[I was asked if I would speak at our local Unitarian Universalist Society here in Santa Barbara last Sunday (01/01/2012) to relate the social justice work we are doing with Occupy Santa Barbara with the theme for January of Unity and Solidarity. Specifically the service on Sunday was about having an All for one and one for all mentality.]
"All for one & one for all." I hear that famous phrase inside of communications that have lent strength to me in the past few months. Most messages I've received while volunteering with Occupy Santa Barbara ends with phrases like, "In solidarity." or, "With unity and support.", or, my personal favorite, "In solidarity, unity, and love." The sudden reemergence of these terms, often used by generations who had been written off as self-obsessed, anti-compassionate, and only interested in pointless entertainment, made me start to wonder: what is it about trying times that makes it feel so right to simply come together with other people?
Sometimes the expression of an all-for-one, one-for-all mindset is simply cathartic. Other times it allows us to follow through on coordinated actions, which would never be possible to undertake alone.
Sometimes the expression of an all-for-one, one-for-all mindset is simply cathartic. Other times it allows us to follow through on coordinated actions, which would never be possible to undertake alone.
On the worldwide stage examples of these actions are such things like the Global Day of Action on October 15th, when hundreds of cities, towns, and hamlets around the world participated in occupy actions. People were protesting, demonstrating, and marching with total strangers (A.K.A. new-found sisters & brothers in arms). They were calling for the version of social justice that makes sense to their communities and countries.
On a national level another example would be the Move Your Money Day action, which allowed targeted messaging to be disseminated throughout the country, (except for those sadly still yoked to the kleptocrat-controlled media). The message was to ask people to stand together as consumers, citizens, and Americans. To move their money out of corrupt institutions which seem to no longer serve the nation or even the market. People came together to say that no bank should be too big to fail, but that the people are.
Making any of these stands alone would probably make most of us feel isolated, ridiculed, and dismissed. Taking these actions and making these protests together in unity can result in completely different feelings. Calling on our fellow citizenry with a united voice...this invokes feelings of legend! Instead of feeling discounted it can make a person feel electrified and elated, even if the fight seems overwhelming. Chanting together about issues which a person deeply cares about with total strangers suddenly warms a deep central spot in your core. Its almost as if we, as humans, were built for a All-for-One-One-for-All mentality.
The fact seems to be that, regardless of what the cause is, what the day's struggle has in store for us, it always helps to have people with us.
On a personal note, some of the moments recently when I felt this truth most strongly expressed was when our local occupy movement has shown up for some type of action. All of this is new to the vast majority of us. Often even committing to protests, rallies, community picket lines, and the like, is way out of most folks' comfort zones. But something magical happens every time we show up from our wide variety of independent existences to gather together with a purpose. At least it does for me and I have a sneaking suspicion that I'm not the only one.
A perfect example was showing up at Port Hueneme at 6:00am after meeting up with the other Santa Barbara folks at 4:45am to caravan down to the location. On a side note, I was totally impressed that anyone from Santa Barbara would show up before five in the morning in the rain to do anything, let alone to picket a port. People who we had never met showed up from as far away as Fresno, Bakersfield, San Lois Obispo, Thousand Oaks, and more. Even though the vast majority of these people from so many walks of life were complete strangers, there was some sort of a family reunion feeling to the whole affair. I watched an elder from our local community talking to a young fired-up citizen from Oxnard. The way they were speaking it would have been impossible to guess that they were absolute strangers only a couple of hours before meeting up in the dark rainy morning at the port. By the very necessity of being there together in solidarity for the cause they believed in, these two people were ready to be united and look out for the other's well-being.
Moments like these have crystallized, in my mind at least, that our movement really is about all for one and one for all. That, especially in these times of profit by any means necessary, total ideological domination over mutually-respectful communication, and a compassion-barrier that somehow makes it okay to ignore atrocities so long as they happen somewhere else, the very thought of being non-self-obsessed enough to express an "All for One and One for All" mentality is indeed a revolutionary thought. And I, for one, am a proud revolutionary.