After all, we are mortal, so we die regardless of our rights and wrongs. Criticizing someone’s life relates to our prejudiced side, making us think we are better than others and therefore right. Why and where does this kind of thinking come from? Our parents instilled the knowledge they learned from their parents and so on, so certain societies promote and preach that they are right and everyone else is wrong. Thus, we are taught prejudice from the very beginning.
Now, honestly look around the world and find me even one society that is free of prejudice. From the smallest to the largest, from the least populated to the most, they all preach two things to their young ones: nationalism and religion. Both openly fan the flames of prejudice, even in communist and socialist countries. If each and every one of us grows up with prejudice as our first education, how can humanity exist without conflict? To me, it falls on the shoulders of the individual. As a group, we are all victims of an out-of-control sense of belonging. Therefore, if countries or religions talk peace, we will never achieve it because of our sense of belonging.
The problems faced by individuals as they grow up are related to being torn apart by conflicting knowledge, learned prejudice, and the desire to grant equal human rights to all due to inner spirituality.
If one is right, that means others are wrong. This argument has persisted since the beginning of human individual awareness. Yet, we all have been and are mortal. Even our societies are to some degree mortal. Some may last longer than others, but even empires collapse.
With our evolving knowledge, our rights and wrongs trade places over time. Just look at the social advancements of humanity. We don’t burn witches, don’t kill homosexuals, don’t buy and sell human beings, and racism is a crime in advanced societies. Yet, we still have a long way to go to deal with prejudice.
Why so much passion in our wars related to nationalism and religion? At the heart of our conflicts is our prejudice-related sense of belonging. If one can overcome this, they can choose humanity over nationalism and spirituality over religion. But how far are we from this as individuals? If you personally ask yourself this question, you will often end up choosing your belonging group because you don’t want to be on the wrong side of your group.
This is the decision-making time for us all to start overriding politics and learn to lean towards humanity and spirituality instead of religion and nationalism. Historically, they have brought out the worst in humanity and failed to help us evolve spiritually.
Today, whether it’s Snowden, a football player, or other athletes who show signs of defiance against societal norms, they receive both hate and love from their belonging society. This is because a segment of the population thinks beyond the boundaries of their sense of belonging. Normally, we follow the politics of our groups, but these days people are standing up for what is right. They are not afraid to state their opinions. Things have been changing rapidly, but this is not new. States, races, and religions have been at odds for a long time for political power. These days, awareness of spirituality and equal rights has been emerging as a power with the potential to override all other powerful entities because it is evolving from within the individual.
As I said, it has the potential. But how far are we from this awakening? That is anyone’s guess, because the politics of belonging usually ensnares us all. As individuals, we are taught to compromise our personal principles when it comes to our religions and nationalism.
As the number of politically educated and spiritually evolved CEOs grows, our politics will change for the better.
These days, the general population can call a religious radical a radical even if they belong to our own religion. Would we be able to overpower religious extremism? This question is harder to answer because I believe religion and music touch individuals in a similar way where one can dance, so if one gets carried away with the rhythm and can’t think rationally, the only way to change individual behavior is to understand the power behind it, and that power is spirituality.
Spirituality crosses the lines of all human education learned from belonging political groups, so it is highly individual. Therefore, the individual must be educated in that zone. You can earn all the degrees and become a master of human knowledge, but when it comes to sense-of-belonging-tainted religious politics, there is very little hope for one to stand for equal rights for all.
Social injustice is at the heart of all conflicts and social ills like prejudice, racism, and inequality. When it comes to equal human rights, they should be for all human beings, not just for some exclusive group. If you believe and choose that your religion or nationalism is right, never forget about spirituality, humanity, and equal human rights, because you don’t want to do to others what you don’t like done to you.
This is a simple principle yet the hardest to find in politically tainted religious groups. Remember, humanity and spirituality are where God resides, so the real belonging is to belong to humanity, which is above and beyond groups. Spirituality means everything to do with humanity, which should be the essence of all religions. But these days, with all our wars, the essence appears to be the group politics that breed and preach prejudice.