Ep 10 Tolerance
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Safrianna: So today we're gonna talk about tolerance because we've recently had some incidents
Ikenna: happy pride month, everyone
Safrianna: happy pride month. Uh, people are bigoted on the internet. Yeah. And everywhere,
Ikenna: just basically the more, the more visibility that you have, the more it's going to reach people that don't support your message.
Safrianna: Right. And I think there's a lot of important things to talk about intolerance because. I know I have a very radical view on tolerance. I don't believe that hating on any group is ever going to benefit us as a society mm-hmm . And so that, that then means even like our neo-Nazis hating a neo-Nazi is not going to make the world a better place.
Now, speaking up against the message of neoNazis and understanding that they have the views that they do. I know I just went all in I'm like, let's just fucking go . But you know,
Ikenna: We went from pride to Neo Nazi in 0.5 seconds.
Safrianna: I'm like, I feel like a lot of people will probably be disturbed.
That idea of mine that like hating on neo-Nazis isn't gonna get us anywhere because they're like, well, they're hating on me, so I need to hate on them back. But all of that hatred comes from trauma. It comes from generational wounds. It comes from probably a lot of abuse growing up and abuse in the form of religion, in the form of racism, like in the form of sexism and homophobia and transphobia.
Those are abusive things. Anything that encourages hate or toxicity of another group of another population, of another, you know, country. Those are abusive ideas. So I don't wanna be a person that's like, well, every time I see a neo-Nazi in the comments, I'm gonna argue with them. I'm like, no, I'm going to delete the comment.
And move on with my life because me arguing with them is not going to shift the world in a positive direction. Me focusing on making key connections with the people that do want to contribute positively that do wanna shift the world in a positive direction. That's who I wanna put my energy into
Ikenna: mm-hmm right.
I think you hit the nail in the head earlier on how we can. I, I hate the saying of like, you know, love the sinner, hate the sin sort of thing, but it's like taking that to a different degree of in, in as therapists, there are different theories and modalities of like how humans have, like what, where human nature comes from nature versus nurture like behaviors versus internal everything.
And for me, and Safrianna, I believe has the same concepts is that we inherently are good. Yes. Like we start out as good and then trauma causes us to build protectors around us. And so that we act and react to different things in different ways. And that could be causing harm for other people.
Safrianna: Right.
Ikenna: And the thing is, is that we are not, when we, when we project hate onto a person saying this person is evil or this person has behaviors or beliefs or thoughts that were created or, um, you know, or were taught to them that make that cause them to do evil things. They inherently are not necessarily an evil person.
Safrianna: Right. It's just that society has fucked them up. yeah. And I, I just pulled up a quote cuz I wanna read it.
Um, The Diary of Anne Frank I taught when I was a public school teacher and we did it as an audio book and we watched the movie, but there was a segment. There's a segment in the book, uh, that always got me really emotional. And I know I'm gonna like get mega goosebumps and I might get a little teary eyed cuz I started looking at the quote and I got very teary eyed over here.
But this, this quote, like has for a long time captured the essence of what I believe about humanity. And, and I kind of wanna unpack this. so Anne Frank wrote in the diary of a young girl, "In spite of everything, I still believe that people are really good at heart. I simply can't build up my hopes on a foundation, consistent of confusion, misery and death.
I see the world gradually being turned into a wilderness. I hear the ever approaching thunder, which will destroy us too. I can feel the sufferings of millions. And yet if I look up into the heavens, I think that it will all come right. And that this cruelty too will end and that peace and tranquility will return."
Ugh, you could hear me get choked up there.
Ikenna: Yep.
Safrianna: Like, wow. If, if Anne Frank, who is stuck, in this annexed attic for years being persecuted, simply for being born, a Jew can see good in people. I don't see why anyone else in the world can't and when it comes to being tolerant right now, I know that a big topic coming up for so many people is religious trauma.
Ikenna: Mm-hmm
Safrianna: and we looked well, you looked, I, I chose not to engage, but you were looking at some of the people that were leaving the hate comments on our page. And would you say that a majority of them identified as Christians?
