Learning for Justice
"People are hard to hate close up. Move in."
Brené Brown
For many years, the Southern Poverty Law Center has published a monthly magazine called “Teaching Tolerance”. A few weeks ago, I received an email from them announcing a name change to “Learning For Justice”. What a revelation – from teaching to learning and from tolerance to justice. Teaching is easy to see as something that benefits others. Learning is more personal – it’s about what I need to do. And the difference between tolerance and justice is about a million miles! If we are to figure out a way to live together in a country with liberty and justice for all, we are going to have to figure out a way to really include “all” of us – even the ones we are uncomfortable with and the folks we dislike or disagree with. And I think we have to move beyond just tolerating those people to see that justice means we all have the same human rights. One of the most popular bumper stickers at the Peace Center is one that says, “CO-EXIST”. It is time for us to live that. Co-existing implies thriving together beyond just tolerance and looking out for the big picture that is justice. There are many efforts around the country trying to bring people together to co-exist, such as Braver Angels, the National Coalition for Dialogue and Deliberation, the Bridge Alliance, Building Bridgers and more found on the map at Bridging Divides Initiative. And they are all about leaning in and seeing others as fellow human beings as Brené Brown says. It isn’t easy, but that is how we put our beliefs into practice. We can all do this by starting small -- with one person -- and learning to get better and better at it with practice so we can also move from tolerance to justice.
