Beyond Divisions:“More in Common Than That Which Divides Us”

2021 ACPS Conference - Plenary

Author: Dr. Lita Crociani-Windland, (Bristol UWE)

In this plenary conversation, we hope to address splitting as a crucial issue that underlies many of the heated topics of our time, to try to invite reflective conversations across differences rather than furthering the divides.  Towards that end, participants will reflect on polarizing issues such as hatred across ethnic, racial, or sexual identity or preference issues; climate change; splits that can be so huge that even within groups there are topics and experiences that can barely be discussed.  Even attempts to reflect on divisive issues can result in an experience of being silenced by projections rather than being invited into respectful, collegial dialogue, as ‘virtue signaling’ furthers the binaries and inhibits reflective engagement. 

 Our isolation during COVID seems to have furthered the divides, in part because we have been frightened and in part because we don't have to encounter one another.  Participants have been invited to begin a conversation that moves towards imagining how to mindfully break through some of these divides, hoping to invite active participation from attendees as well. 

 This plenary panel came about as a result of a conversation between Marilyn, Candy and myself where we found ourselves reflecting on the difficulties of having conversations across difference not just in terms of race, but other difficult issues. 

My association to divisions took me back to the awful time of the Brexit referendum in the UK and the assassination of British Labour MP Jo Cox.  Jo Cox was shot and stabbed multiple times by right-wing activist Thomas Mair and died 16th June 2016.  That tragic event, just as the storming of the US Capitol tell us of the deadly potential of divisions.  Jo Cox has become known in the UK for her maiden speech, which went viral after her death and where the idea that we have more in common than that which divides came from.  This is what the plenary title takes as its inspiration and in small measure it is a tribute to a courageous young woman politician.  And yet this is a difficult truth to hold onto in the midst of difficult and divisive times, whether this be in relation to political views, identity issues, disabilities or even more existentially threatening for us all in terms of climate change.  It is easier to punish her murderer with life imprisonment than to acknowledge the context that led to her murder. 

I want to be provocative and say that we easily fall into the trap of division ourselves: this idea of going beyond divisions and holding to the more in common idea is so threatening of vested interests that it is the most difficult and radical position in our times.  It is anti-competitive, it is hard to hold onto, it calls for everyone to let go of some privilege, it calls for tolerance and the acceptance of imperfection, of less than ideal solutions and continuous reflexive vigilance and criticality. It calls for the acceptance of difference, of assessment that is not judgemental or power driven, while not turning a blind eye to cruelty and abuse when it occurs or has occurred.  It could be seen in Klein and Bion’s terms about being in the depressive position. The problem with that is that it is not only human to be given to fight or flight, but also that it is more exciting to fight and be in the paranoid -schizoid position.  There is more intensity and while also freighted with fear and persecutory anxiety, it is object seeking, therefore mobilising.  And it is an old strategy going back to the Romans to divide and rule, while offering bread and circus.  And never has there been as much bread and circus as in recent times, in spite of rising inequalities we can dull ourselves and have flight in plenty of entertainment sources and echo chambers allowing us to create more and more subgroups confirming our own positions.

I use the ‘we’ provocatively and deliberately, I can hear as I write voices in my head saying ‘I’m not like that’ ‘we are not like that’ and I agree to some extent: we are not always like that, but ‘there, by the grace of God, go we all’ is also true. Culturally and politically there has been a focus on narcissism as a characteristic of our time, less has been thought about in relation to a narcissism of minor differences afflicting counter-movements.

Divisions abound in movements dedicated to social justice causes and climate change. I see psychoanalysis and left-wing parties have a history of divisions that have allowed others power over them.  I could give many examples and there will be others in the next presentations, but let me stick with one that has to do with the toppling of Colston’s statue in Bristol in the summer of 2020, an episode now famous as part of Black Lives Matter.    You may or not know that following the statue’s toppling and ditching into the harbour, white sculptor Marc Quinn fashioned a sculpture of Jen Reid, who stood on the plinth raising her fist.  As she tells in a presentation marking the first anniversary of that event, that intervention raised a lot of controversy, in her words ‘a lot of noise’, and particularly was opposed by a local Black Women’s group, who objected to Marc Quinn as a white man.  As she put it: ‘If I was drowning and someone threw me a rope and that person happened to be a white man I am not going to tell that white man to go and get me a black man in order to save myself…’ She has fallen out with that group.

So, what can we do?  Acknowledging our vulnerability to these problems might be a start, recognise when we might be falling into them, listen and avoid silencing one another.  Faith Ringgold for me speaks to these issues very well.  A resilient 86-year-old black woman artist and activist, unrecognised for much of her life, gives us poignant portrayals of race relations.  I have chosen two pieces that for me say more than I can say in words.

Between Friends speaks to the barriers and connections of friendship across race divisions, it’s title deliberately ambiguous. The painting (and others in the series) derives from observations of gatherings at Dr. and Mrs. Goldsberry’s home, where she was a summer guest.  The Goldberrys were white lifetime members of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) and hosts to inter-racial gatherings.  Ringgold was particularly struck by the uncomfortable interactions between their black and white visitors, even though they shared a belief in civil rights.

Originally, Ringgold titled this work The Wall Between Friends, which emphasizes the interracial divide bluntly. Her change to the less direct Between Friends provides a broader range of possible meanings and outcomes for the relationship portrayed. We often speak of the understanding “between friends,” or the special connection “between friends.” The “between” in such cases indicates a particularly close, empathetic relationship two people might share. The “between” need not be something that divides. Indeed, a portion of each woman’s body does overlap the central beam slightly, which may offer a sense of hope for the future of this and similar friendships.

Die is the next one, now prominently displayed in MoMA. As ever the picture can be read in different ways.  To me it says that whether white or black, man or woman, division ends in dying, whether literally or not. The next generation suffers. I find the white boy cradling the black girl in the picture heartrending in their gesture and terrified expressions.  The mixed -race infant at left of painting is precariously held by a white woman seemingly fleeing.  We are all in it together and we can all suffer if we don’t see that we have more in common than that which divides us.

On the whole I think we tend to do better at APCS than in other settings I’m acquainted with, but no-one can afford complacency in these difficult times.