A Man-Sized Issue

I joined in recently in an on-line discussion of the gun control diatribe (masquerading as dialogue). It wasn’t really a dialogue at all – just a bunch of angry, self-righteous men haranguing each other for the audacity to hold fast to a belief other than their own. So-called pacifists screaming (as best they can over internet type) at staunch defenders of the Second Amendment right to have a gun of their choice to defend their family and property; and the latter’s expletive-laden vitriol about how he will either kill or go to jail to defend that right.

That is not dialogue, and it is one of three main problems that lie at the source of this breakdown. The first problem is that there can no longer be dialogue.  We have lost the ability to discuss and dialogue with each other; unless of course you agree with absolutely everything I say, in which case, I contend, it is not dialogue. True dialogue is an exchange of ideals wherein listening occurs and through which both parties are changed. Dialogue is a creative resolution starting with opposing or differing points of view that results in a new, previously impossible (or improbable) thought. It cannot be reached when both parties start from the absolute point of view that I am right and you are dead wrong, and operate from a fundamental dualistic logic.  Right/wrong dualism renders anything the other person says automatically wrong and therefore not-listened-to. Where is the dialogue in that? So as a result, congress and my Facebook friends simply engage in angry positioning and demeaning name-calling.

But that is only one part of it.  The second source problem within the gun-control diatribe is that we have evolved into a state where we expect laws, legislation and other people to do the hard work or moral decision-making and critical thinking for us. It takes a ton of developmental work to build the capacity to think critically and in a fully mature way about such complex issues as justice, gun-control, global warming, sexual ethics, reproductive rights and human dignity (to name a few). These and other issues like them as immensely complex dilemmas that have no single or simple solutions. Yet as a society we want the simple solution; we want the silver bullet; we want washboard abs with only 15 seconds of exercise a day. 

Thirdly, we have de-evolved into a society who expects that if something is wrong, we can just take a pill to fix it, and that just is not the way things happen. And within that, we hold the expectation that someone else will do it for us. Dear brothers, it is not up to someone else (be that chemistry and pharmaceuticals or law-makers and their polity) to solve our problems for us. These are ours and we need to take ownership and responsibility for the issues we have. Having a law that polices how guns are sold (we have one), or requiring background checks, or magazine sizes will not solve the problem of accountability and responsibility.

 

So the long and short of it is that there is a way out or through this fiasco, but it will take a huge amount of work. First and foremost, we need to take full responsibility not only for the creation of a solution but for the control and use of any firearms out there. In a way the platitude that “guns don’t kill; people do” is right. But until every person who owns or sells, or touches weapons of any sort (let’s throw crossbows and bows and other forms of weaponry in there) takes full accountability of how each weapon is responsibly used, we will continue to have the problem of weapons getting into “the wrong hands.” We need to develop the lost skill of critical thinking to begin to address complex problems and complex solutions in a more mature and rational way.  But above all, we need to re-learn the art of true dialogue.  That is a tall order, but the consequences of ignoring the source issues are too costly; innocent children’s lives being snuffed out before they have even begun to live; malls and theatres becoming unsafe places to go; and young men thinking that the resolution of an argument is drawing and firing some sexy weapon. And  face it, while some women own and sell firearms, predominantly this is a men's issue! When the statistics are frightening enough perhaps the work will be done.

Generating Authentic Power

Our society, it seems, is set up as an accomplishment-driven world. What this means is that we value and measure each other - especially as men - by what we can and what we have done. I must tote around my resume of accomplishments in order to be seen either as a man of my word or as a valued, results-producing go-getter.

But when men reach a certain age or level of maturity, accomplishments are no longer the measure of worth.  In the second half of life (as Richard Rohr calls it) our goal is more about creating worth through what we give rather than what we get or win. This all came to a head yesterday as I talked with a friend and contemporary (he is as old as me) who was signing up for a goal-crunching program in order for him to up his personal integrity.  This man said that in his life he has seen where he has often not accomplished what he said he would and that he has not "shown up as his word" far too often.

I asked him what he though integrity meant to him and he told me that it meant doing what you say you will do.  Well, that may be true, especially in an accomplishment oriented first-half-of-life society.  Integrity is the consistency between what you say and what you do.  But in the second half of life we lose the fascination with trophies and points, so integrity of our word takes on a different texture and flavor. "What if," I asked him, "you looked at integrity as telling the truth about where you are right now?"

The wisdom and power of integrity at that point would look like telling others how much being out of integrity in the past has cost you.  You could look at the wounds and scars you have and say, "This is where I failed to do suchandso a thing, and here is what happens when you don't do that." and so on.  How powerful it is to be fully present to one's failures and the lessons learned from them, instead of pretending that history didn't teach him anything and having him try to (once again) white knuckle through another program of goals and accomplishments. Doing the later would no doubt result in another imbalanced list of losses and a few wins, and further the evidence of his life that he cannot accomplish these huge piles of goals - and that therefore he must suffer one more hit to his pride and integrity in the accomplishment world.

Enough is enough! He does not need anymore evidence.  What he needs, if anything, is the ability to tell the truth and to be fully aware and present to his results and lack thereof. Then, standing in the truth, fully aware of the associated pains and joys of his life, he can finally claim his authority - authority in his own life and his authority for the wisdom he dispenses. It may be hard to face the truth, and even harder to stay fully present to it, but the power that reveals is immense.