How has the “Be Kind” brigade become so cruel?

We were told that Woke stood for Awakening, to wake up to where we needed to become more tolerant, open, aware of bias and inequity.  We were told that it was about being “kind”.  How has it happened, then, that we are actually waking up to a world that is less tolerant, more divided and cruel than I have ever known it in my lifetime?

Every day we read of vitriol on social media, of people being threatened with death, rape, harm to family should they express an opinion that is not considered “acceptable”. Such a person or group posting this unpleasantness often hides behind an anonymous or false user-name.  These words would probably not be expressed in a similar way if people were actually to meet face-to-face or be looking one another in the eye, but on social media people seem to think they can say whatever disgusting things they like. Some, no doubt, do this without fully being aware of the impact of the words.  Others will be writing these words deliberately to threaten, to frighten, and to silence.

We have come to a place that is similar to a child’s playground and yet the grown-ups have left the room.  We are left in a world where sending people to Coventry is commonplace, where Chinese Whispers end up getting spread and ruining a person’s career, or life, without due process of the law.  We are in a place where pointing fingers of blame at anyone and everyone happens every day but where a finger very seldom points back at the person who is doing the accusing, so there is little personal responsibility or personal awareness of their own part in a situation.  Telling tales and snitching is the norm in business and politics, where people run to a boss or HR to report feeling offended by something someone said.  Name calling and labelling those who have a different viewpoint is used as a way of shaming the person into silence – “bigot, racist, transphobe, Islamophobe” etc – so there is no real will in hearing another person’s opinion. And cancelling the lecturer who might talk on subjects that are not popular to some majority view removes the threat of anyone actually being able to challenge their own opinions. Or, as happened at the Oxford Union this week, the audience turn like a mob on a speaker who doesn’t conform to their world view. Manners and respect go out of the window, as does curiosity.

This is the most intolerant and judgemental period of my life.  Forgiveness, or an effort to understand the ambiguities and subtleties of life, have been discarded.  It is a black and white world where you are either with me or against me, either good or bad, and if you have a different opinion to me then you are bad, if not actually evil.

How have we got here?  It has been building up over several years now and is silencing people’s ability to joke, to speak out about what they believe in, or even to test out ideas as a group, for fear of saying something someone in the group dislikes because then you’re in trouble. Cancelled.

You aren’t allowed to make mistakes.  Young men have always been rather clumsy in their first attempts at wooing and my generation generally forgave them (sometimes too much) but no young person, whatever their sex, knows exactly what to do when they first get together with the person they are attracted to.  It is a learning curve that can often take several years to discover what works best.  Yet it seems that if you get it wrong these days you can be sent to Coventry, as was apparently the case of Oxford student Alexander Rogers, who tragically committed suicide.

The Sunday Times of 1 December carried some heartbreaking stories of university students nervous of speaking up. They shared experiences of being ostracised, sidestepped by friends and isolated if they said or did something perceived as wrong or offensive, or out of kilter with the current groupthink.  Building a social network of friends at university is so important but how can you know who your friends are in this tribal world, where making one small mistake can have you cruelly shoved out of the group. 

Who have we become that we are so unforgiving, that we don’t realise that we spend the whole of our lives, not just our childhood, learning, adapting and improving ourselves.  Personal development doesn’t stop when we leave school. We are continually learning and reinventing ourselves as we go through different phases of life and in this we have to listen to others, be curious, and take the odd risk to push ourselves into a new career, direction or relationship.

This is very far from any “kind” generation.  It is more a world of “Lord of the Flies” and subtle and not-so-subtle bullying and threatening, so that no one dares to have a different opinion or to bother to really think why people have formed a set of opinions, or whether they are based on facts or context. 

The sad truth is that we can’t always be kind to everyone.  If we are kind to one set of people, we can’t always be as kind to another set.  Such is life, and any government has to make difficult decisions, knowing that giving money in one direction will mean that some other group will go without.

However, this doesn’t mean you don’t have compassion for both sides, or for all needs, even if you can’t actively help everyone.  You don’t have to have a firm preference for one side or another but in this day and age apparently you aren’t allowed to see in shades of grey. The subtleties of situations such as Israel/Gaza, the fallout from mass immigration, the decisions around Brexit, the trans debate, the difference between being a Muslim and an Islamist, the election of Trump, the war in Ukraine, or climate change are lost. You can’t even explore those subtleties in conversation because in doing so you might expose yourself to be on the “wrong” side and that would threaten your position with your friends or work colleagues.

It seems that keeping in with the in-crowd these days involves chucking others out in the most cold and callous way. And it isn’t just in student life, this is true in business too, where the smallest misspeak can get you sent to HR, even if your intention was not to do any harm.  The grownups are just as bad – statements like “I’ll never have a cup of tea with a Tory” or “I won’t talk to a Brexiteer” are common and are intended to close down discussion.

Recently it was reported in The Guardian of 25 November that Professor Dorothy Bishop, Emeritus Professor of developmental neuro-psychology has resigned from the Royal Society because of Elon Musk’s fellowship.  She has been quoted as saying “I am not going to be polite and nice to Elon Musk, so I can’t keep the code of conduct.”  But why can she not be polite to him?  She may disagree with him but surely she could have an interesting conversation with him to discuss their differences?  Similarly, Bishop Helen-Ann Hartley, who recently called for the resignation of the Archbishop of Canterbury, Justin Welby, says she has since met a “wall of silence” from her fellow Bishops, effectively sending her to Coventry for her action.  Again, why can’t people have reasoned debate and discussion and learn from one another’s differences instead of just deciding, without deeper investigation, that someone is a bad person for something they have said or done. We may disagree but that doesn’t make them a bad person.

All this adds up to a judgemental and unforgiving period of history that is stifling freedom of speech, creativity and relationships.  It is making people nervous to open their mouths for fear of alienation or being misunderstood.  It is not a good place for a society to end up.  We have too many examples through history of how populations have been silenced to the detriment of the majority.

If being “kind” is really something of an aim, then that takes being rather more curious as to WHY people have that opinion because very often you discover they are not so different in their principles and aims. However, if you can’t be bothered to understand the background or intentions that underlay their views you will never arrive at a meeting point. I have a friend who has a very different view of Assisted Dying to my own, but I fully respect his opinion and remain fond of him as a friend. Why shouldn’t I? The whole point of ‘diversity’ was to listen to others different to ourselves, wasn’t it?

Is it not time to slow down, stop judging and pointing fingers but instead ask questions? Teachers told us not to tell tales, bully or isolate friends.  Let’s remember some of those playground messages. We will never learn anything if we silence opposite opinions.  The adage “I may not agree with your opinion but I respect your right to express it” needs to be lived and acted upon more often if we are to innovate, grow and get along as a society.  Silencing people, dividing or isolating them is anything but kind.