Ikenna: Uh, yeah. yeah.
Safrianna: And, and some of them literally in the comments were mentioning like, basically you need to find God. Yeah. And what's so interesting to me is, is here I am this radically queer, , polyamorous, kinky, neuro divergent, hippie and. and I don't mean this in a boastful way, but I am more Christlike mm-hmm than these people leaving hate comments because love thy neighbor as thyself.
Ikenna: Yeah. Maybe they just hate themselves.
Safrianna: Right. And this was a really interesting conversation that, that came up with a client recently is they were like, huh? You. Love th neighbors myself is this huge Christian tenant. Uh, and this particular client was raised very, very Christian, like family involved in the church.
Ikenna: Mm-hmm
Safrianna: kind of level. And, and the client said, well, if someone doesn't love themselves and they're harsh and cruel to themselves, like then they are loving their neighbors. They're loving themselves by continuing to perpetuate that.
Ikenna: Yeah. And it's weird. It's so weird. How, you know, we, we come from. we're, we're redefining the concept of how human nature, like humans start off as good, which is a very different concept than, uh, some Christian or a lot of Christian concepts of original sin.
Safrianna: Mm-hmm
Ikenna: like you were born bad. You were, you know, The only reason why you're being saved is because Christ died for your sins.
Safrianna: Oh, my word. I need to leave the closet right now to grab another thing. so let's let's pause. Pause.
So I'm gonna read a little bit from how to pray without talking to God moment by moment choice by choice by Reverend Linda Martella-Whitsett.
And this is a book that I'm currently reading as a prayer chaplain. So it was assigned as homework for us, prayer chaplains. And in the first chapter, she talks about original sin. And I'm just gonna read a little bit from the se segment. You are not a sinner is the title. "I delivered my second child in a hospital birthing room.
I worked long and hard for 17 hours eventuated with the primal push and gro of delivery. Giles was Giles, Gil. Either that's okay. Giles was the first to behold, the seven pounds of wrinkles with girl parts, Giles cut the cord, gathered up her crumpled body and laid her in a warm bath." I don't know how I feel about the girl parts there, but "I turned my head and watched mesmerized along with Giles as our baby's toes uncurled and turned pink.
Then her legs, her belly, her torso, arms and fingers. One by one pinkening and stretchening. Stretchening? Stretching. Finally, her face filled out evidence of life flushed her cheeks and her eyes opened along with her mouth. As her healthy lungs brought forth a demanding cry. Giles wrapped her in a soft blanket and placed her in my arms.
She turned her dazzling little face up to mind in that moment. Captivated, I spoke the words that I knew were on everyone's mind, the doctors, her daddies, the nurses. I cried out. 'God help you. You miserable little sinner!' All right. All right. I did not say that. Who would say such a thing who would think such a thing?
All I knew and all I saw was this marvelous bundle of possibility. I saw the purest expression of love and human form. I saw the beauty of absolute perfection, no religion, except Christianity condemns a person before they behave badly. The sin gene passes from one generation to the next, so that according to many Christian denominations, every newborn enters this world corrupted by inherent sinfulness."
And obviously this goes on and on, but. that's so interesting that like no other religion pushes that idea. Mm-hmm , there is karma and Dharma and, uh, you know, life purpose and different religions. And the idea that we've been divinely created and organized and all of that, but like only only modern Christian religions push this idea that you are wrong.
The moment that you are conceived.
Ikenna: Yep.
Safrianna: Congratulations.
Ikenna: Yeah. And that can cause a lot of internalized hate for yourself.
Safrianna: Yeah. What was it like for you managing the Facebook to see those comments rolling in and those being the only comments we were really getting,
Ikenna: So I have each week.
Based off of a specific section of, um, like subsect of LGBTQ people. And this week is about LGBTQ youth, specifically ones that are, uh, suicidal, which is why we're supporting the Trevor project. Uh, when this podcast comes out, it'll be a different week, but, um, I. Was my heart immediately went to these young people because I, as someone who, who my inner circle and some of my more like inner circle and like medial circle, like out, just outside of that pretty supportive, pretty damn supportive, right?
