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The Other
By anitamckay on 2009-05-12 06:34:46
I spent a winter afternoon not that long ago sorting clothing at a homeless shelter. The woman who trained me explained the
tules: nothing soiled, out of date, or out of season. These are the same guidelines given to potential donors. As the
afternoon wore on, I was shocked by what I saw. Perhaps one garment in four or five passed. I saw filthy clothing,
mildewed clothing, torn clothing, stained clothing. There were items that haven't been remotely in style for twenty years. A
lot of summer clothing fitting in those same categories were in the donation bags. Even if the summer clothing were clean
and useable, where would a non-profit, pinched for funds, store the excess until summer? I could think of a few reasons
people might ignore the donation guidelines. There's always a chance something not worn this year will be, next year, until
the years pile up. It's still good, isn't it? And maybe the non-profit can get out the stains that have been there and not
coming out for years. Maybe it's guilt about buying things and not caring for them, or getting tired of them. One reason
stands out, though. There are people who think the poor are different from you and me. They can wear stained, odd, out-of-
season clothing, because they don't have anything else and ought to be grateful for what they get. Right? It is our ignorance
of the other that supports our willingness to shoot first and ask questions later. It's hard to turn away from someone we
know, or even a stranger with a face. The organizations that advertise for donations with the photograph of an appealing
child know that. Not that it hasn't been done, but people are less likely to allow people they know to suffer, or even to kill
them themselves. In many other parts of the world, people live close to other national and cultural groups. It isn't unusual
for someone in Europe, for example, to know three or four languages they're picked up by rubbing economic shoulders with
people from other countries. How many Americans speak even one foreign language? Here, we don't have that proximity
and usually have to work to get to know people much different from us. That we don't always do that work is illustrated by
a couple of examples. I recently had occasion to look up what's going on in Bosnia these days. A quick online search turned
up dozens of books about the war. There was very little about the country (then region) before the war, and very little since.
I wonder how many US citizens knew anything about the former Yugoslavia before they heard that President Clinton had
decided to bomb the Serbs. Afghanistan is another example. When President Bush made the decision to begin bombing
Afghanistan after 9/11, one poll showed that not one US citizen in ten could point Afghanistan out on a map. I would wager
that most of the people who didn't even know where Afghanistan is, formed an opinion on the bombing and haven't done
much work since then to find out about the country and the issues there. What is the point in living in a democracy if we do
not accept the responsibility of becoming informed?
