Of books & battle lines
How can we de-escalate, depolarize, step away from our battle lines?
When I studied for an MA in English at Queen’s University in the early 2000s, the buzziest field was post-colonial – books about the legacy of colonialism. And in that category, the buzziest book was White Teeth by Zadie Smith. Smith was born in London to an English father and a Jamaican mother. Her debut novel, White Teeth is a lively and searing set of interlocking stories about three families, three cultures and three generations set in a vibrant, multicultural London of the 90s. Immigration, assimilation and belonging are its main themes. People of colour in the novel experience racism regularly – it’s baked into the system – but it doesn’t define their lives. There’s humour and nuance, alongside questions of how to live together in the aftermath of Empire. There’s a reason Smith won accolades for it. And there’s no way a book like this could be published today.
“White Teeth seemed fresh and hopeful in 2000 – how does it read now?” the Guardian wondered in 2020. Sadly, it’s hard to imagine “a contemporary novel so fearlessly multicultural,” it said, “in which a young author feels entirely free to inhabit the heads of people of different sexes, races and religious persuasions, and to do so with joy and irreverence. Who feels comfortable poking gentle fun at Christianity, Islam and Rastafarianism alike [. . .] It’s fun to read such cheeky lines,” the Guardian concluded, “but also poignant to realize how much more fraught things have become.”
studied at the University of Cambridge. (Facebook).
is a graduate of Oxford. (Facebook).
Clinging to power
I went back to White Teeth recently after finishing another novel about the British Empire called Babel by R.F. Kuang. Born in China, Kuang immigrated to the U.S. when she was four. Babel came out in 2022. It’s in the rare category of historical fantasy, set in an alternative-reality 1830s England. In Babel, Britain’s imperialistic march around the globe is financed by the power of magical silver bars, which only Oxford University scholars can control. The main character, brought to Oxford from China, gradually realizes that his education and skills prop up Britain’s criminal stranglehold on its colonies. The book’s central question is whether positive change – specifically, decolonization – by well-meaning people can happen gradually, or whether violence and force are the only solution.
Babel is a brilliant and compelling book. It’s also pretty depressing. There’s no question that Babel made me think, and jot down startling phrases, and then research the Opium Wars – which I’m embarrassed to say I knew nothing about. But Kuang’s world is a grim place, offering only the slimmest of hopes for humanity’s redemption in its bleak future. Ultimately Oxford’s seat of power, a building nicknamed Babel, collapses, just like the tower in Genesis 11. From White Teeth to Babel in 20 years.
(from far left) John Milloy, Neal DeRoo and Ashwani Peetush. (Angela Reitsma Bick).
The lines we draw
Both of those books explore the colonizer/colonized relationship, but tension, of course, can occur between any two people groups. I recently attended an Institute for Christian Studies (ICS) conference called “Beyond Culture Wars: Fostering Solidarity in an Age of Polarization.” During a panel discussion Neal DeRoo, ICS professor, offered a helpful polarization rubric.
It used to be, he said, that when we disagreed with someone, we’d say, “I’m right and you’re wrong.” As White Teeth puts it (poking fun of its own idealism while still reaching for it), “people should just live together, you know, in peace and harmony or something.”
In the Donald Trump era, DeRoo said, things got a little more intense. That was when we’d say of someone we disagreed with: “I’m right and you’re an idiot” (which was the title of a book on public discourse published in 2016). When debate devolves into name-calling, that’s a problem, as the Speaker of the House of Commons made quite clear in early May. It’s not OK for Canada’s leaders to call each other “wacko,” “shameful” or “spineless.” Nor is it OK for me to be called “naive, immature” and “asinine,” based on my April editorial, in an online forum made up of members of the Christian Reformed Church. (Those jibes were challenged by others, which I appreciated; yet they’re the kind of barb that has a way of lingering.)
It’s not OK for Canada’s leaders to call each other ‘wacko,’ ‘shameful’ or ‘spineless.’
These examples bring us to DeRoo’s last point. “We’ve lost the ability,” he said, “to say we understand someone without agreeing with them.” By this point, the stakes are higher. Now we say, “I’m right, and your wrong-ness threatens my being right; I will not rest until I convince you I’m right.” In such battle lines are the seeds of war sown.
The way forward
How can we de-escalate, depolarize, step away from our battle lines?
Our little five-person family just went through a tough week. I had a hard time focusing on anything. In the midst of that, the communion of saints (aka Christian Courier writers) started sending in their columns. Without any specific topic prompt, this beautiful list of suggestions for a way forward poured in. I guess the question is on more minds than mine! They said:
Give a soft answer.
Build trust.
Address underlying issues.
Tell me what the poets are doing.
Petition the Lord.
Ask for help.
Look for hope.
Reach for truth.
What would you add?
