By Gordon Kearns
In the television series "Northern Exposure" the character Joel Fleischman often reminds his friends and himself that he is a Jew. Admittedly not a devout practitioner of his religion, but in the core of his being he bears the unalterable stamp of his people.
In the movie "A Man Called Horse," the Richard Harris character cries out in defiant passion, "I ... AM ... A ... MAN."
And in song Helen Reddy declares, "I am woman; hear me roar."
Man, woman, boy, girl adult, child, senior, Jew, Catholic, Protestant, Muslim, Buddhist, Hindu, Serb, Croat, priest, minister, rabbi, doctor, Hispanic, white, black, liberal, conservative, gifted, Blood, Crip, Lithuanian, German, Armenian, Navajo, husband, wife, father, mother; so many things a person can be. Religions, nations, cultures, races, sexes, ages, politics, occupations - all have measurable and reliable shape, place, function, discipline and ritual.
On the other hand, the behavior of any given person can derive from a fantastically complex and unique network of possibilities. The resulting individual unpredictability doesn't lend itself to a society that finds its security in structure. Since we can't understand the complexity of the individual person's makeup, our human societies have developed a massive system of categories to which their members can be assigned and, therefore, understood. The category becomes the person.
We can't possibly understand Joel as an individual; however, if he's a male Jewish-American from New York, well, we figure we have a pretty good idea what he is and what to expect from him. What individuals by nature are not, society's institutions provide for them to be.
We judge and mistrust one another according to our categories. What we wouldn't do to our next door neighbors because we know them personally, we find no qualms against because of their membership in a category. Witness the horrors in Bosnia perpetrated by otherwise decent men, all in the name of proud ethnicity. How many Serbs would rape the 12-year-old daughter of a lifelong friend. How many don't hesitate to ravish the nameless Muslim preadolescent?
It's not just in our consideration of others that we find comfort and justification for our attitudes. From early in our childhood we look on the conventions of our society as naturally occurring processes for ourselves. A girl who ordinarily looks upon herself as modern-world liberated, blandly surrenders her own identifying surname in marriage to the man she loves. A Jewish boy trains years for his Bar Mitzvah. A serious Catholic shuns contraception. A Muslim sacrificed a lifetime of savings for his trip to Mecca. An African girl-child looks forward to her vaginal mutilation as official recognition of her growing up; and her mother doesn't hesitate in putting her daughter through the painful process because it's the natural way of life.
A recent television show reported on a study of the toy preferences of 3-year-olds at a nursery school. It was observed that the girls gravitated to pretty dolls, and the boys to guns and G.I. Joes, thus suggesting there is a natural gender difference at work in the choices. Of course, the boys all wore long pants, white dress shirts, and neatly combed and slicked, short hair; while the girls wore their prettiest dresses, and their hair was finely brushed and decorated with cute ribbons. Those conducting the study didn't seem to notice that the children pictured already had been well-situated into their sexual categories.
Still, we can't escape playing the roles our cultural institutions expect from us. The African girl will be mutilated. The American girl will perm her long hair, wear spike heels, surrender her name in marriage and, even if she works, probably accept the greater share of tending the home fires - as her husband dutifully goes off to work in suit and tie. And the killing and raping will go on and on, all in the name of our cultural institutions.
However, in spite of the "truths" taught us through childhood, human categories are constructs - artifacts. But they are immutable, and, in essence, limiting of human potential. The best one can hope for is the occasional acceptance of Joel Fleischman, not as man, Jew, American, or New Yorker, but as Joel, who ultimately is Joel only. Because what difference does it make that Joel - or any of us - live, if our life is only as defined by categories invented by other people than ourselves?
or go to
An Explanation; Being Things; Childhood; Heroes; The Inner Spirit;
Elves I Have Known
Other Essays at Large: Movie Classics; Class of the Millennium;
My Book Reviews; My Stories
From Dorothy's Corner: For Dorothy
Comments: GKEARNS@prodigy.net