It's October, and plenty of people are thinking about Halloween, watching scary movies, or reading horror novels. It's a whole month about fear, at least in the modern world. The original Celtic harvest festival wasn't about fear, of course; it was merely that one protected oneself against evil spirits on All Hallow's Eve. After all, it's the night when the veil between our world and the spirit world is the thinnest.
But what if I step away from traditions--modern ones or ancient ones--and talk instead about Fear Privilege?
Fear Privilege is what I call is the power of a dominant group in society to say that their fear matters more than a minority group's fear.
If you stop and consider it, centuries and centuries of history show the tale of humans using fear privilege. Consider World War II. White American citizens decided that their fear of Japanese invasion mattered more than the fear of thousands of innocent Japanese Americans--some of them second or third generation citizens and not recent immigrants. We took away their homes and land, threw them into our own concentration camps, and said our fear of the Japanese outweighed their terror at being imprisoned and abused. Then we claimed the Nazis were evil for putting Jews into concentration camps. Down with those Nazis! Because Nazis are scary, and we're afraid of them. They want to invade America and take away our home and land.
The hypocrisy is easy to see 80 years later. But what about right now? What groups do the Majority fear? The Majority lashes out in that fear, terrorizing minority groups and saying, "My fear matters more!"
As someone who is ex-Christian, I am hyperaware of my previous attitudes versus my current ones. I'm hyperaware of the Christians around me who fear they're being persecuted, and their response to this supposed persecution . . . is persecution. I used to feel that fear. I used to feel like a persecuted Christian. Now I'm not Christian anymore, and I see the Power of the Church. I'm aware of how much power and privilege I gave up and how my life is still very much run by other people's Christian values and Christian worldview. It defines a large part of what I can say and do even though I am a law-abiding citizen. It defines my rights. But I know my fear of having little or no rights doesn't matter because in multiple venues, I am a minority.
It's interesting to stand in a position of having had the power, then not have it and watch how the world shifts around you.
So I guess my Halloween horror movie question is this: Can you give equal credence to someone else's fear?
After all, all hate is really fear that has festered.
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