Like awesome. Like, uh, chosen family. You know, awesome friends, all supportive of, of me, of who I am. And I, my, when I saw those comments from these strangers who were like, I hate this, how dare you post this thing? Uh,
Safrianna: give God back his rainbow.
Ikenna: Yeah. Stuff like that. Um, you know, I want this bullshit off my feed.
all of this anger towards me just wanting to spread awareness and kindness and you know, basically talking about fundraising, like right. We're just trying to, to raise awareness, save kids' lives. And so I was disheartened. That's like the word that I've been using is disheartened. Because, you know, a lot, I, I come from a place of curiosity of like, where were these people raised?
Um, like what were they taught to cause them to have such hatred towards, you know, LGBTQIA a concepts. And I felt. Very small. Like I felt then I wanted to withdraw. I wanted to, you know, it was not an intense amount of bullying, but it was enough for me to start questioning. And I was like this, the fact that someone were 99% of my life, or like of my people support me, my authentic self.
And yet strangers bringing up a few bullying comments caused me to have these feelings of, you know, just these, these feelings of hurt and pain and, and upset and invalidation and hoplessness. Like no wonder there's these intense statistics about LGBTQIA youth who have been kicked out of their family homes who have been, uh, invalidated.
And, um, I believe the Trevor project posted a, a statistic about how based off of the amount of kids, LGBTQIA kids who have, , attempted suicide. It's technically , an LGBTQIA kid has attempted suicide like every 45 seconds. Yeah.
Safrianna: And I mean, I was one of them.
Ikenna: Yeah.
Safrianna: Like looking back. I definitely think that some of my suicide attempts were probably at least background influenced by the fact that I knew deep down I was queer.
but was literally told by my abuser, if you , if you go down this path, you're going to hell. Right. Even though his path of abuse was totally acceptable. Right. Cuz it was, you know, heterosexual, I guess. I, I don't, I don't know,
Ikenna: but, but that, but also like the concept of going to hell, like was for, for my. You know, we're both nor divergent, but I guess like for, I know that for me, you know, we were taught this, this 10 commandment song.
when I was in children's choir. And you know, it's like, you shouldn't, uh, take the Lord's name in vain. Mm-hmm like, don't say, oh my God, or Jesus Christ or any of these things, unless they're related in a religious sense. And I remember one time. Like the, I was friends with this, um, family who basically they're like, even if you say something that insinuates you saying, oh my God, me, like, don't say, oh my gosh, Like, gosh, is, is like the gateway to, oh my God.
Or don't say what the heck, because heck is the saying the gateway to hell, the gateway is saying, oh, what the hell? um, and so I remember like internalizing all of these things. And so one time I said, oh my God. And I remember going into my parents' bathroom. Sobbing and like looking out the window and like praying fervently over and over and over and like being like, I already asked Jesus Christ my heart, but can I do it again?
Like and I was like a seven year old, like, yeah. Why? You know, and this wasn't even, this was even before I explored sexuality and, you know, and I was still internalizing all of these things of like, I'm a bad person because I said. A thing. I whispered a thing to myself. Yep. Um, and God sees all and therefore I'm going to hell.
And so there's no, no wonder I'm medicated for anxiety.
Safrianna: Yeah, no say geez. Like I remember laying in bed as like a three and four year old and I don't have memories of my early childhood. Yeah. I must have been. Because we had moved. Um, and it was like right after we moved, but I remember laying in, in my bunk bed sobbing at night, just praying that God would not smite me for being evil.
like, that should not happen to small children. No, it's so scary. But I wanted to, if my ADHD doesn't squirrel me off, I had something I wanted to go back to. Mm, that commandment about not taking the Lord's name in vain or whatever. I've, I've recently read a really interesting interpretation of that commandment that I think seems to me way more, uh, viable interpretation, which is don't take the Lord's name in vain or God's name in vain, whatever, by using the name of God.
