It's Who You Are.
I came across a Twitter thread about a lady who is always against other ethnic groups except hers. She feels her tribe is the best of all and even said she would never marry anyone else from some particular tribe. As many people bombarded her thread, some were abusing her while others were saying she is entitled to her opinion and that's right. You might not agree with her (of course, I didn't agree with her and I was tempted to leave a comment too but didn't), but you have to respect her opinion.
We are shaped by the things we go through in life and when we see certain patterns we can't help but accept them as a reality. I can't blame the lady on the Twitter thread that much because it might be that all the people that surrounded her had terrible experiences from those set tribes or maybe she had personal experience too regarding certain tribes and that made up her mind quickly as to not entertaining anyone from other tribes.
The mistake she made is that she generalized this. She seems to have forgotten that we are all different and we are all shaped by different experiences too. What worked for one might not necessarily work for the other and since those around her experienced such, it doesn't mean she would too.
Someone once joked that "Why do girls take so long to choose since they already agreed that all men are the same?" Another one like it says, "All men are the same? Who asked you to try ALL men?". Jokes apart, I don't think it's about the tribe or ethnicity or race or even religion, it's more about the person not where they are from.
Who you are is greater than what you have because what you have is a result of who you are. We often confuse what others have to determine who they are. In the comment section, one guy from this lady's tribe started abusing others by telling them they should go to their low paying jobs because it's their tribe that earns that low... Bla Bla Bla. We attribute so much importance to what people have to determine who they are.
We don't have to forget our humanity in all that we do because that's who we are. We have to look away from religion, from the culture, from ethnicity, from race and everything that seem to bring about a division between us as humans. There are certain people that would never be kind to another tribe no matter how much they are in need. There are those who will give preference to those from their religion over those that are not from their religion no matter how better skilled they are. We have allowed where we are, where we come from to cloud who we are expected to be.
Just as I have said that it's not love that hurt us but humans. It's the same way when we feel offended by the action of others, they are the ones to be held responsible, not necessarily where they are from, so we don't have to generalize anything. It's who you are that matters and when others hurt you, it's who they are. Stop blaming their race even if there were certain patterns and traits from that particular sect. We have seen those who stepped away from the norms regardless of their race. We are responsible for how we turn out so we can't blame anyone else but us.
There are many people from a particular sect that has been known to be unkind, yet they defied the odds and still showed kindness to others because life is about you...not about where you come from. Where you came from can influence who you are, yes, but it doesn't have to dictate who you will be. What you did, that's who you are but not what you will become.
I read the story of a man from another tribe just this morning and that's what inspired this post coupled with the thread of the lady I read yesterday which I mentioned earlier too. This guy said her mother was retrenched from her job and she was really struggling with finances back then. She was expected to pay 2 years rent because she has defaulted for a long time but the landlord didn't say much.
She managed to sell some of her assets or however she came up with the money. She approached the landlord with the 2 years rent intact and the landlord turned it down in a way. The landlord refunded a year rent to her and told her to use the one year rent to take care of her family because her children matter more than the rent. The guy said the landlord was a Muslim and a Yoruba as well (a tribe in Nigeria).
We can see that it's never about the tribe but about the human. We have had those with a bad experience with Yoruba men and we have seen those with good experience with the same tribe. It's not about the tribe but the human. We are to develop ourselves and be the best version of ourselves possible but most people won't even develop themselves and they answer to every name-calling.
You are who you are.
Thank you for your time.
Kindly follow me on Noise.Cash... I am trying to engage more with people and connect with everyone with this account. I look forward to seeing you there... You can say hello to me there so we can get familiarized as well. Click here.
Your first paragraph is the very essence of free speech, as long as done without malice and/or harm to others. The other part is that there are "tribes," if you will, throughout all countries, and where you are born, the color of your skin, or other variables that one has zero control over is absolutely no basis for judgment. Some people have a simple philosophy, you treat me like an a$$hole, and I'll treat you back with your own attitude. But some of us will not treat people badly no matter how nasty they treat us, for we have one who will judge all. You did a very good job with your post, very well written.