Part of the Collective

"We live in a society where we may have differences, of course, but we learn to celebrate these differences."

-Bernice King

To summarize what is going on in this podcast for you guys who can't make time to listen or who would much rather read, this is an unplanned "long-formed," conversation between Kaileb, Aja and I. Kaileb and I tend to get into really big disagreements on moral rights and wrongs. Partially because we grew up in completely different environments, partially because we CAN agree to disagree on just about any topic we discuss. Aja is my roommate and we meet eye to eye most of the time, however we do have an understanding of one another when it comes to our opposing perceptions. I try to surround myself with individuals who are open to seeing other peoples side and accept that everyone's experience in this life is different. I wish everyone was like that. I wish everyone was non-judgmental, less criticizing and more understanding of others.

We did not plan this discussion. This was a conversation that developed through high thoughts, political issues and collective thinking. It'd be hard for me to give all the context of this discussion but I am going to attempt to summarize each of our points in this podcast. To give a little context... Kaileb and I are constantly getting into heated debates when he says something relatively discriminative of a certain group of people because I believe that seeing color, race, gender, culture, and any other stereotype is not the way to live. I do find myself using these categories however and every time I fight myself because that isn't me. Kaileb however, justifies his reason behind telling "jokes," about particular groups by saying he is only acknowledging the truth. I on the other hand see his comments towards particular groups as discriminatory because whether or not they were a joke they still have a more negative than positive effect towards those groups. For example, Kaileb told a joke one time that we talk about in this podcast. He cracked a joke on me calling me a "country bumpkin." For those of you who don't know what that means, according to urban dictionary this refers to individuals from a small town who lack understanding of the world and are uneducated. He called me a country bumpkin because I described the town I grew up in and told him the kinds of things we did for fun. Nonetheless, it was a joke. I get that. And in the moment, I saw it as just that and found it unimportant to react to (partially because he was getting laughs). BUT it did make me feel some type of way, it made me question Kaileb's character towards people from small towns and it hurt my feelings. I find it important to mention that I DO NOT believe it is anyone's responsibility to not offend anyone. It is rather the individuals duty to not let it effect them. However, you cannot help how something makes you feel, you can only attempt to understand it and not let it effect you negatively. In this discussion Kaileb defends his "jokes," against groups by saying they are just jokes of acknowledgment. My stance against this was that regardless of it being a joke or not it is still in support of "hate." I quote hate because I do not believe that Kaileb is a hateful individual, however I view a lot of the jokes he is defending as discrimination/judgement they stems from hate and I believe that this type of thinking works against progress.

To me, progress starts with love, positivity, and differences in order to evolve and reach a more enlightened place. I believe we must move away from seeing stereotypes and judging by collective ways of thinking. What do I mean by this exactly? I mean that everyone should attempt to look past these groupings and attempt to spread love regardless of the differences. I understand that there is a lot of negative in-effect right now in this crazy world, but I still do believe that challenging this collective way of thinking with individual awareness and understanding will get us further than "following the crowd," ever will. When you discriminate or label someone based on some category created by society you are unconsciously supporting the wrong side of progress. I think we need to acknowledge our feelings, thoughts and ideas about particular issues we have with society but instead of getting stuck in how these things negatively affect us, we have to accept these things for what they are and move about them in a positive light.

I've had several conversations with Aja about what kind of podcast we should do. In this podcast she mostly played a neutral party. I am extremely grateful for that though because things get really heated between Kaileb and I. Aja and I did however, mention a conversation we had the other day. The topic is less important than it is for me to mention than the point I am trying to make. Basically, we were able to disagree on a particular topic but had a good understanding and loving response to one another's perspective. Though I could say that Kaileb, Aja and I are "individuals," we can all acknowledge where we are flawed due to these collective ideas unconsciously planted in our brains by society. And I believe that is more powerful than any disagreement we will ever have. We have the ability to control our ways of thinking, but in order to do so we must be able to have these conversations and accept our differences.

If you took the time to read this, it's safe to assume you'd like to be part of the change in the world or that you are looking for answers to questions you might not even know you have. This podcast and this blog is not going to do that. It is not here to answer all your questions or give you some false hope that "everything will be okay." It's actually here to remind you that things are not okay. Its here for you to listen and take in different perspectives on life that maybe you can or can't relate to. Regardless if you've made it to the end... you heard me. Say what you will and think what you will think after taking all of this in, but ask yourself after you react, "Is this really how I feel or is this how I think I should feel?"

Peace and Love,
Jaz




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