We are all Human Beings
“But at the end of the day, we are all human beings. Why do we need to make everything about race, or sex, or gender?”
Why do I feel such aversion to the above assertion and question? Why does it make me feel hesitant, cautious, and immediately vigilant, as I start searching for further signs which may point to the speaker’s political affiliations? The speaker surely cannot be from the left, they surely must be living with too much privilege if they cannot see why race, sex, and gender identities are the basis upon which much inequality and discrimination exist, as we see it today.
I believe that the speaker who makes an appeal to our common humanity is appealing to the human essence, isn’t it? Attributes, traits, emotions, circumstances which are inherent within the human experience- Life, death, connection, loss, sadness, jealousy, greed, compassion, happiness, joy. Undeniable. And so the speaker goes on to point out that if all of us are subject to certain fundamental, immutable experiences as human beings, why do we not try to connect over this shared essence. Why do we not emphasize what is common to us? Why do we instead highlight our differences as the grounds for some radically different experience which the speaker could not even conceive of living through?
Human beings in our current form have been around for almost 300,000 years. And we haven’t always experienced discrimination on the basis or race, caste, sex, gender, and class. Discrimination itself seems to have existed in some form or the other, simply because our societies are hierarchical. But in our earlier communities which were presumably extremely homogenous, race for instance, could not have been a basis for discrimination. In an all-white group of individuals, who had no notion of any other race or culture outside of their own, racism seems unlikely. And in pre-industrial societies where wealth and income inequality were not nearly as high, discrimination on these factors too may have been much lower than it is today.
It seems to me that many forms of discrimination that we see today (except maybe for gender and sexual discrimination) are relatively modern phenomenon, originating within the last couple thousand years. And even then, if one lives within a relatively homogenous community, many forms of discrimination occurring outside of their immediate community may be completely invisible to them.
Again, I assume that there are still many towns in this country that are predominantly white. In such towns where there are no people of colour living, a white individual may find it absurd if they were accused of being racist. If my entire life revolves around this small community of people who are also white, and if I rarely even encounter a person of colour, then when do I even have the opportunity to be racist? To then speak to them about structural and unconscious racism would be too abstract and disconnected from their actual life circumstances. On the other hand, discrimination on the basis of education, skill, and gender may be more salient for these individuals.
The speaker who appeals to the human essence however does not fully account for the temporality and spatiality of human beings. Yes, we have shared, fundamental experiences. But we also exist in time and space, and during each period of time, and across different geographical locations, certain aspects of our identities become more or less salient. Thus leading to marked differences in how our human essence manifests. Or to what extent our human essence is given the space to manifest.
Human experience is thus essential, temporal, and spatial at the same time. The sentiment behind “we are all human beings” or “all lives matter” is completely fair, and yet only speaks to the essential aspect of our experience.
