INTERSECTIONALITY?!?

i hardly know her...

i wanna jump asshole first into a woodchipper...

I had a great conversation with one of my lovely cousins the other day and it really distilled something for me. I finally heard the soft ball, soft serve message that young men have been hearing. The message is, “why can't we just unite as Americans under the shared identity of American's? Why do we have to keep putting each other into all these little boxes? Why can't we just put people in one box and have one identity and can't we unite as American's?” - Doesn't that sound nice? It's hard to argue against it. I too would like to see everyone get along. I love cooperation. I love when people are nice to each other. I would very much like a united America. An America where people respect each other. An America where we can get along. An America where we can all feel good about moving into the future together. BUT. And it's a big but, I don't think going to war against intersectionality is the way to unite America.

Now, first and foremost, I love my cousin, and I am so glad we talked, and we will continue to talk; this is not a condemnation on a human being hearing a nice message and saying, “yeah, I would like some of that.” BUT. And again, it’s a big but, the soft ball, soft serve message of, 'uniting everyone under one identity, an American identity' is something that, philosophically, defies all of recorded human history, human progress, and all human interactions past and present.

So here goes; this is my case for Intersectionality...

Intersectionality is crucial for government efficiency. If you are concerned with government efficiency, then intersectionality can be your biggest tool for success. Émile Durkheim studied suicide in France and published a fantastic book in 1897, Suicide: A Study in Sociology. Durkheim engaged in ZERO emotional labor; he was not there to ask people about, 'how do you feel and what makes you so sad and alienated?” He went to the morgue and asked for a huge stack of death certificates, and he singled out every death certificate that said 'suicide'. Durkheim did a Census of suicide victims; this was the second sociological study on Earth. And although suicide feels like an extremely individualistic act, Durkheim quickly saw that there were easily recognizable social patterns. So, what did Durkheim do? He started to put people in boxes. He counted all the men, the women, the Catholics, the Protestants, the city mice & the country mice, and they were all placed in different boxes; not out of hate, but out of an innate human ability & desire to label, name and identify things. Now, were all of these people French, were they united as one under the French identity? Of course (united as much as anyone could be for 1890's France). They were French men, French women, French Catholics, French Protestants, French city mice, and French country mice. But studying suicide through the filter of 'French' is too vague; you can't center you research on 'French suicide'; it's not zoomed in enough to get a clear picture, and you cannot allocate resources efficiently. If you want to help French suicide victims, then you need to do a census to find out; who in France is committing suicide? This was the first time on Earth, statistically, that we found out men commit suicide more than women. Durkheim's data was so good, he found out that Catholics commit suicide on Saturday night, so they don't have to do confession on Sunday morning. Now, what the hell does this have to do with government efficiency? If men are 90% of all suicides, then don't they get 90% of suicide resources allocated to them? Why split it 50/50 with having a targeted suicide prevention program positioned towards women? They don't need the help that men do. Now, this is not an anti-woman stance. Every time a woman commits suicide it's an unspeakable loss. But, if we spend billions of dollars blanketing the highways with suicide prevention billboards targeting women, there are going to be millions of women driving around, looking at these billboards saying, “who are these for? I don't wanna kill myself!? Why don't they make these billboards for someone who actually is planning on committing suicide?” And they would be right to question our tactics. Is suicide prevention important? Oh, hell yea it is. But we have a finite number of resources and throwing unlimited amounts of money at an unstudied problem only makes it worse. So, Engage in Intersectionality; find a problem; find who suffers from that problem; complete a census of those people suffering from the problem you're investigating and then allocate resources based on how bad off each different group is; not all groups are the same; and not all groups are going to need the same amount of help; that’s efficiency. In Durkheim's study, women, who were married and Catholic and had kids and lived in the country had very low suicide rates; it's not anti-woman to say that women, who fall into that specific category won't be given lots of suicide prevention assets. On the flip side, men, who were Protestant, single, and lived in the city; they had much higher rates of suicide and they needed help, lots of help; and Durkheim's not trying to defraud the government by stealing a bunch of funds for his buddies, Durkheim identified the people that had a higher need for help. If you have a problem, and that problem involves millions of people, it is going to be insanely hard to manage resource allocation without finding out the differences in the millions of people you are trying to help. Not everyone needs the same help in the same way, and you can save yourself a lot of heartache by finding out who needs the help the most and concentrating your resources there; that's efficiency. When one group is given more assets than another group; it is not an attack on the group that receives less; they might not have the same need. If you are interested in government efficiencies and solving large scale problems that involve millions of people, you need to be willing to engage with intersectionality; I'm not asking you, I'm telling you. Now, remember what the original prompt is, “we need to unite under one box and stop putting people into multiple boxes” – Durkheim shows us that putting people into multiple boxes is the only way to control government efficiencies and resource allocation responsibly; it also shows a clear, logical and rational way to get millions of diverse people lifesaving crucial help.

