Cynthia Fortlage reflects on acceptance without understanding, using a local plastic bag ban to explore how policies affect people with disabilities. She also addresses missing and murdered Indigenous women and girls, and lack of clean water on Treaty 3 territory, arguing that accepting others' lived experiences creates space for real dialogue.
Hi, Cynthia here, still in beautiful British Columbia. Everywhere is beautiful, by the way. This is just different than where I live. I wanted to share with you today some insight to how acceptance without understanding is lived out on a daily basis. This morning I was reviewing a post that I had put out about how I felt the city of Victoria, British Columbia, on the island of Vancouver Island, how I thought it had done a beautiful job of banning plastic bags and plastic straws. And I was challenged upon that acclamation by folks of not having the perspective of those folks with physical diversity than myself. And I realized at that moment that, you know, they're right. I do not have a physical disability. I am very able-bodied, thankfully. And at the end of the day, I don't know all of the reasons, and I don't need to understand the reasons that they need to have the product. And we had a brief chat of whether or not alternate products could work. I was informed that it couldn't. I was given directions on how to get additional information. Now you see, a lot of people continue to understand, "Well, if we've got these exceptions, if you can use a paper straw, well, isn't that good enough?" Acceptance without understanding says, "No. That is their lived truth, not mine.". And I have to accept their lived truth because they, like I, am a human being. And they deserve to be treated that way. My understanding comes from me doing the hard work. One of the things that I'll continue to share with you is the insight that I found that was shared to me regarding the Indigenous issues within Canada. Dealing with murdered and missing Indigenous women and girls, dealing with the lack of clean drinking water when my own city that I live in gets its water from a Treaty 3 territory. And the aspect is that through this journey we have to understand that those are not our lived experiences. Experiences. And other human beings have their own unique lived experiences. And it is our job to accept them as human beings on their own journey with their own lived experiences. Not to ask why. Why is that question that we continue to ask to gain understanding. Which means if you believe believe that, then therefore we are a society that needs, that seeks to understand in order to accept. If we can't understand, we cannot accept. That's not the way to treat other human beings. What we need to do is we need to accept without understanding. Because only when we accept without understanding Does it create a safe space for us to have a dialogue in order to learn from each other? Hugs and kisses. Bye!
