Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of the Emerald Coast
“Taking the World for Granted”
Rev. Rod Debs
January 31, 2010
Story: When I was young, if you asked me “Who provides for you? Who takes care of you?”, I would have said, “My parents.” Is that who takes care of you? Your parents or step-parents? Or maybe your grandparents or adopted parents?
Well, this morning I want to show you some pictures of a lot more people who help provide for you and for me. Lots of people! In fact the strangers you see all around—walking or driving their cars, even all the people here in the fellowship, they help in many different ways to care for you and me.
Who provides the food that we eat? Farmer. Baker. Grocer. Salesperson. And who takes away the waste that we throw away? Garbage Collector.
Who makes the things we use? Basket Weaver. Potter who shapes a bowl, bakes it in a kiln, and then paints it. Glass Blower. Carpenter. Electrician wires our house so we have light and electricity. Watch Maker (jeweler).
Other people take care of us. Barber—Hair Dresser. Teachers care for us all so very much. School Administrators. Librarian. Music Teacher like Cecile Lindegren. Museum Guide teaches us. Medical Professor.
Scientists study so that we can learn about the world from them. Botanist. Oceanographer. Archaeologist. Arctic Scientist and explorers. Miners.
Many people provide us information: Photographers—Reporters. Photo-Journalists. Newscasters. Writers, Artists. Mail-Carriers bring mail to us.
Mechanics take great care for us that our cars are safe to take us and our families wherever we want to go. Who provided us with cars? Design engineers. Assembly Line Workers. Remote Control Painters. Assemblers. Bus Drivers, Taxi Drivers, Truck Drivers provide transportation for us too.
The roads we drive on are provided by people we may never know: Road Worker. Workers who Build Bridges and Build Roads.
Airplane Pilots also provide us transportation with the help of a lot of other people: Air Traffic Controller. Ground engineers. Flight Engineer. Stewardess. Ground Stewardess. Baggage Handler.
When I ask, “Who takes care of you? Who provides for you?”, you might say: Fire Fighters. Air Rescue, Sea Rescue teams. Are there other people we have left out? Who else don’t we have pictures of? Nurses, Doctors, Hospital Workers, Police Officers, Air Force, Social Workers including volunteers for Shelter House, Sharing and Caring, Opportunity Place homeless shelter. There are so many people who care for us and provide for us.
Other people help out too. Visiting Nurse. Minister. Neighbor. Friend. It’s good to be provided for and cared for by so many people in our world.
Message: In September, 2003, National Geographic Magazine carried an article by Kevin Bales exposing that there are 27 million slaves in the world. Slavery is now illegal in every nation of the world, and the percentage of slaves to world population is smaller than ever in history. Even so, there are more slaves alive today than at any time in history—more than the total seized from Africa in four centuries of the Trans-Atlantic slave trade. What does this say about human nature?
On NPR this week, I heard an interview with Jeremy Rifkin. In his book, The Empathic Civilization, he argues that we humans are by nature empathic. The reason that history books and magazines write about slavery and war, he says, is that these are exceptions to the rule in which we experience empathy in our everyday lives. We take for granted daily kindness and cooperation in our communities across human cultures.
So which is true of human nature? Are we by nature empathic or are we each against all in the battle for survival?
The story is told of a Cherokee elder teaching a young boy that we all have two wolves inside us. “One is a wolf of honesty, kindness, justice, moderation, selflessness, compassion and love. The other is a wolf of greed, lust, selfishness, calculation for his own benefit and wickedness. And these two wolves are forever opposed to one another.” “Which wolf wins?” the boy asked excitedly. And the answer? “It depends upon which one you feed.”
It seems to me that I take for granted, I don’t “feed”—I don’t celebrate with gratitude the countless experiences of civil social engagement which I experience daily, hourly.
Ayn Rand would argue against feeding empathy with gratitude. She argues against Jeremy Rifkin that human nature is essentially selfish, merely held in check by laws and by enlightened self interest. We love our children, she would say, only because they are our possessions and because we find our own immortality in their survival. We love them most when they make us proud. Ayn Rand would explain love for our mates as simply a combination of selfish lust and enlightened self-interest. Which wolf does she feed?
It seems to me that human nature has both capacities: to behave selfishly and to behave empathically. As the perceived competition of each against all grasps and monopolizes my attention, too often I take for granted the bedrock of human empathy in community that births, nurtures, heals and serves our countless needs and wants.
We often take for granted familial providence and caring. When we receive it from strangers who have made it their job, we recognize empathy even less. But the moment we get grouchy or imperfect service, then we notice the lack and take offense! We feel entitled!
When members of our community provide food, clothing, housing, transportation, education, entertainment, healthcare and comfort during crises, economists might discount such care as merely economic exchange of values. “They’re getting paid! No empathy involved!” I’ve heard it said: “You don’t thank someone for doing their duty.” When you’ve paid for it, they owe you their service. In this view, rather than gratitude and appreciation, we are taught to demand quality service, we are taught to take it for granted.
My hairdresser Kim makes appointments by phone. She has no other employees at Cut N Curl, so when I’m in the chair getting a haircut, she’ll pause and say, “Hello, Cut N Curl. May I help you?” At my last haircut, she apologized that one of her customers likes to talk, and it’s hard to get off the phone respectfully with her. Kim said that another client once got really miffed at her for answering her phone. The client said, “When I’m in the chair, I’m paying for your time, and I expect your undivided attention.” When she’s paying for a haircut, she feels that she “owns” Kim for that period of time.
Is this “wage slavery”? Clearly, a slave is owned 24-hours a day and does not have any choice in complying with orders. From my dozen years of factory work, I learned that, to be a good employee, my time on the clock was not mine. Within legal limits, if I wanted to get paid, I did not have any choice but to comply with my boss’s orders. Truth be told, I was proud of my work—as most workers are. Call it slave mentality if you wish, but we workers internalized company goals and took pride in our productivity. As long as our work relationships and our pay afforded us a degree of dignity and respect, we chose to make our work into a calling. By exercising choice, we felt more than wage slaves.
On the other hand, when we do not make a living wage, when we don’t make enough to be able to make choices in our lives even on our own time, when we can’t afford to quit, when we have to put up with whatever unkindness and even abuse in the workplace for fear of destitution, then workers’ lives can be compared to slavery, wage slavery. Economic enslavement as opposed to legal slavery.
One of our Share-the-Plate agencies we support, Shelter House assists survivors of domestic violence. Marital isolation and control is typical of family violence. Abusive spouses seek to exercise control through threat or violence. This is marital slavery.
In addition to supporting Shelter House for survivors of domestic violence, a second challenge is to provide a Hot Line of counsel and support for those who feel little choice but to stay in various degrees of abusive marital slavery. Our current UUFEC Congregational Social Justice Project is to support Opportunity Place shelter for those “economic slaves” whose jobs have “run-away” leaving them homeless and with little dignity and respect.
I am speaking about taking for granted, not just our loved ones—our parents, our spouse, and our loyal friends who bless our lives with their kindness and loyal support. In the economic rat race, a further challenge is that we not take for granted the neighbors and strangers who have made a calling of their employment, and who serve our countless needs in this interdependent world. We drink from wells we did not dig. We eat from fields we did not plant.
May we be able to graciously receive the daily gifts of service provided in our community, and receive them with gratitude and respect. May we no longer feel that the strangers in cars passing by are competitors in a battle for survival, each against all, but rather a social network of empathy serving our every need. May we feed a heart of gratitude and hospitality, that the interdependent web of our life together might become a little more healthy and more whole.