*acknowledging the gender paradox in suicide; I'm not a professional suicide researcher and Durkheim's study is from 1897; lots has changed; Currently, men have higher rates of completing a suicide whilst women have higher rates of suicide ideation (thinking of doing it) and higher rates of suicide attempts; that's something Durkheim didn't study; also - gay, trans, and intersex individuals suicide rates need to be studied; along with native peoples suicide rates. All individuals deserve to be heard, listened to and have suicide prevention assets allocated to them. This emphasizes the fact that intersectionality is vitally important, now, more than ever.*

Now, let's have the Abrahamic, Christian discussion about how engaging in intersectionality is the most important thing that human beings have ever been involved in. In the beginning, in Genesis, it is said that God paraded all the animals in front of Adam and whatever name that Adam gave the creatures that would be their name going forward. Remember the original prompt, “Why do we put people in boxes? Why can't we just all unite under one box?” Then why didn't God just call all the creatures, Animal? What is the point of putting all these animals in different boxes? Why would we label, name and identify every animal? Isn't intersectionality destroying the western world? Why can't the animals all just unite under one identity the Animal identity? Why do we have to have differences in mammals or lizards or freshwater or salt water or amphibians or primates? Everything is just, Animal, correct? And if we label, name and identify the animals like we label, name and identify people, then we are just going to somehow ruin everything that humans have built for thousands of years? Even though humans have been labeling, naming and self-identifying themselves for the entire time they have ever existed. I don't go to the grocery store and buy - Plant. There are differences. There are fruits and vegetables. There are fungi & mold; hell, lots of different fungi & mold. There are lots of different kinds of meat. There are 50 different kinds of kiwi. And I have to know where I stand; am I gluten intolerant, lactose intolerant, allergic to nuts? I have to engage with the intersectionality of nutrition to even feed myself on a daily basis. I am not ruining the natural world by labeling, naming and identifying all of the different plants that God put on earth and then allocating my resources to the foods that will be the most efficient for myself. In the Abrahamic, Christian faith, human beings were put on earth to label, name and identify things; we were literally put on this earth to engage with intersectionality. And if you think animals and plants are complex; just wait until I introduce you to 8 billion people on earth; they are way more complex; and they have really sophisticated ways to label, name and self-identify themselves and they have a shared history of doing this for thousands of years. Being against intersectionality is being against the main tenet of world building for the Abrahamic, Christian faith.

