Doug Lipman of Storydynamics.com talks about storytelling being "a dangerous adventure because it tells the truth of what it means to be human". A story, he says, makes us face what someone else has faced. And it makes us acknowledge the truth of what another person has experienced. If we put ourselves into the shoes of someone else - for instance, a person who is being oppressed or victimised by our society - we cannot continue to do what we are doing to them, and still live with ourselves.
I remember being at the dentist's rooms when I was a young child and discrimination against people of colour was still the norm in our country, when an Indian family entered the rooms and stood in the passage instead of sitting down in the waiting room. After some time had passed and the receptionist had not made an attempt to show them to chairs in the waiting room, my mother got up and invited them to sit down with the other patients. They declined and proudly stood in the passage until the dentist called them in.
That made an impression on me. The father of the family was a doctor in our town, and yet, his family was not at liberty to share communal space with the rest of the patients. And they were too proud to accept little crumbs of kindness from a member of an unjust society.
I felt ashamed that day: ashamed to be white and ashamed to be me. But I learnt something, and that is how it feels to be on the other side: to be a member of the oppressing side.
Lipman's words touched me more than he would ever know. His call for action to storytellers is: firstly, to tell the true stories in order to give the victims of injustice back their humanity, and secondly, to tell the story of the effect of injustice to those who belong to the oppressor's side. Because, says he, "every oppression harms everyone".
By nurturing the gift of storytelling, we can bring these stories into the open and share them. It is only through sharing that our nation will be healed.
If you would like to share a story or add a comment to this post, please feel free to do so.
