P.31

For Equality and Diversity

(Excerpted from 23 social principles of diverse thinking)

We live in a Social Diverse though some will deny this. When we do not respect the principles of a Social Diverse as some anti-diverse people do, then we have problems, we have suffering.

The principles of social diversity demand that we respect difference, appreciate difference, learn from difference, use difference, and promote difference. Multiculturalism is a natural behavior in a Social Diverse. Equality is a fundamental premise of this condition. And action to create equality is an exigent call upon all. The citizen in a diverse democracy is ever alert and vigilant.

Our first proscription in a manifold world is bigotry – No racism, no ethnic and national discrimination, no misogyny, no anti-Semitism. no exclusion on the basis of

disability, appearance, sexual orientation, age, social strata etc. NO prejudice in any form is acceptable.

The list of bigotries is endless -- we cannot list them all but we are against them ALL, and this even includes the new forms that ill minds will create in the future.

We extend bigotry to mistreating individuals with different sub-cultural behaviors and lifestyles, this too is not acceptable. Glass ceilings, poverty, unequal pay, bad schools, lack of services, double agendas and so on, all of these things result from anti-diverse behaviors and are not acceptable to civilized Human beings.

Bigotry and prejudice is a process. We can call this “casteing” in the sense of creating castes. We must be aware of all forms of casteing, those direct and obvious, and those that are subtle and indirect, and lurk in gray areas where the immoral like to inhabit.

Casting is a process that locks people out. The opposite of casteing is the process that brings people within. Remedying the effects of inequality takes place through action, through programs to help people. If we have inequality but we are taking no action against it, then we are sustaining it. Discrimination is a process, anti-discrimination is the opposite process.

Declarations of equality when some are still suffering the political, psychological, cultural and economic effects of bigotry are false pronouncements and false sentiments. The damage must be fixed before we can say such things. Some may hide behind high principles of “liberty”, but we must judge these trees by their fruit, and we can see that they do not care and their fruit is rotten and putrid. Attitudes of blame the victim are wrong. Setting lower expectations for downtrodden groups is also very wrong.

Along with these principles is the practice of social combination. Through life experience we have the fundamental unifier of common experience. When we bring many different people together in a joint effort we can build affinity and sincerity, sympathy and empathy. When people can live together, work together, and socialize together then they can change their views. Principles and worldviews are not enough, we need the actual physical experience of sustained mutual contact, then we can learn to get along, and work for a common goal.

These integrating experiences do not eradicate difference or diversity at all. They sustain difference. But they actually teach two opposite things at the same time. First is appreciation of difference, the second is the recognition of commonality with all other Human beings. This duality provides the trick that binds us together in an unbreakable bond.