Why Can't We Live Together?

The United Kingdom shames itself when it takes away the dignity and self-respect of the most vulnerable. Those who come here for safety and sanctuary do so out of necessity: we should honour their trust! The UK Government must not exploit their difficulty by imposing destitution and further degrading their humanity. The Government needs to change its approach - in just three simple steps set out in the Scottish Refugee Council’s Stop Destitution in Scotland campaign. Then perhaps the nation can hold its head high.

In signing the StopDestitution campaign petition, I wanted to remember the message (above) I posted. It also led me to think of why there is constant agitation about who’s in, who’s out, who belongs, who doesn’t. Not just in the global environment, it’s even in the tiniest village, perhaps even in the core family unit. How many of us parents agonise about the daughter or son-in-law to be? That’s where the fear starts of course. And it does build, through communities, countries and into the World.

Which is where I started.

Why can’t we live together? There is only one world, one atmosphere, one set of oceans, seas and lakes. We are scientifically only one species of human beings. We have travelled far, across many lands, throughout time. This is all ours, our inheritance, from the first homo sapiens in the Rift Valley.  

So why do we worry incessantly about who fits and do we fit, or how can we fit?

Yes, Britain is a small island. Some are concerned whether we can sustain more lives here. A bit of perspective might be helpful: Britain could easily fit into a third of Namibia, just one country in the southwest of the African continent. Or 13 Britains could exist within South Africa. The doom-mongers will argue its more than geography or even agricultural opportunity; many more resources are needed to support a population of 70 million. Apparently.

But humans are resourceful – we can, we must, we will come up with solutions for how to live together on this blue marble of a planet.

However, thinking only to the end of our noses shows up how small we are. I suppose that’s not too strange, after all we are islanders. We have been big thinkers before though; some great minds over the last 500 years or more have come from this island. Perhaps it was that those visionaries of the past thought bigger and wider, over the horizon and beyond. It is not their colonizer, imperialist mentality we need today. It is the bravery to go beyond ourselves, to embrace the wider world, the Other’s space. In true reciprocity. We are one Earth after all.

Rec.i.proc.i.ty (noun)

The practice of exchanging things with others for mutual benefit, especially privileges granted by one country or organisation to another.  

Dare I suggest “from one person to another”?




To add your name to the StopDestitution campaign click here.