Building Bridges not Barriers

50 years ago, this August, Martin Luther King Jr spoke his world famous words, within one of the most awe inspiring and well known speeches of the 20th Century. Using the captivating words of what he dreamed he ushered in the hope of freedom for all people, freeing them of all racial prejudice. His dream became reality, with nations following suit. However within that there are and will be some barriers put in place, through peoples assumptions, memories of holding onto wrongs and prejudice of any body, race, creed, sexuality or disability.

Nevertheless we still see this happening, even half a centaury later we still see prejudice. People may be shocked to see it written like this but the truth is that law can stop and eliminate discrimination through prejudice, but realistically the power automatically becomes powerless when dealing with prejudice rather than discrimination, for the above reason I listed.

Is it possibly to eliminate the prejudice in people rather than just create laws preventing discrimination?

The truth is that we are all prejudice to one form or another.

Being Disabled, I have met discrimination an awful lot, sad as it. I could tell you story after story of how I have been targeted due to my disability, but I wont. I will only give you two examples, with each showing a different form of discrimination that a young disabled man has had to put up with.

Story 1: One of my best Friends and I decided to go to Nando's for dinner, He absolutely loves the place and is usually his chosen venue. Alas the place is always busy, with this also being near Christmas time (as that is when Paul is usually back) there was snow and ice on the ground. We ventured out with me sitting in my wheelchair, as expected it was busy and we were waiting in the queue, coincidently in the doorway, Paul stood back a little. A group came before us, this one young lad looked me up and down, said "no worries" put one foot in between my legs and climbed over me to get out. No consideration to ask me to move, which I would have happily have done, or to consider my feelings. Where was the fact that this guy, albeit in a wheel chair, was a human being who shouldn't just be walked over, which is inevitably what he did? He saw me as an obstacle rather than a person, would he have seen me differently is I was a healthy, 6 ft, muscular and threatening in appearance?

Story 2: This recently happened, but happens a lot. I decided to go the beach with my girlfriend, trying to enjoy the seaside, as one does, we got our fish and chips and wanted to park up and sit by the sea. We found a little spot with a disabled parking space outside a venue that was perfect, so we parked up. There was obviously an event on for OAP's, which we were unaware of, every time someone pulled up they stopped, looked at us, with a glare almost with an air of "why are you parked there!". They then parked somewhere else and walked past, every person who walked past stopped to check that I had my Blue Badges on display, that I truly deserved to be parked in "their spot".
In this case, it was different to the other story, because in this case I was being discriminated against, not because of my disability but because of my age combining with my disability. I clearly don't look disabled, which is nice, but that doesn't mean that I am any less disabled. With that truth being that I possibly had a little more mobility problems than some who were "eyeballing" me. Would any of these people have questioned the fact that I needed this parking spot if I was over 65? As I have heard the comedian Michael MacIntyre say "What do you expect to see, the person flop from the car and start crawling?"

In both case's I felt discrimination, yet this is against the law, and I would whole heartedly believe that if these people were sat down and spoken to about their actions that they would defend that they weren't discriminating me, and I do believe that they probably wouldn't discriminate maliciously, yet they were discriminating through prejudice.

The issue I believe here is the cliquishness. It is natural for different peoples groupings to form natural groups, with individual identities, coming with that certain expectations. In this case people put up barriers, built up brick by brick with the groups expectations and identities. We saw this recently, let alone throughout history, where a religious group, whose concern is truth, drawing lines of successions and expulsions, often closing ranks forcing their individual barriers to come out stronger. The problems with lashing out at any religious group is the understanding between extremists and individuals, to normal people with individual view points. It often becomes commonly said " I am right you are wrong" and " what is not done my way shouldn't be done at all".

Having a refreshingly open minded view point on the world, would follow the hopeful nature of Martin Luther King, open minded with hope of an equal future keeping in mind the phrase "Whoever is not against us is with us" rather than the extremist view point of "whoever is not with me is against me". There is a big difference between the two. In different circumstances there may be a place for either, but I honestly believe that we should be aware of a natural tendency to jump to negative conclusions when faced with an outsider.

Whether we realise it or not, we all harbour certain prejudices in our heart. We see this in the bible when it explains in Jeremiah 17:9 "the Heart is more deceitful than anything else" It is for this reason why I believe that people can be discriminating in prejudice rather than by law. Believing whole heartedly that they are tolerant of people of all types, even rationalising  that we have a valid reason to hold a negative viewpoint.

Yet this must stop, we must stop. We must remind ourselves of Peters words in Acts (10:34,35) "then Peter began to speak "I now realize how true it is that God does not show favouritism but accepts from every nation the one who fears him and does what is right""

We need to follow Peter's example here and come to this realisation that God is partial to all. Take a step back evaluate yourself, your barriers, instead of putting them up try and form a bridge.