‘Names will never hurt me.’

‘Sticks and stones can break my bones, but names will never hurt me.’

So goes the old rhyme that many of us heard in our childhood. But all of us have stories of the exact opposite being true. Most of us have never been physically assaulted, but many of us live with the scars of being called names or being labelled in some way.

When I was growing up in Northern Ireland I realised that what we called people, the labels we attached to them, led us to treat them differently or to accept that they could be treated differently.

Gordon Allport’s scale of prejudice clearly shows that antilocution, the negative things we say about others is the first step in a progressive move towards the final stage of extermination. Describing people differently leads us to avoidance, either voluntary or enforced, then to discrimination, either personal or systemic. This then allows us to practice or allow others to practice subtle agression, leading to physical attack and finally extermination.

Many people in my own community in Northern Ireland would not physically have attacked or harmed any one from the other community, but their comments when these things happened showed that they would not condemn such behaviour being practiced on another human being. Such behaviour could be condoned because of political or religious beliefs.

The recent study by the STUC on ‘banter’ in the workplace reveals that language used of other people, even in jest can be offensive and abusive and needs to be dealt with.

Communication vowels.

Assumptions – what assumptions are you making?

Evaluation – what criteria are you using to evaluate the communication?

Information – have you got all the information you need?

Observation – are you observing this communication from only one angle?

Understanding – how do all these things affect your understanding of the situation?

The importance of Dialogue

Last week I watched the Channel 4 production ‘Endgame’ which told the story of the secret talks between both sides of the apartheid divide which then led the way to the end of apartheid and the subsequent elections for all South Africans.

It reminded me of a documentary last year about the secret talks between the IRA and the British government which were mediated by Jonathan Powell.

His words at the end of the programme were these:

The conclusion I’ve come to… is that you should talk to your enemies. I wouldn’t always have thought this, but I do now think that we ought to have channels of communications with other terrorist movements too.  You should have them with Hamas, with the Taliban, with Al Qa’eda. It’s much harder to kill people when you know them. You have to get to know people and build a relationship of trust to break out of the cycle of violence.

If we thought of the Taliban, or Hamas, or Al’ Qaeda as human beings rather than as terrorists, if they thought of us as human beings rather than Western Governements imposing their will, then it would be much harder to carry on fighting rather than reach a peaceful solution.

Why is it that talking is always the last thing we do, and that talking to the enemy is seen as betrayal, when it is only talking that finally brings about any resolution of any dispute or disagreement?

You’d think we would have learned something by now in our time in history, but we always seem to need to learn the same thing in every generation.