If you want to change the world, change it yourself

On Oct. 12, I awoke to my radio alarm announcing the Indonesian military was again slaughtering East Timorese, who were resisting aggressive foreign commercial occupation. What a fitting way to start Indigenous Peoples Day.

But this is nothing new. I hope those who attended SF State's Indigenous Peoples Day teach-ins did so in a sincere effort to learn and to act. What I fear is it will fade like all other causes du jour , much like the fight against Proposition 187. Even those who participated in the 1960s and '70s activism eventually propagated the system they once fought.

Student activism overall is pathetic, and for various reasons. One reason is the continuous in-group divisions on the race/sex issue. No doubt racism and sexism are omnipresent. But rarely do I hear anyone, from "white" mainstream corporate news to ethnic grassroots, ask deeper questions. Instead of fighting each other over jobs and schools, why don't we ask why there aren't more jobs or schools to accommodate those living in the so-called richest nation? Why do we continue to enrich the military? Instead, I see the historical divisions that have sustained an elite few, while the masses fight each other over the crumbs -- from African and Latin American dictators to transnational corporate neo-fascism.

These issues aren't about skin pigment or genitals -- it's about traditions of fear expressed as self-centeredness! This sentiment is then expressed in structural institutions.

If you really want to change the world, it behooves you to change yourself. How can one profess to stand for justice and equality when that very same fear or self-centeredness controls you?

Social change isn't something you participate in because it makes you look cool or because other people are doing it. It's not a phase, it's a way of life. It's something done selflessly and unconditionally. If you're expecting quick results or anticipating minimal work or discomfort, you'll likely burn out or sell out and fade into the masses of complicity.

Everyone has their own way to contribute toward a more "just" world. But what do we accomplish if we only address the symptoms? If we could only realize our power in numbers, we could carry out a radical revolution of true democracy. But it must be done in the spirit of my favorite revolutionaries: Gandhi and Martin Luther King Jr. Otherwise, we replace one repressive system with another.

Let us all, from the inspired to the apathetic, begin by healing ourselves so that we may heal humanity and see through the illusion of division. If only a conscientious mass would lead, the leaders would inevitably follow.

[ Golden Gater Online October 24, 1995 ]

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