To excuse your bigotry, to excuse your hatred, to excuse your war, et cetera. And I think that. I, my God is loving God period. End of story. Jesus was a bro. Jesus was the way shower Jesus. He told us that the kingdom of God is within us and that we could do all of the things that he can do. And more, he taught us that we were love.
He taught us that we were supposed to treat the outsider with dignity and respect and go out of our way to love the outsider even more than the majority. And. That's how I, I lived my whole life as a kid. I was always the kid that befriended the bullied kids and who could see the likelihood that somebody was going down a dark path and I would befriend them and I would be their light.
And I would be somebody who gave them unconditional love and they all were able to rebalance and not be the kid that everyone was afraid was gonna shoot up the school. They just needed somebody to see and love them.
Ikenna: Yeah. I mean, and, and that's the thing too, is. Uh, there would be some kids or friends in my school that share different religious values than me.
And. I remember being like, let's go get a coffee and talk about it. You know, like I love deep conversations.
Safrianna: Mm-hmm
Ikenna: and I just wanted to learn more. Like I came from it as an aspect of curiosity, and initially they were hesitant cuz they were like, is this you trying to convert me? I'm like, no, I'm literally just wanting to learn, like what caused you to, you know, not to believe what you believe.
Like I just wanna know like your journey. Um, and a lot of the things that they said were valid and I'm like, I totally get that. And they were. Shocked that I wasn't going to just barrel over those things. Right. And be like, well that, you know, we can agree to disagree. And, and like, that makes no sense to me.
Cause I don't want to even fathom the idea of that making sense. Um, so that was. That's, those are things that I live for is, is listening to people's stories and, and them first coming in this tentative way of being like, are you gonna, are you gonna smite me for ? Yeah. Like, especially if someone's posting, like if I noticed a friend of mine posting something on Facebook, um, a couple of months ago that I was like, wow, they, they seem to be like doing a lot of weird, uh, like shit posts politically that just don't align with what I believe.
But I don't know where they're coming from. I don't, I I'm, I have no idea. Like I'm not gonna just, um, go, go at them and call them an evil person. Like I'm like there has to be some, you know, they must be receiving information from media sources that I'm not receiving because you know, media. Is aligned with what we searched down.
So if I'm more liberal, I'm gonna get a lot more liberal media versus this person that might be receiving a lot more conservative media. And so I messaged them and I was like, Hey, can you like show me where you're getting some of this information from, because you seem to be really scared, um, about different things and.
And they were like, oh my gosh, yes. Like, let me show you some of these videos and some of these speakers that are, you know, showing us these different things. And so we like had this really good back and forth of like, , you know, I, I noticed parts of me being like, uh, more activated because I was like, oh no, this doesn't feel right.
Safrianna: right. This is not my truth,
Ikenna: but they weren't, they also weren't attacking me. Like we weren't attacking each other anymore. We were just sharing information of like, this is where I got this information from. This is where I'm learning this information from. I get why you're scared. This sounds really scary.
You know, and so that type of support kind of allowed. Cuz this person was also receiving a lot of hate from people who I consider to be friends with. The hate that people on quote unquote, my side of the fence, it's just gonna cause a bigger schism, right?
Because even if you consider yourself to be the more. Um, like you said, you're like, I don't want to be bragging, but I believe like, uh, like my God is the, is the one that truly loves neighbors at yourself sort of thing. Like that's what we believe in. But the only time that that becomes problematic is when we have this level of righteousness that we feel like we can bully other people.
Safrianna: Right. And if we feel like we're above anyone, We are not in the right, right. The moment we feel a sense of superiority to any other creature on this planet. Yeah. We are now in the wrong,
Ikenna: right. Cuz everyone is doing their journey, like you have no idea what someone else has gone through to cause them to have these different beliefs and, and triggers.
And you have no idea. So it's like, if, if you just look at something that they're saying at you and you're. Uh, this behavior, um, I don't agree with, and you're a terrible, like you, yourself are evil. That's problematic, right? Like if you, if you call someone, you know, a Nazi like that, that was a huge thing.
