Choosing love as an act of courage

My daughter and I recently visited my nieces in New Delhi, India, and each year I visit, we make time to reflect about the joys and politics of our lives. These critical thinkers are all in their twenties and so thoughtful, caring and deliciously irreverent.

Our reflections are particularly poignant on the heels of the tragic shootings in America, and the bigotry displayed by the U.S. President in shunning racialized Congresswomen. The writing was on the wall after a racist presidential rally that stirred up hate speech from the crowds. This white supremacist trope is an old insidious tale ratcheted up by settlers on stolen land. More ongoing erasure of the fact that we all collectively occupy lands colonized and pillaged from Indigenous people. Sadly, the worst tragedies in human history are rooted in such hateful rhetoric.

Yet, such dehumanizing strategies are gathering storm – from Washington to New Delhi to Toronto and Montreal. If you are an Indigenous mother in Canada, you understand that the state’s failure to protect women, girls and children from murder or child poverty is rooted in cultural genocide. If you wear a hijab or turban or yarmulke, Quebec’s secularism law reminds you that you are unwelcome. Under such political hegemony, Jagmeet Singh, the Canadian-born and current leader of the NDP party, cannot work for the Quebec government with his degree from Osgoode Law School. Meanwhile, if you are a refugee in Toronto, the Ford government has cut legal aid so drastically that you will face even more barriers to fight your case to remain here. Across the earth, in Kashmir, a beautiful eight-year-old Muslim child was brutally raped and murdered, and Hindutva fundamentalists respond with macabre rallies in support of the accused. Listening to fiendish news debates that tally rapes of girls from Hindu versus Muslim homes to justify brutality, one wonders how politicians can defend any argument where girls are used as weapons of war. Heart-wrenching stories of violence like this are commonplace in Kashmir – one of the most heavily occupied military zones in the world. As I’m writing this, India has annexed Kashmir by revoking a law established 70 years ago to allow Kashmiris a notion of autonomy to make their own laws. India and Pakistan are on the brink of war again while the world is conveniently too busy to care. Besides, the pace of Tweets from the Whitehouse keeps everyone busy in the home of the brave, where the wheel of trauma spins daily to grind out ugly truths that live beneath the skin of the “free”. Every day, the family separation policy forces children from their parents as a state tool to punish vulnerable refugees for entering America. Should we share with our leaders that Turkey hosted 3.8 million asylum seekers and Uganda hosted 1.2 million asylum seekers in 2018? Scripts that tell people of colour or ethnic minorities to “go back to crime infested countries” or “love it or leave it” are lacking in imagination but also terrifying, because it makes us wonder what corrupt leaders are plotting while they keep the masses busy with witch hunts. We are weary of all the divisive agendas from governments across the globe, but we are awake and we see you.

Whether it is racism, ableism, classism, homophobia, transphobia, patriarchy or misogyny that spills into our lives, it feels like we are always armoured up for battle wherever we are in the world today. It seems we don the role of yodhas in response to violence in our daily lives. My nieces in Delhi talk about negotiating what they can and cannot share about their lives in their circles and the misogyny they have to face on a daily basis. Just as my Canadian-born daughter who makes her home in Montreal relives stories about social spaces where she feels like an outsider and the shaming she experiences for being a racialized woman in her beloved country. I consider out loud my own acts of resistance, when encountering “othering” in various systems – from social circles to board rooms to community activism. We ask ourselves, “what are we allowed to do as daughters, mothers, activists and leaders in the countries we call our home and who benefits from keeping us out?”

During these inter-generational conversations that center our narratives as women of colour, we share strategies that uplift our experiences of the world. How do we become thoughtful mentors and honest guides who can lift each other up and also lovingly hold each other accountable? How do we embrace our beautiful, complex, intersectional journeys and hold space without judgment? How do we celebrate our bodies and liberate ourselves in the context of colonizing, culture appropriating and patriarchal messaging? How do we shine in on our own stories of resilience, rather than center the voices of those who steal our collective power? How do we find each other across arbitrary borders and vast socio-cultural divides in meaningful ways? How do we include love in our intentions with ourselves and each other?

Through our generous inter-generational dialogue, we endeavour to liberate our narratives of strength. We continue speaking up against white supremacy, colonization and hate, and interrupt patriarchal societal constraints that tether us. We look to powerful mentors to guide us towards truth. We choose love to help us see each other, and to find our way through difficult conversations. My daughter Tara and I would like to share just a few favourite resources that help us to laugh, cry, rage, love, and act – please share yours with us and let’s light up some courageous conversations with love.

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