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“My philosophy’s pretty simple. If you have the means at hand to help, you have a responsibility to do so. You should always punch up and never kick down. Those people who have less institution power than you do are never the source of your problems, and those people who are trying to convince you that they *are* generally have their hands in your pockets while you’re looking down at whoever they have decided to ‘other’ this week.” — Beau of the Fifth Column
No, I’m not Beau of the Fifth Column. I’m Southern, and I’m named Beau, but I’ve never been that eloquent.
In my Lenten reflection, in which I cut out the doomscrolling and political engagement, I found I could sum up many of the world’s problems in one word.
Othering.
The best definition I’ve seen is from Macmillan: “treating people from another group as essentially different from and generally inferior to the group you belong to.”
This practice is, of course, mostly but not exclusive a right-wing phenomenon.
Let’s deal with the left wing first. Young, well-educated urban and suburban dwellers are prone to “othering” people who didn’t have the advantages of being raised in a progressive (and sheltered) environment. These are the people who offer condescending lectures and Twitter “dragging” rather than…
