Tonight I remembered a strange, brief conversational exchange of years ago. It happened at a luncheon in Europe, where I was living, when I mentioned historical "roots."
A French woman at the table objected with a tone of disgust: "Why are you Americans always talking about your ‘roots'?"
I decided not to answer at length. Yet, a question lingered in a corner of my mind: "What is wrong with being interested in one's 'roots'?"
Recently I heard a rebroadcast of a Philadelphia Free Library* speech by Natan Sharansky. He equates identity with cultural, ethnic, and tribal or national roots.
Mr. Sharansky was born in the Ukraine and later was imprisoned for nine years in the Soviet Gulag. The Gulag was a system of prisons that operated like ever-deepening circles of death-work, isolation, and torture for those who disagreed with the government system.
Mr. Sharansky received the U. S. Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2006. In his speech in Philadelphia this year, he said that learning of his Jewish roots helped him survive the brutal, oppressive regime that pounded into his mind certain ideas: "You are nothing; you are alone, you do not matter!"
When in prison he learned about the State of Israel and the Six-Day War. He realized that being a Jew gave him more than persecution, which was all he had known about Jewish status up to then. That awareness of his roots beyond the cruel regime emboldened his hope and helped his will to survive.
At one time, he had been prevented from learning anything about what being a Jew meant, beyond the fact that it was cause for persecution under communism. In his book, "Defending Identity," he contends on behalf of his heartfelt conviction that identity is what is so important that we will defend our right to it. This does not exclude others' identities, but preserves the freedoms of all, even if striving to do so means death.
He contends that how we use identity is the crux of the matter. When people or nations with a strong sense of identity face people or nations without it, the former win. He mentioned the extremists' sense of identity that seeks to deny others their different identity. The different identies are cultural, religious, political, and/or personal.
If the identities opposing extremism are not strong and convinced within themselves, whether it be a tribe or a nation, they will not prevail. A strong Muslim terrorist's sense of identity with extremism will win out over those who enjoy freedom but are not willing to die for it.
Mr. Sharansky asserts that a non-identity Europe falls into the category of a people without a strong sense of roots. He argues that fact as a possible reason why the ideal of a united Europe--with no national cultural identity but only a vague, new geographical and government identity--has not taken hold.
Democracy is no guarantee to those who experience it, reminds Mr. Sharansky. Democracies without a sense of identity become too weak to stand. Democracies with strong identity foster freedoms that guard the multi-cultural identities that make up the larger democratic identity. An understanding of what shared freedom means and what it costs holds them together.
While living in Europe, I met a few people unlike any I had imagined. They had no sense of belonging anywhere and saw no problem with it, at least on the surface. By their own admission, they thought of no place as "home." They could move, work, and wander almost anywhere in the world with no problem. Yet, they had no passion for any special place or people.
They felt they were "free."
For me, "home" is a major theme on many levels, and I would not consider their situation to be freedom. Home includes identity and roots, as well as a national place. Being without it would represent a void. The idea of having no sense of home saddens most people. For them, there may be gained an awakening to the costs of the belonging they have taken for granted.
I used to think of "roots" as genealogy, where family history, language, and culture were the major parts. I think differently today, considering how much life's larger meanings support who we are and can become.
Mr. Sharansky emphasizes the importance of a sense of meaning that is inherent in identity. If you and I have no sense of any meaning in life worth dying for, what do we have to live for?
In vital, healthy democracies, the members share identity. They hold beliefs about the importance of shared freedom for all within a historical and legal foundation. That freedom allows and protects rights for them to hold different beliefs and opinions.
In every case, freedom requires that no one prevent others' lawful freedoms. This applies to religious choices and political affiliations different from one's own. One of freedom's major features is that it does not require agreement.
In the U. S., a worker may wear a Muslim headscarf or a Christian cross necklace. Freedom allows for such differences that reflect cultural or religious affiliations.
In France, there has been strong discourse about Muslim girls wearing headscarves in public school. The French government has tried to pass laws against the scarves. This legal approach began long before terrorism became a factor.
Sharansky believes that democracies that feel threatened, due to lack of strong national identity, try to put such laws into effect for fear of being overrun. A strong democracy, he proposes, has no such fear; its people are committed to shared freedoms so much that they would die for them; they reject extreme efforts that might undermine basic tenets and laws.
Each democracy-loving person has family, cultural, religious, and national roots that help form identity. However, that is not enough, Sharansky proposes. People need a greater identity, one they share with others not like themselves.
This larger identity is based on freedom certified by basic documents and beliefs that govern and allow different cultural and religious identities. Many countries require new citizens to know the language, customs, and history that make the homeland one people, although with many differences among them. The reason is to help form that national identity that is not to be scorned, but welcomed, for those who belong and those that seek to enter.
Recently, a young journalist made the disturbing comment that he does not care about "then" (the case he referred to was WWII-era political and governing decisions). He said he cares "only about now," even as he comments on the election period now on-going.
If we forget the past, we forget the "then" of our lives. We choose only the "now," ignoring the truth that we owe much to others.
This is true of freedom. There are failing democracies now; they are where people only know how to enjoy freedom, not to die for freedom, says Mr. Sharansky.
About 17 years ago, a short time in the scheme of history, a wall came down that divided oppressed people under communism. For most of them, the experience of freedom was an unknown, unimaginable freedom. Will today's children know about what happened when that wall came down in Berlin? Will they learn how it came to be there? Or, will they be only concerned with now?
Will American children be allowed to know they are free, but not how their national freedoms came into being? Will they learn the facts and consider why it is so important to have family, cultural, religious, political, and national roots? Will they care enough to do more than enjoy what only fierce devotion and willing action can maintain for them and those after them?
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*Thanks to C-Span's Book TV for helping many people think about freedom and democracy through the rebroadcast of Mr. Sharansky's speech at the Free Library of Philadelphia. Mr. Sharansky received the U. S. Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2006.
What is the largest democracy in the world? India
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