When like the riots to the capital happened and everyone was like, uh, people who were rioting the capital were offended. That they were being called Nazis. Right? Like they were. And so it's like, you know, we, the, the one political side was like, you know, we're gonna call them the evilest type of person ever.
And then, but they're like, but we're Patriots. And like, you don't understand, like what? So it's like, this schism got even larger because of all of that. And it's like, you're not even like, why are these people so afraid? Why are these people wanting to storm the capital? Where were they raised and what messages are they getting?
I'm not saying. So we, I also want to have a, have a slight pause because we can go into this, this realm of like, just be understanding of others and like where they're coming from. And I know I can get on the soapbox of, of that as well, but there's this, there's a difference between tolerance and accountability, right?
like, we are hearing a bunch of terrible messages involving, uh, mass shootings lately. Like it's always been a problem in America, especially, but, uh, the it's just become rampant. I don't know what it is about summertime, but you know, there's more outings and more outdoor occasions and people bring their guns to it.
Safrianna: There's more mass shootings. There's more trans hate crimes, you know, with trans. Especially trans women of color. Yeah. Being murdered, etc.
Ikenna: And, um, there's a, there was a post that I saw the other day, um, by someone named Hailey page, Maggie, I'm gonna say, um, the codependency recovery coach and it says "You can have compassion for someone's trauma history."
Cuz again, we don't know like. if it was someone's trauma that caused them to reach this level of extreme of extreme. "You can have compassion for someone's trauma history while holding them accountable for the ways they're harming you or others. And you can have compassion for your own trauma history while holding yourself accountable for ways that you are harming others."
Safrianna: Right?
Ikenna: So this is a shift of. holding compassion for ourselves, cuz we are inherently good people who are messy, who are messy and have been traumatized. So we're not inherently evil. We are just a very traumatized population of people who react to things due to our trauma. The trauma doesn't the trauma does not mean that we are excused from our behaviors.
Safrianna: Right?
Ikenna: Um, and so for example, like, you know, we have to place boundaries where our spoons, you know, don't where we don't have the energy necessarily to sit down and have those conversations with someone who our ideals don't line up.
Safrianna: So like move along, if you don't. Right. Yeah. You can just choose to ignore it.
Ikenna: Yeah. Um, and so, and if you have, for example, um, if, if there's something that really like with, uh, the school shooting, like, I felt hopeless when I, when I heard about it and I didn't really know what to do. Um, , you know, I couldn't necessarily evangelize and tell gun toing people to like, you know, sign different petitions about gun laws, but I could look up specific organizations that were about working on gun laws.
Mm-hmm and, and like, I was gonna put my energy towards, towards those things. Right. So yeah, you have to pick and choose, uh, you have to set your boundaries. I would recommend, like the way that you can be your best self is, you know, if you have the energy to approach someone with differing values than you approach it with compassion and curiosity.
Um, but if you start to notice it coming from a place of bullying or threatening or anything like that, you are not going to. you're just gonna be, uh, causing that other person to see like the other side as a bully. You know, like if, if I'm, you know, this queer person who is engaging in arguments and, uh, against people, like if the people posted the things onto our Facebook message and I was like, well, fuck you.
Anyway, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Like I had, if I had all of these. Hateful things to say back at them. They're just gonna be like, well, that, uh, is exactly why I don't. Right. I, I absolutely hate LGBTQIA people because of people like you, we don't accept that we have boundaries around what, you know, we don't accept hate speech, so we're gonna delete those and ban the people and ban those people.
But if someone was like, I don't really understand where this is coming from, but I'd be willing to have a conversation about it.
Safrianna: Yeah. Mature conversation.
Ikenna: I absolutely love to talk to you about it.
Safrianna: Um, I mean, I've had tons of conversations about polyamory, where people are like, uh, I don't get it. I couldn't do that.
What is that like? That's fine. Yeah. Right. Um, I think that if we could just have open conversations, a lot of things would be resolved. And I wanna just make a note and I don't know if we wanna move this earlier in the episode or not, but tolerance does not mean not defending yourself from actual danger.
