Disagree to Agree
Relationships are built upon common ground, and on this common ground, we interact within these four categories:
Agree to Disagree
This is where we allow one another to be diverse and different, where we value our fellow man above our supposed correctness. This form of common ground relationship is the root of progress and brings the best out of us all.
Agree to agree.
This is the most basic function of any relationship at any level. It takes nothing special to agree where we already agree. This form of tolerant relationship is also sustainable, though it leaves something to be desired. In this state, humanity is fragile, and tensions rise.
Disagree to agree
When tensions have risen for too long, we arrive here at the cold war of relationship. Where even where we agree, we refuse to connect so that we might progress together. This form of relationship is unsustainable and is usually the staging ground for those jockeying for position to wipe out their opponent.
Forced agreement.
This is where the cold war turns hot. This is where the side that came out on top in the disagree to agree stage expects and demands agreement to their positions. People do not long stand this duress. This form of relationship is pure volatility. This is where match and gas play. When our shared lives take this form, we must watch out for every horror of history to be repeated.
Though it is indeed different between individual people where we currently stand as a broader society agreeing to disagree hasn't been on the table for quite some time. We have moved well beyond this place of progress. Sadly agreeing to agree is also in the rearview mirror. We are shamed and canceled for speaking with thought criminals even on the aspects of agreement. Our public servants refuse to vote on the 70% of a bill where they see eye to eye.
If you haven't figured it out yet, the next several years will undoubtedly present an ever-increasing amount of evidence.
Division is the goal.
One side covers BLM with vitriol. One side covers the proud boys the same way. And while certainly, one can fairly criticize both groups, when they get together to condemn white supremacy, it is hardly covered. Why? It is because when we, the common people, break their rules of engagement and actually tolerate one another enough to agree to agree they turn the camera away. Division is their goal. If this were not the case, events like the aforementioned would be on the cover of EVERY magazine and the leading story of EVERY prime-time news channel. If those in power were good and honest, they would use events like this to encourage more unity. Instead, they sweep it under the rug.
Division is their goal.
Antifa members who rarely get banned on social media start feeling the wrath of tech just as soon as they start reaching across the digital aisle to find common ground on the other side. When we stop hating each other, the powers that be ignore and laugh at us. But more and more often, the machine's response to any true unification is to lay waist to this common ground.
Common ground is the battleground.
The left, for generations, has been rightly concerned with the way that those in power might abuse that power and in-turn, abuse common people. Many on the right have come to see how their concerns were correct all along. The left's concern with the Bush/Cheney administration and their power grabs were ever on the tongues of our media. When unlawful arrests were made, and undue tortures and pressures were pushed upon those at Guantanamo bay, we heard about it day in and day out. Yet when Hillary Clinton, who knowingly lied about the Benghazi attack and its origins, arrested a guy who she built the lie around.. hardly a peep. We now have the emails where she and others discussed this crafted lie, yet still nothing. In principle, we agree! We agree that those in power should be held in check, yet we the people largely only champion this foundational fairness and plea for justice when the perpetrator is not on our side. Where are our principles; where is our virtue? Because of our obsession with the cult of personality and our preferred brand of tribalism, we DISAGREE TO AGREE. We, like starved gluttons, gorge ourselves upon every scrap from their table, fighting each other for each crumb, never looking up to see that the two sides dine together. Our only great unity is in our passion to regurgitate their senseless division towards one another. The whole game of the ruling class is to keep us pitted against one another, the whole game is to avoid a united surge for justice.
There is only one right side of history. Honoring our fellow man. Agreeing that it is ok to disagree. Loving that in our differences, we create new possibilities for progress. Humbly knowing that iron sharpens iron only where sparks fly. Our greatest pride should not be in our correctness but in how we allow the other to build upon the same foundation and plant in the same garden of our long toil. Our pride should be in our assurance that in our own shortcomings, those who live differently might in them possess that which we have clearly neglected.
The Patriot Act allows for the executive to arrest and detain anyone who is deemed a “threat” to national security. Many many on both sides have condemned this for what it is. Wrong. But in our agreement, we never unite. In our agreement, we never move with action and purpose. In our agreement, we never get anything done.
It is hard to imagine anything to be worse than disagreeing to agree, but there is one greater; many in positions of influence & power are now pushing forth the idea of forced agreement. Forced agreement or mandatory unity is division in its most powerful and evolved form. The most destructive of lies are always the ones whose banner is its opposite. The death of progress is when we call clear regression “progressive.” The death of liberty is calling authoritarianism liberal. The death of unity is the celebration of forced conformity. We are in a time that is sadly transitioning from disagree to agree, to forced agreement. We should, with great vigilance and intentional purpose, do all that we can to combat this cancerous and most corrosive form of our shared lives. With great sorrow, I guarantee, and with deep sadness, I promise it is not sustainable. There are exactly 0 instances in history where a society remains in forced agreement and blood doesn’t run in the streets eventually. We either fix this now or pay the price soon. It’s up to us. We must expect the inevitable; the more we seek to find this common ground, the more the powers that be in the pillars of our society will sow their division with greater and greater fervor.
Everything is stacked against us. We all need to stop watching the news waiting for good news. The only good news is that the ball is in our court. The only good news is that we get to decide; fate is in our hands, and the future is what we say it is by action or lack thereof. It isn't going to happen for us. It has to happen because of us.
We are allowed to love those we disagree with; we are allowed to enjoy those we disagree with; we are allowed to befriend those we disagree with; we are allowed to stand up for those we disagree with; we are allowed to protect those we disagree with, we are allowed to champion those we disagree with.
Stop waiting for some celebrity to tell you that this is the right thing to do. Stop waiting for your teacher to teach you how. Stop needing “the man” to give you permission. People are looking for courageous leadership. People only follow titles when their hearts cease to leap from the lack of courageous leadership. Our ruling class may have the titles, they may have name recognition, they may have every other worldly advantage, but they can't beat courage. We all have our spheres of influence, our circles of friends and family. Who will take courage? Who will lead them? Who will be the first?
The anecdote, as always, is courage. Selfless courage.
We each have within us this resolve. A resolve that only we know. A resolve so unique that only in those midnight moments of holy clarity where honesty can’t be eluded might we know if we have been true to our hearts ever surging cry towards courage. We must be true. We must make up our minds that the buck stops with us. We must take back our beautiful common ground. Because if they take that, they take everything.
Be a real man, be a true woman, face the wind, part the wave. You are that courageous one. It is you. If you are reading this, it is you.
Love wildly, forgive recklessly, take courage and change the world.
It will ever be we - Samuel S. Adams
Dear Foe, how long have you been friend,
Distant Foe, closer come, I see me,
Dark Foe in light, brother be,
It has always been you, it has always been me.
Oh nigh hidden Foe to filled soul,
Hindered perch on that hill,
The first frozen plunge, in shock still,
If always me, it is clear it can never be we.
Shaded eye, bright mirror, same blood run,
Together first in hate, self imprisoned,
Bound together risen, Foe, why can’t I see,
It will ever be you, It will ever be me.
Hates cords turned, wrought strength untold,
Eyes lift to follow the string,
One to one we have to see,
It has always been you, it has always been me.
In rivers rage, Foe, you have to see,
It took the age, Foe, I am freed,
Together smashed cages, it is time to leave,
It has always been you, it will ever be we.
Hold Tension, Be Vast.Remember, restoration alone brings victory.