Finding common ground
250 years ago a bunch of wildly diverse people did something unheard of in world history—they declared that people, not a divine, had the power. And then they proved it. The army created to prove their point was the most culturally and ethnically diverse this country has fielded until now, and while one man, George Washington, is given the credit and admiration for holding that army together and then the country that followed, he wasn’t the one and only reason for success. Benjamin Franklin was correct with his political broadside stating, “Divided we fall.” (Just for historical accuracy, that broadside was created to garner colonial support during the French and Indian War, not the American Revolution, but the sentiment still held true during the Revolution.). The country had stood upon the precipice of failure more than success and could have easily never happened many, many times over, if our differences and prejudices had been allowed to rule the day.
That’s my point. Diversity makes a community stronger, but seeing past the differences is something people routinely find impossible. We put others into comfortable boxes and ignore what doesn’t fit or somehow craft reality to fit. Similar to Cinderella’s stepmother in the fairytale, who cut one daughter’s toe off and the other’s heel off in order to make their feet fit the glass slipper. She ignored reality and tried to visciously craft it to fit her vision of having one of her daughters, instead of her stepdaughter, bag the prince as a husband. (Of course, I always wondered how stupid that prince had to be to ride off not once, but twice, with the wrong woman bleeding all over his horse. That’s just me, though.)
In the final installment of my trilogy, Syllé and Tarin have to bring together all the diverse peoples of MithTerra. Not just the dwarves, elves, and humans, but the Limnades, Werelings, Drengas, Indili as well. And each of the three main races (dwarves, elves, and humans) aren’t united under one leader either. There are different realms and kingdoms with different leaders and issues and prejudices. Somehow Syllé and Tarin will need to find a way to bring everyone together or they will all fall to Merilik and his orc. That, however, is the key—common ground—the idea or situation that brings even the bitterest adversaries together. I wish more of us these days could find that common ground with each other. Unfortunately, that seems harder and harder to do. It’s way easier to place people in ill-fitting boxes by cutting off a metaphorical toe or heel so that our own personal beliefs aren’t threatened than to actually try to see the human being we are dismissing and diminishing.
Tarin learns to appreciate that the world isn’t exactly as he believes it to be and that people can repeatedly surprise you, often very much for the better. I wish more people today could do that, instead of putting their fingers in their ears and screaming at the top of their lungs to block out the differences of others. Everyone’s truth is different because every individual is unique. Having different viewpoints doesn’t make one human being evil and another pure. In fact, the different viewpoints make this society greater and keeps the USA from devolving into a totalitarian regime. 250 years ago, America was born when different people from vastly different backgrounds, cultures, and ethnicities found common ground—sovereignty reigned not in a fictitious nobility but in the hands of everyone; and this nation has flourished and grown. So happy birthday, America!