Right? I am not saying go out there and be a pacifist. I might choose to be a pacifist. Mm-hmm . I don't think anyone else should have to be a pacifist. If their life is being threatened. If their safety is being threatened, their livelihood, et cetera, there are definitely times where we need to step up and defend ourselves in whatever way that we need to.
But , but trying to defend yourself on the internet against people who are literally engaging in throwing hate speech around. Trash talking groups. I have never seen someone come in and present another point of view and it go well, even, even in groups where it seemed like we were aligned around a common cause.
Ikenna: Yep.
Safrianna: I have never seen engaging in arguments in a thread feed ever make somebody go, oh wow. I never saw it that way. so it, yeah.
Ikenna: I, I don't know if it's because of the, the public eye. Like sometimes if I can. Get someone in a private message, um, and be like, hi, I just wanted to check in, see, are you doing, you made this comment about this thing, or you posted this thing and I'm curious about it.
That usually leads to a better conversation instead of like people I, you know, there was someone that had made a political comment somewhere on a thread, and I decided to go about it with curiosity and compassion and they, of course were seeing it as an attack like, you know, people will receive it and interpret how you ask questions, however they want.
And so they were continuing to kind of try to figure out any way to disprove me or any way to say that I'm being a terrible person.
Safrianna: Yeah.
Ikenna: Based off what I was saying, and I was starting to get like a following. People who were like this, you know, Ike has said nothing, but, uh, you know, gracious, compassionate, uh, things, literally just asking for more information, like they were not, trying to prove you wrong.
They were just trying to learn more about where you're coming from and you're, you're still trying to bully them. Mm-hmm and, and, you know, we could just tell that it was kind of a lost cause. Like they were going to take that to mean. Whatever they wanted to and try to prove their point, but nothing was solved like it was just 30 minutes of everyone getting riled.
Safrianna: Yeah. And when we're talking about tolerance, I know that I'm coming in from this lens of being a white, assigned female at birth person, and that no matter how much non privilege I've had in my life, I have privilege. Oh yeah. I have boatloads more privilege than.
you know, BIPOC people than, you know, more impoverished than I am currently. People like, yeah, just so many ways that I have privilege. And I, I want to make a note on tolerance for any of our listeners who might feel like, well, I can't be tolerant because no one tolerates me.
Ikenna: Right.
Safrianna: That I totally get where you're coming from.
And the. First step with that, I feel like is having tolerance for ourselves. It's dismantling society's ideas of us and learning to love ourselves, whatever our circumstances are. Because again, that whole Love Thy Neighbor as Thyself, I think that a lot of, um, Intolerance does come from intolerance within, because we've been told we are bad.
mm-hmm and we want to defend ourselves and say, no, I'm not bad. I'm good. Like, look at me. So we need to believe that in ourselves to the point where we don't have to defend our inherent goodness. but especially with, you know, bipo people, they often do have to get into that defend themselves mode. Because their livelihood safety life is threatened often.
Ikenna: Yeah. I mean that I was reading something or watching something the other day about, the concept of, why do BIPOC people like why do they run from cops?
Safrianna: Cause they're fucking threatened.
Ikenna: And white people are like the, the cops aren't doing anything bad and
Safrianna: it's fight, flight, freeze.
Ikenna: Yeah. They're gonna run because there's literally, there's so many statistics out there that even if the cop tells them to do a certain thing, like certain things like do this, do this, do this and, and they're completely and utterly compliant, compliant. Some people still end up dead. Yep. They still end up dead somehow.
And it's like, and, and so it's like that, that concept of, you know, people being like, well, why are you so scared? It's like, well, yeah, most BIPOC people have been, you know, considered, uh, a threat in some way. Mm-hmm uh, because they've just walked down the street and there was a white person that was like, oh no, there's this person being shady.
Safrianna: It's like heaven forbid a Black person walking on the street. Yeah.
