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Introduction:
Helen Chauncey explains how fear can interfere with coexistence efforts,
especially when it is the high-power group that is proposing "coexistence."
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This rough transcript provides a text alternative to audio. We apologize for occasional errors and unintelligible sections (which are marked with ???).
Identity and Fear
Helen Chauncey
The Coexistence Initiative
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A: Fear can also be a problem because
identity is so fundamental to what all of are, that if I come to you, you
represent Clan A and I represent Clan B. If I either come to you as an outsider
or if I come to you from another clan, particularly if I'm more powerful than
you are, and I say, "You know we're going to get along, we're going to coexist,"
you would have every reason if that's all I said to be afraid, to be afraid that
what I really mean is we're going to coexist and the identity of my clan is
going to more or less dictate values, social practices and so on.
Q: "We're going to coexist under my conditions?"
A: Exactly, "coexist under my conditions." The Universal Declaration of Human
Rights talks about being free from fear, particularly in the context of basic
needs. One of our challenges is to encourage the people we are serving, the
people we learn from to be free from fear that their identity will be attacked.
So that's another challenge.
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