As much as anything else, life is about change. The process takes place all the time and is unstoppable. I, for example, am already 20 seconds older that when I started this blog. In fact, now that I’ve made a cup of tea and started again, some four minutes has now gone by. Doesn’t time fly when you’re enjoying yourself? So what has prompted these thoughts about the way individuals react to change?
Now, as someone, whose life has been full of change, I tend to get bored if things stay the same. Hence, I look for change and relish the challenge it can bring, with two important provisos. Which are that I have some say in the result and exert some control over the process. The more of both of these I have, the happier I feel about the situation. I also, I like to think, take a broader view and ask why not.
Well, I’ve been watching TV programmes about the suffragette movement recently and find myself shouting at the screen (again). The resistance to the idea of women having the vote was reflected in statements that would have been laughable if they hadn’t been so serious. If I had any hair left, I would have been tearing it out. Yet, after many years of struggle, most people now have the vote. So, what was all that waste of effort in aid of? In reality, precisely nothing. It merely delayed the inevitable.
You could say the same in regard to judgments (about gender) to justify discrimination on the grounds of skin colour, sexual orientation or disability. They would, in my view, have the same validity, ie, none. To give one example, the epidermis, which gives the skin its colour, is only 0.5 to 1.5mm thick. The former is the same as a sheet of writing paper! It signifies nothing about the personal qualities that the individual possesses. The same could be said when discussing whether or not you have external genitalia.
So, what is such opposition about? Well, for a start, I think it tells us more about the prejudices of those who oppose such change than it does about the change itself. Also, unfortunately for them, it diminishes those making such statements. Excuses (not reasons) are put forward which are irrelevant at the time and seem like music hall jokes in the light of history. Neither are things I want to be remembered for after I’m gone. So, join the side of the angels, embrace such change and know that you did the right thing. History will thank you.