Those of us left feeling uninspired by both the inauguration of President Trump and the politics of the Women’s March will find a sympathetic perspective in writer Sarah B. Anderson’s essay “Inauguration Day, the Women’s March and the Lonely in Between.” Anderson invites all those in the middle ground, unaccounted for, unsatisfied by either side, to “lean in” to the radical reality that “nothing is as simple as it appears.”
“The most radical place to be, the most controversial thing to hold on to, and as a result, the most lonely position to take these days, is that which acknowledges the intricacy in all of it. That refuses to call simple what is not simple.”
These divisive narratives depend on oversimplification, but lived reality—we all know—is far from simple.
I am not going to buy into a group think narrative. There are obvious rights and obvious wrongs in the world, but one political party does not corner the market on all of them. Neither does one presidential era or march. We are operating in a complex world that is attempting to force us into a simplified system. It doesn’t work that way. And if we find ourselves fitting too easily into one or the other, it’s possible we’ve been had. Maybe. I’m just speaking as someone who feels like she doesn’t fit anymore. Who is wary of political labels and promises. Who is feeling isolated in my neglect to pick a “team”. Who is wondering if in the raising of our voices we are quieting the human dignity found in the “other”—because to both teams, on some issues, I am the other. And if not me, then someone else. A real person. And they deserve to be thought of as a real somebody, even when they don’t fit the characterizations we have of them. … We are the new revolutionaries who have one hill to die on. That of knowing nothing is as simple as it appears, there is more murky than maybe either side feels comfortable admitting, and the act of not belonging anywhere is in and of itself belonging and taking a stand somewhere. This too takes courage, self-reflection and conviction. We are not copping out, selling out or flaking out. We are leaning in, we are tuning in and we are giving in to something larger than our need to feel comfortable. We are learning to live in the in between.
Read the whole thing here.
