So much can change in a short space of time.
I don’t think many of us would have said a year ago, that in 12 months we’d have a government that has passed more bills through the House under urgency than any other New Zealand government.
I don’t think many of us could have foreseen that the quality of our physical and mental health, education, working life, and other touchstones for the stability of our lives would look markedly different.
I don’t think many would have said that the things that we normalise, tolerate, accept would shift in favour of targeting those who are vulnerable, marginalised - those who are seen as other, as less.
I watched a film called Origin this weekend.
It’s from director Ava DuVernay, based on the bestselling book Caste: The Origins of Our Discontents, by Isabel Wilkerson, a Pulitzer Prize winning journalist and author.
I walked into the movie theatre with one view of the world and left with a completely changed perception, so powerful was DuVernay’s directing, and Wilkerson’s premise.
“The ancient lens of caste helps explain most every regression we are now undergoing. It accounts for oppression of all kinds across time and space.”
“Caste is essentially an artificial, arbitrary graded ranking of human value, the underlying infrastructure of a society’s divisions. Any number of random metrics could be used to divide and rank people in a caste system - ethnicity, lineage, religion, language.”
- Isabel Wilkerson
The book, and the film, explain that caste is upheld through a number of man-made pillars, used to uphold our divisions - and to render those divisions inviolate.
The pillars are below, recognisable from linked crises depicted in the film - Nazi Germany, the treatment of Black Americans, and the treatment of Indian Dalits.
“Divine Will and the Laws of Nature: Caste structures are presented as the will of God or the natural order of things, sometimes both. Defenders of caste systems appeal to myths or sacred texts to justify the strict hierarchies they support.
Heritability: People are assigned their caste at birth and pass it on to their descendants. Caste cannot be changed during an individual’s lifetime.
Endogamy and the Control of Mating: Caste-based societies enact laws to prevent intermarriage or intermating between different castes. The penalties for violating these laws are often harsh.
Purity versus Pollution: Members of lower castes are seen as having the ability to “pollute” dominant-caste persons with their touch, their presence, or even their shadow. Bodies of water, such as beaches and swimming pools, are vigorously policed to prevent such “pollution.”
Occupational Hierarchy: Caste dictates the range of occupational possibilities for each person in a society. Lower castes are typically assigned to “unclean,” physically taxing, or servile labor. They form a “mudsill” that protects higher castes from having to perform menial tasks.
Dehumanization and Stigma: Lower castes are treated as less than human. Myths are invented or adapted to rationalize this treatment and explain why subordinate-caste persons are not “really” human to begin with. Individuals in subordinate castes are referred to by nicknames or even numbers.
Terror as Enforcement, Cruelty as a Means of Control: Violence is used preemptively to keep subordinate castes from rising up. Torture and murder are employed not only as punishment but as a proactive means of asserting control.
Inherent Superiority versus Inherent Inferiority: Media and culture are enlisted to perpetuate the idea that castes reflect an inherent hierarchy of beauty, intelligence, morals, or worthiness. Laws reinforce this supposed hierarchy by restricting the dress and manners of the subordinate caste”
I don’t think you can watch this film and not also see the pillars above showing in the appalling terror and dehumanisation occurring in Palestine. In the way Rainbow Storytime events are described as offending the will of God.
In the way increasingly restrictive measures are used to control access to reproductive healthcare.
In the way health equity is decreasing, with access increasingly tipping in the favour of those with privilege.
In the way the wealth gap is increasing, the way workplace protections are being revoked, the way diverse voices are being discounted and silenced.
In the way violent policy controls just as surely as physical violence.
It’s why the cruelty is the point - because it’s about control - and adherence to caste.
In the film Isabel says, “I write answers.”
For me, the film generated some questions.
What if we said out loud that we can see the links between all of these decisions, which are ultimately in service of a system that enforces division?
Are we afraid to call it out because it isn’t true - or because it is?
Does that mean we have both questions and some answers to the divisive tactics that have repeated ad nauseam throughout history?
Maybe we’re all students testing what we know to be true against structures that do not serve us.
Maybe we are starting to see that once those pillars are gone, it’s just us out here.
Holding each other up.