Ikenna: Yeah. So it's like, um, speaking of tolerance, white people, white people. Can we like check ourselves in what we consider to be dangerous?
Safrianna: Yeah. Cuz again, it's. Yes, we need to defend ourselves, but, but tolerance is, and, and I put a definition of tolerance on a Facebook post because I spoke out about this, uh, on Facebook.
But tolerance is accepting that there are gonna be other sides that disagree with you, but letting them do their thing, if they're not really doing harm to you and yeah. a person with dark skin walking down the street, like doing absolutely nothing but walking down the street, um, mm-hmm like,
Ikenna: oh no. Why the BIPOC person glanced at you? Scary.
Safrianna: Like, no, that's not something that deserves intolerance.
Ikenna: And that is another thing involving the, you can have compassion for your own trauma history. Like, let's say you've had a bunch of trauma from a specific population or a bunch of tr like, or societal, societal legacy trauma. Yeah. Societal legacy trauma, or, or parental, uh, teachings about specific populations that make you now fear specific populations.
You can have compassion for the fact that you are scared. But don't like, you have to think about it. Be like, why am I feeling scared? Is this person really a threat? Or is it just because I have, um, you know, inherent biased, you know, racism that was nurtured through me and therefore I'm having this reaction to this person.
And so it's like, you need to hold yourself accountable. To that reaction to that person, especially in terms of, um, and this is different in terms of BIPOC people being scared of cops, like, because there's a power and control difference, right? Because cops have the power and control versus, you know, you're just two people passing each other on the street.
One is a different race than you and you have feelings of fear. That's different. So like there's a bunch of nuance in gray area, and I'm sure there are gonna be things that people can rip apart about this episode of being like, well, what about this situation and what about this situation? And what about that situation?
Safrianna: Yes, and the end, the end thing is love.
Ikenna: Yeah.
Safrianna: If we all just could accept. Love for ourselves and love for others and love for the planet. And I don't have to like you or the way that you run your life or your hobbies or whatever, as long as you're not coming from a place of doing harm. And I'm, I'm writing a lot about this right now.
This concept that we don't, we don't have to agree with anyone. As long as they are not hurting, like doing physical or direct emotional harm upon us. Mm-hmm , uh, you know, we, we can still offer them love as a person. mm-hmm and choose not to engage with them. Yep. Obviously, yes, there are definitely cases, wars and physical attacks and assaults and all kinds of things where yes.
Defense has to come in and it's gonna be really hard to do anything other than dislike that person. Mm-hmm uh, but. hating people more and being intolerant and putting everybody on blast all the time for no actual reason. yeah. Doesn't move us in the direction of love and doesn't move us in the direction of healing.
Mm-hmm hatred does not create healing. Right. Love does. Right.
Ikenna: And that's why I'm gonna continue to spread love towards, you know, pride month, LGBTQIA a stuff, and I'm not gonna be like, Yay LGBTQ and also fuck these people for not for, for not, uh, supporting LGBTQ. Like you don't wanna be LGBTQ don't . Yeah.
Safrianna: Like, but leave us alone please. And we'll leave you alone and all will be well.
Ikenna: Yeah, you don't wanna have gay marriage. Don't get gay married. I always loved hearing that. Like, if you don't want to see that don't participate in it. Um, right. So it's yeah.
Safrianna: So just, and just be more Christlike folks yeah.
Even if you don't believe in Jesus Christ, we can all benefit from just being Christlike and loving everyone.
Ikenna: Be a bro, be a bro, just, and, and if you don't or a bronette or. A a Brony a Brony or Brony. I mean, we can all learn a little something from my little pony. Let's be real.
Safrianna: Oh yes. My little pony is a great, everyone needs to just watch my little pony because it has such good lessons about communication and tolerance and hard feelings.
And if we could just have more conversations. About that we'd all be better. Yep. I love how we went from pride to Neo Nazi to my little pony. this episode's been a wild ride. Yep. Hope you've enjoyed. And that you are tolerant of our points of view and that we can all just love each other better. Bye. Heck.
