Caste

 Caste: The Origins of Our Discontents by Isabel Wilkerson
2020
Weight: 1. 7 lbs
Method of Disposal: Mailing to my Mom

I am grateful this heavy, painful, difficult, and powerful book was passed on to me by a friend.  Books like these,  I always think that I want everyone to read them, but then I think, do I?  I want those with the appropriate mental strength and fortitude to read them.  But who should be excused if they do not have that?  Who should read it?  Will this book find the people that will get the most from it?  Or is it more about doing the most with it?  I could see that for some it would be so painful to live treated as a bottom caste member, surrounded by others in the dominant caste, and then to pick up a book like this and read horror upon horror.  I briefly read some of the reviews of this book on Amazon, written by people who seem to be the people I most think would benefit from reading this book, people I want to read it the most, and I am horrified by how quickly they dismiss this book as liberal trash.  Did they really read it?  All the way through?  Or is it best to focus on the MUCH larger number of people who rated it 5 stars?

Here are some snippets from this book that I hope are enough to make you want to read more.  I am still processing and, really, I would rather you read Isabel Wilkerson than read my words trying to express hers anyway.

"None of us chose the circumstances of our birth.  We had nothing to do with having been born into privilege or under stigma.  We have everything to do with what we do with our God-given talents and how we treat others in our species from this day forward.  

We are not personally responsible for what people who look like us did centuries ago.  But we are responsible for what good or ill we do to people alive with us today.  We are each of us responsible for every decision we make that hurts or harms another human being."

I guess the above is not so surprising, but I believe I pulled it out because I am so tired of hearing that argument from white people.  I was not there.  I did not own slaves.  I have no responsibility.  Just stop trying to defend yourself and start trying to be the best person you can possibly be.  We all owe that to each other.

"The fact is that the bottom caste, though it bears much of the burden of the hierarchy, did not create the caste system, and the bottom caste alone cannot fix it.  The challenge had long been that many in the dominant caste, who are in a better position to fix caste inquality, have often been the least likely to want to.

Caste is a disease, and none of us is immune.  It is as if alcoholism is encoded in the country's DNA, and can never be declared fully cured.  It is like a cancer that goes into remission only to return when the immune system of the body politic is weakened.

Thus, regardless of who prevails in any given election, the country still labors under the divisions that a caste system creates, and the fears and resentments of the dominant caste that is too often in opposition to the yearnings of those deemed beneath them."

I think what speaks to me here is that there was Obama and then there was Trump, and it is is easy to want to shout WHAT? HOW? WHO LET THIS HAPPEN?  It is more difficult to know in your heart that Trump did not just happen and is not an anomaly.  That one man or administration is not THE problem.  None of us, no matter our caste, can ignore the caste system.  It is sickening our individual mental and physical health, it is sickening our communities, it is sickening our nations.

"Germany bears witness to an uncomfortable truth--that evil is not one person but can be easily activated in more people than we would like to believe when the right conditions congeal.  It is easy to say, If we could just root out the despots before they took power or intercept their rise.  If we could just wait until the bigots die away...It is much harder to look into the darkness in the hearts of ordinary people with unquiet minds, needing someone to feel better than, whose cheers and votes allow despots anywhere in the world to rise to power in the first place.  It is harder to focus on the danger of the common will, the weaknesses of the human immune system, the ease with which toxins can infect succeeding generations.  Because it means the enemy, the threat, is not one man, it is us, all of us, lurking in humanity itself."

There is so much that I want to pull out and share, like the above quote, but you should just read the book because these beautiful, thoughtful snippets do not have the same power when they stand alone as they do when they are encapsulated with the author's personal experiences, stories from other individuals, people you read about in the news.  Just remember, if it starts to feel like it is too much or that it is overwhelming it is because what you are reading about is too much and is overwhelming.  We cannot fix what we refuse to see and recognize.  If it feels too painful that is because it is too painful, and it has been for a long time.  Ignoring the pain not only does not make it go away, but it makes more pain. If comparing slavery to Nazi Germany rubs you the wrong way, can you at least ask yourself why? Can you, at least, keep reading?  I do not want to be wiping the ash of human beings off a child's jacket and pretending not to see the cruelty around me.  I do not want to hold the burden of having been that person in my lifetime and beyond.  I do not want to be the ash on that child's jacket.  I do not want to miss out on all the great things humanity can achieve if we all take care of each other and allow each other to live and thrive.  

Read this book.  Tell me what you think.  Let's start there.