of people with no training in mediation and their own limited views that make them unqualified to be the arbitrators of what’s acceptable. People who were not present at the "transgression" and can't possibly understand the context within which whatever happened happened. 

 

We all look at the world through the glasses we choose to put on daily, glasses made from our preconceptions or narrow viewpoints handed down to us. In my experience, the new prescription glasses of looking for examples of “inappropriate” songs, stories, vocabulary to be reported makes for a police state of sorts that is the exact opposite of what we need. A “gotcha!” culture that has well-meaning and good-hearted people afraid to open their mouth for fear of saying or doing the wrong thing. Really? Is that helpful? We might as well stay in bed all day, though I’m sure the sheets would eventually find that offensive.

 

By bringing those glasses to every table, we not only feed the culture of fear and division but we miss what’s actually going on. To give a simple non-controversial example: 

Today my hope was to teach the way that a major song can go to minor and a minor song to major. One of my aims was to give the students the tools to arrange and orchestrate music with that concept in mind. And so we sang three pieces that demonstrate exactly that. 

 

All three were exquisitely beautiful and powerful 3-part songs that not only illustrated this concept but went straight to our hearts. When I revealed the meaning of the lyrics (the songs were from the Ukraine, Bulgaria and Sweden), the tear ducts opened wide. All spoke directly to who we are in this moment of graduating from Level III and saying goodbye to friends we will never see again in this particular context. We're feeling the pain of bidding goodbye to these special friends and experiences and so these songs hit us right where we lived. 

 

Now had there been a narrow-minded music supervisor watching, that person might have criticized me for straying from my spoken objective. Or had the P.C. lens been firmly in place, the visitor might be looking at who sat next to who or whether I mispronounced a Swedish word or whether I got permission from x number of culture bearers to share their music. They would have missed it all.

 

And the “all” is this group of 27 people from Croatia, Spain, Catalonia, China, Chile, Brazil, Uruguay, the Philippines, Korea, Japan, the U.S. and Canada, men, women and trans folks, gay and straight folks, rich and poor folks who, through their open hearts and the power of music and dance, erased every single one of those categories (while still owning them) to get to the core of our shared humanity, to truly see ourselves in each other. They took off the glasses of their preconceived notions about both others and themselves and for these brief two weeks, came to see themselves and others as we truly are. 

 

I expect nothing but division, ignorance and hatred from the right, as that is what they show without fail. But I expect better from the folks on the left and am profoundly disappointed that it seems to be getting worse. It’s so damn sad. Those are ugly glasses to wear out into the world. Yes, like reading glasses, sometimes the situation calls for them, but not all the time. Let’s learn to take them off and truly see.