Have you ever watched an animal’s eyes when they are in full-blown predator mode? The look is primal, untamed and destructive. I’ve seen that look in the faces of people who bullied me in school, and I got to see it again this week after the elections were over.
An animal that fights to survive and kills for its food gives into instinct and basic survival mindsets to hunt and bring down other animals which will attempt to run away and deprive it of its needs. In groups, they work together for a common cause. We, as human beings, normally only kill for our food if we decide to execute a lobster for dinner. Otherwise we tend to let experts kill and dress our food. To survive we strive, through craft and knowledge, to better others like us, and our groups are much more exclusive. In the wild there are no major deviations between lions or elephants; a lion is a lion and an elephant is an elephant. Humans, though, separate themselves and may choose divisive measures over working together for a common cause. Humans work together for the common cause of a few. That is where cliques are formed, races divided, education divvied out like a prize for the chosen few.
Why else would we see such a shocking turn of events as watching a black person beating up a white person because of the results of an election? Why else would middle school students start chanting about a border wall, making their fellow Hispanic students cry?
I have never understood why humans go into predator mode over nothing. We are all the same, basically. Just because we all don’t look like what we call a lion or an elephant, we tend to behave as if there are really some human beings who don’t matter. We all matter. When we start feeling desperate enough about being poor or ignored or disenfranchised that we vote as we did last Tuesday, nobody should be surprised by the outcome. It’s survival instinct which drives us all. If you’re going to kick a dog, don’t be surprised when the dog bites back. We have all brought these election results upon ourselves because we let our primal fears and instincts take over. Some of us are overreacting; some of us have no right to complain because we sat and did nothing.
It doesn’t matter if you can put two and two together; you should look at yourself and ask yourself, “What kind of a human being am I, really?” “Who am I afraid of, and why?”
If you’re not sure, that’s where we have the real problem.
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