Whilst continuing with the Abrahamic, Christian faith; they themselves operate under the structure of intersectionality. Whilst glossing over ancient Christian history and the schism in Egypt that split the Roman empire in half (deciding whether or not Jesus was God incarnate or a lesser god; the Council of Nicaea). We can now think about how the Catholic Church had a monopoly on the Christian faith for thirteen-hundred years (even the Catholic church split into eastern & western versions because they couldn't agree on whether or not to take sacraments, - drama queens). Then, an English king wanted a divorce, the Catholic church didn't wanna give it to him and he started the Protestant church. Then a guy named Martin Luther nailed a bunch of complaints on the door of a church and kicked off the Protestant Reformation and now there are 200 Christian denominations in America and a lot more internationally. For the record, I glossed over ALOT. Let's look at the modern state of American Christianity. The Catholic Church plays a huge role in American Christianity, and historically, they claim to be the oldest and the original version of Christianity worldwide. So, holding that the Catholic church is the big dog; you got the Protestants next and then, in no particular order, Pentecostal, Lutheran, Methodist, Nazarene, Seventh-day Adventist, Presbyterian, Episcopal, and Mormon churches; Wait; - Where am I going with this? Remember the original prompt “Why can't we just unite under one box? Why do we have to put people into different boxes?” This is also a question under the guise of Unity. We are supposed to take peoples identity away to unify the country. Imagine telling all of the churches that I listed that they have to give up their personal beliefs and identities to unify under the Catholic Church to unify Christianity. Do you think it would unify them, or do you think they would riot? I think they would riot. Try telling Mormons they don't get to be Mormons anymore and they now have to unify Christianity under the Catholic Church; it sounds ludacris. And it sounds just as ludacris when someone tells me that if I have an identity then I am somehow dividing America and I have to drop all my identities to only have one identity - American. I know I'm American; I just happen to be a lot of other stuff too. And you can't remove my identity at the barrel of a gun and expect it to have a unifying effect. God can't even stop themselves from engaging in intersectionality, God puts Christians into little boxes, lots of little boxes! There is not one unified Christian identity. That's why I disagree when someone says America is a Christian nation. Which version of Christianity are you talking about? I know they have a base level of understanding; Jesus is my homeboy, all dogs go to heaven & hell is hot; but Christians have the ability to label, name and self-identify themselves a thousand times over based on interpretations of ancient texts and allegories that have been translated over many languages over many times. So. Why can I not have an identity? Why can I not use Pro-nouns? Why can I not self-identify? The non-secular world of religion gets to use intersectionality on a global scale with billions of followers and no one would ever tell them to stop all their denominations and go back to their original state, especially in order to “Unify” their religion. The toothpaste is outta the tube; it's not going back in. American's have always been a diverse group of people, and our strength comes from our diversity. Our strength comes from empathy. Our strength comes from all our unique individual identities. I am so glad I live in a world where everyone isn't the same. I am so glad I fit into way more than one box. Human beings have never occupied 'one box'. I'm so glad that there are lots of boxes that I get to choose from. The idea of putting human beings into 'one box' defies God, logic, rationality, history and any possibility of a future. Intersectionality is the most important thing that humans have been involved in whilst on Earth.

quick note – I am not an atheist and I am not an agnostic; I believe in a god, I just don't believe in any man made way to get there; I am more in line with the Baha'i faith; I was a camp counselor one summer for the kids of the Baha'i center of Las Vegas, they really are lovely people, but I also don't claim to be a Baha'i member, just a fan of their thought process. They have 9 sided buildings to welcome all 9 major religions (atheism included).

Anyways. Thank you for reading all this and let’s wrap up.

When your friend and loved one says to you, “why can't we all just unify under the American identity? And why can't we all get along? Why can't we just fit in one box? Why do we have to be put into so many different boxes?” You can confidently tell them that putting people into different boxes is called intersectionality and it's done in order to help. You can tell them confidently that intersectionality is the most important thing humans have ever engaged in. You can tell them confidently that intersectionality is an amazing tool to drive government efficiencies. You can tell them that, biblically, God put you on earth to label, name and identify things. You can tell them that by labeling, naming and identifying things that nothing is under attack. In fact, the opposite, if Christians couldn't break away from other Christians to start their own denominations, to label, name and identify their own unique beliefs and rituals, then, they either would have gone to war with the Catholic Church or quit being Christians – and that's definitely not unity, in fact they are stronger due to their diversity. And I would argue, if intersectionality works for the non-secular world (religious world); then why would intersectionality destroy the secular world (non-religious world)?

The soft ball, soft serve message that is going out about “not putting people into different boxes” is a way to deny people their ability to have an identity. America has 350 million people and there are 350 million identities; everyone is unique. Telling people they are not allowed to self-identify will not create unity. Forcing someone to identify in a way that isn't in accordance to how they feel and live will not create unity. Removing protections and writings on historical and governmental websites about gay people and trans people, and other individuals with any identity that is now 'a threat' is not going to unify the country. Threatening people because they have pronouns in their titles will not bring unity.

The way forward is through empathy and education. Our strength is in our diversity.

Engage in Intersectionality; I’m not asking you, I’m telling you…

Thank you all so much again for reading...