People keep saying the Democrats no longer have a clear, concrete, coherent message for the American people. Well, if I were a political consultant, I would push candidates to use adapting to social change as their campaign platforms. I would write speeches with handling neo-diversity anxiety as the theme.
A speech that goes like this:
“We’ve got some difficult days ahead, my fellow Americans,
America is in the midst of a struggle with a force we cannot stop. Social change.
Yes we have always been a country that is evolving and changing. But today’s social change has come to us with a new speed. Today’s social change is also not about one thing.
Today’s social change is not just about race-relations. It is not just about women’s rights. It is not just about immigration. It is not just about oil and gas. It’s not just about diversity. It is not just about the technology that is in and around all of our lives.
Today’s unstoppable social change is about the fact that because of all those changes happening at the same time, every day we all have to interact with, go to school with, work with, people not like us. Today, we Americans are struggling with anxiety about what that neo-diversity situation means about our future.
But we should not panic. We cannot afford to panic. We must be, and we are, stronger than that as Americans.
Lord knows, the question is not how do we go backwards to when everybody in the room looked the same? Today’s question should not be and is not, how do we go back to when only people who had money, or who were Christian, or who were white or who were male, or who were heterosexual, were in the room and automatically in charge?
That can’t be the question because that social reality is gone. The social change of neo-diversity has already happened. And, that neo-diversity social change is continuing to happen and is unstoppable.
To move forward together, to move forward with a new national strength, the real question is, how will we use that social change to improve the life situation for all Americans to keep America strong?
Fighting against the force of the neo-diversity social change will only disrupt our lives; will only push our lives into anger against other Americans. Fighting the social change of diversity has already damaged the first goal of our American dream to create “…a more perfect union.â€
How, instead, can and will we use the social change of neo-diversity to move America forward with new sources of strength? How can and will we harness and focus the energy of the neo-diversity social change to make the lives of all Americans better?
For us to harness and focus the energy of the neo-diversity social change, there are some things we all have to learn to accept and embrace as part of our already changed America.
First, we must accept, embrace the fact that we live in a new America, where at our work sites we are no longer segregated from each other by race, sex-of-person, religion, sexual-orientation, and the like. We are all in the same room. We must accept and embrace the social fact that we are no longer separated from each other in this new, truer, version of the American dream.
Second, we must accept and embrace that technology is one of the unstoppable forces pushing us into close interaction with each other in our neighborhoods, at work, in school, in the mall, on Facebook, on Twitter.
Third, we must accept and embrace the social fact that people who do not look like, sound like, love like, worship like us, are Americans.
Fourth, we must accept and embrace the social fact that how you look, love or worship does not make anyone automatically the most qualified for a job or for admission to a training program, or a college or university.
Fifth, we must accept and embrace the truth that our neo-diversity means that our social lives, our work lives, our school lives, have and will continue to change in the mix of people involved, and we must respect those Americans.
Sixth, we must accept and embrace the truth of neo-diversity that says that each of us must work to adjust, adapt to respect this new America not just for ourselves today but for the sake of the future of America.â€
As a political consultant that is the kind of message I would put together for a Democratic candidate. But I am not a political consultant. Even so, I hope somebody is listening.
Final note:
For a deep dive into the dynamics of neo-diversity social change, see my well reviewed book, Taking on Diversity: How we can move from anxiety to respect†(2015; Prometheus Books) (https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/22822943-taking-on-diversity). For multiple examples of how I use neo-diversity analyze contemporary events, go to my Psychology-Today Blog, “A Quiet Revolutionâ€: https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/quiet-revolution
January 18th, 2018 at 8:42 AM
This makes so much sense. It truly is building blocks too, “a more perfect union.”
January 18th, 2018 at 8:53 AM
Needs a retweet and share button.
January 20th, 2018 at 6:06 AM
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