Different Worlds

We’re all living in completely different worlds.

From an academic standpoint, this used to fascinate me. But from a “watch and wait” standpoint, being a private citizen living in 2020, with Covid and Trump and Proud Boys and misinformation amidst rising racial tensions…. this scares the living shit out of me.

I studied theater in college because I believed it was in my blood, that it was my life’s calling at 6, then 12, then 14 and then again at 18. Every step along the way I kept coming back to theater and acting and the arts. And I was lucky enough to have two financially secure parents (secure, not “rich”) who loved and appreciated the arts and encouraged me to “follow my dreams.”

This is before 9/11.
This is before the housing crisis.
But this is also after my family and I survived a Category 5 hurricane and I understood at a very young age that nothing is ever guaranteed and life is too short to wonder “what if.”

Theater was what I knew I wanted to devote myself to for the rest of my life, no matter how discouraged I became along the way – to bring stories and lessons and empathy and other people’s life experiences up on to the stage: to educate, enlighten and entertain a willing audience… THAT felt like living the dream.
But, while in college, I also flirted with the study of English literature. So much so that I took enough classes to walk away with a second degree.

Thinking back on the sequence of events that nudged me in that direction, I would like to credit a freshman lecture seminar on Semiotics as the driving force that encouraged me on that second path (initially I had my eyes set on psychology).
I always loved books as a kid (being an only child in the era before constant internet access) but the Semiotics lecture and a class on literary theory really sparked a hunger to keep diving deeper and deeper into our western language and culture, through its literature, particularly its earliest forms.

Semiotics: the study of signs.

When I say the word tree, the image that pops up in your mind will be different than the image that pops up in my mind, which will be different from hers and his and theirs and everyone else’s. Based on our lived experiences, where we grow up, what trees we see, what trees we like, what trees we remember, what trees we wish to see again…. I think you get my point. The image that the word “tree” draws up in your head will be, I think it’s safe to say, unique to you. Same for the word “arbor” or “baum” and on and on and on.

From an academic point of view, I think this is beautiful.

Where it gets dicey is when we start deconstructing words and terms that may or not be troubling and triggering to and for other people.

Like the terms “nazi” or “black lives matter.”

…

Seeing the new era we’ve entered, I’ve been working to clean up my own language, just to make sure that I’m crystal clear to myself. I’ve also become hypersensitive to when I’m not crystal clear to others, and I am currently trying to reconcile that (as my husband says “fuck ’em” if they don’t understand).
I recommend everyone else, if you’re willing and able, try this as well. It’s not easy, and it’s not quick, but so far it’s been worth it as my conversations with “my side” have been growing deeper and clearer.

For myself, I found that I needed and wanted to make a distinction when it comes to particularly muddied words. For example, I needed to move away from the catch-all word “Republican” and towards a distinction between “Republican Party,” “Republican Elected Official” and “People who voted for Trump.” This has enabled me to see the three categories as separate entities and I now, thankfully, have very different intellectual and emotional relationships to each of them – one I’m annoyed with, one I’m convinced is evil, and one I feel supremely sorry and embarrassed for.

I also wish that the public, in general, could do the same for the word “Democrat,” as the “Democratic Party” isn’t the same as “Democratic Elected Officials” or “People who voted against Trump.”
There’s also a distinct difference between the terms “Republican” and “conservative” (because you can be “conservative” and vote “Democrat”) and the terms “Democrat” and “liberal” (same thing – a “liberal” may choose to vote “Republican” or “Democrat” or not at all).

If that last paragraph was confusing, let’s deconstruct a bit more.

The word “liberal” has a dictionary definition of “being open to new ideas.” But the word “liberal” may strum up different meanings to you.
I once had an interesting conversation with a lifelong Republican about how the word “liberal” immediately meant “whiney” in her mind. “Whiney” and “snowflake” and “politically correct” and on and on and on.
Her definition of the word “liberal” included every image that was seemingly *the opposite* of “being open to new ideas.” And now, four years later, I see hacktivists on the internet spouting off a whole new level of slangs and slurs for what they intend to mean “the other side” or “the people who didn’t vote like me” or, given their other rhetoric, “liberals.”
As a self proclaimed liberal, and as the daughter of a United States Marine, I used to live and breathe the motto “I may not agree with what you say, but I’ll defend to the death your right to say it.” As my dad pointed out tonight, I can thank Voltaire.
But I’m not going to lie, these last four years have changed me. I will not defend to the death your right to fling death threats at people you don’t know online just because you don’t understand why they think the way they do. I am embarrassed and appalled and horrified by what this country is seemingly becoming.

Which brings me back to why I realized I needed and wanted to make a distinction away from “catch-all” words and clarify for my own mind, for my own sanity, just who and what we’re actually talking about here.

Because we’re talking about ourselves.