Letting the Gray In
I have always argued that exploring the gray area is ok. In fact, we rely too heavily on seeing things as black and white, eschewing the possibility that both sides might be right…or even wrong. Gray area suggests compromise, a giving up of an inch, maybe even a mile; it reeks of complexity and forces us to actually think, listen, dissect, choose wisely.
I am nattering on about gray areas because I became aware of just how many folks around me love to sidestep them altogether. I find myself agreeing to end drawn out battles, to calm my own frayed nerves when a discussion falls into static polemics: I am right, you are wrong, now shut up!
This happened recently at a gathering that was dedicated to bringing awareness about a film currently in production that examines the issues facing gays in Jamaica. Almost everyone that was in the room was gay except, ironically, the filmmaker, who herself seemed out of sorts. There was this guy there, B., a small man who openly staked his intelligence directly to his sexual prowess.
B: I have been to the Dominican Republic and the gay men there walk with their dicks out.
Of course, this is a lie. It is also vulgar and purposely provocative.
Later, B. got his back up like a hissing cat, and tried to scream everyone else out of the room with,
Why is homophobia such a violent issue in Jamaica, when it is not true anywhere else. Why Jamaica?
Another provocative lie designed to have no answer good enough for him.
I listened to this small man, who after some time began to inhabit my vision of Napoleon, and after he cut off several people trying to make valid points in answer to his question, I finally said, “B. you are not so much interested in the answer, as in the sound of your own voice.”
Maybe it was the quietness with which I said it, cutting through his domineering baritone. Or maybe it was my coolness, my refusal to give into the heat he was desperately trying to generate around an already hot topic. But he stuttered for a moment, then flew anger first into the cliched line: “You don’t know me!” The truth hurts.
I nearly laughed out loud, except he was about to fly out of his seat to come at me. Then one of the hosts, quick on her feet, subdued him and then gave him an ultimatum: “calm down and listen to what others are saying, or get out of my house.” He said little after that, and I was surprised he stayed.
With his voice subtracted from the discussion, others including myself were able to acknowledge, perhaps obviously, that violence against gays is never as simple as hatred, it is steeped in institutionalized bias, it is a societally accepted answer to fear, it is government sanctioned vigilantism. It is a lot of things.
This was some weeks ago, and since then I have made the personal decision not to support the filmmaker in her efforts on the project because I just didn’t understand her point of view or why she was making the film, which as a writer told me that the end product will likely be messy and unclear. She too refused to acknowledge the gray areas of the issue, and at the end of the day it is this insistence on black and white only that leaves little room for reconciliation, truth, or understanding.
*Photo by Marcello U.
Love this blog, Scetches. Sorry to disappoint you, but I love it completely and totally, not partially. I know what you mean about people who have been abused in some way, such as gay people, minorities, women, foreigners, gypsies, skinheads, Christians, athiests, Muslims, Hopi transexuals, and others, not being able to see a middle path, that grayish thing in between black and white. Even those who have not been abused (there must be some somewhere) insist on black or white.
I'm in the uncomfortable position in my own blog of promoting the primacy of mystery. Nobody wants to hear that. Mystery is too gray, and how non-inspiring is it to hear that nobody knows?
Gray rocks! Mystery rules.