Wendy Videlock, "Change"

The mere title of Wendy Videlock's poem, all one syllable of it, commands attention. You know we need "Change." Not in the way it was used as a political slogan before, not as a word that needs to be uttered. "Change" is a gravitational pull from our bones, keeping our integrity. If things differ but the violent are permitted rule, injustices aren't addressed, and power fails to translate to equality, we will feel nothing has changed. We will react from within our own bodies, no thought required.

Videlock is positive enough about change: "lovely enough / to raise a song // or implicate / a sea of wrongs." The cosmic justice which calls for it can be addressed; the promise that the sea will not flood us hovers in the background. But this is not how conservatives conceive change, and it is their abject fear and loathing which has given rise to an extremism threatening to destroy everything.

"Change is the new, / improved / word for god:" those who don't know anything sneer at this, saying that church has changed too much, especially if they never bothered to attend services at all. Those who do know more rely on the sentiment, the sigh, of a "new, / improved / word for god." You see it in their crude invocation of Nietzsche, where the traditions of Western Europe, treated as the sum of all knowledge in the Middle Ages, are eclipsed by a headless progress. Change takes on the mantle of providence, but providence was tied to a clear, purportedly moral structure.

Change (from Poetry)
Wendy Videlock
  
Change is the new,

improved

word for god,

lovely enough
to raise a song

or implicate

a sea of wrongs,
mighty enough,

like other gods,

to shelter,
bring together,

and estrange us.

Please, god,
we seem to say,

change us.

It's a narrative I wrestle with for a few reasons, despite the fact it is broken. Firstly, there were and are powerful forces of reaction which can stall anything like progress indefinitely. So while I do not want to say that there was absolutely no concept of progress until, perhaps, the 18th or 19th century, it is imperative to try to imagine how tradition shaped people's thinking. There are arguments I find laughable which dominated the behavior of entire ages. Secondly, if we discover something in the past which is of value, how do we account for our neglect of it? Progress is not progress on all fronts; it is uneven, favoring some areas and disfavoring others. An abandoned wisdom may not seem a great sin, but at times we do not know the cost of it.

Still, the heart of conservatism, nowadays a sneering contempt for change, is fundamentally broken. You see it in a lust for nostalgia that elevates every cruel, idiot bigot at the expense of everyone else. Everyone else must learn to adapt, but the system in the hands of conservatives only exists to reward those who could not survive otherwise. And there's no respect for the progress which has been made, the progress which enables them to have rights as opposed to attacks from other reactionaries. Even when I was more conservative, believing that the wisdom of good books could provide the thoughtfulness we needed, I didn't fall into believing that you could simply substitute "God" for "progress" as those around me desired. (I fell into believing a lot of other stupid stuff, to be sure).

Videlock treats "Change" like a god. "[L]ike other gods," it can "shelter," "bring together," and "estrange us." The poem is from 2009 and I can't help but feel that the entire world has been turned on its head since then. We do need to be changed, as the end of the poem hints, but changed toward what? What, exactly, is progress?

Ironically enough, I think "shelter" and "bring together" have more substance than one would initially suspect. There are facile calls for unity which imagine that racists who advocate for genocide can be converted. This is stupidity. If you want to bring people together, you need to make sure everyone is safe and not compromise the basic needs of others. "Shelter," I believe, speaks to that principle: we establish the safety of everyone, we build serious boundaries, we make sure that everyone is housed, fed, clothed, and more. Too often some want to believe that defeating hatred means sacrificing those who are already suffering.

But with "shelter" speaking to true security, we can better understand what "bring together" must mean. No less than Jesus says that he was in prison, wanting to be visited. Instead of obsessing over converting the enemy, what about making sure their targets are empowered? The incarcerated suffer mightily–just today I read about a prison's programming being almost exclusively religious preaching–and I know giving to them can't hurt. It can't hurt because you always do something good when you give to the most vulnerable. At the very least, taking care of their needs gives them hope and dignity. If you must indulge a utilitarian calculus, fine: if they receive help from elsewhere, then your giving frees up that many more resources for others. Goods multiply quickly with focused efforts, and when populations who are attacked receive them, the attackers may find their power reduced.

I think a lot of people don't give because they want posting to be praxis. They want to be the main character of a drama where their words change minds and hearts. Where the violence others suffer isn't the primary focus. They don't give because they genuinely can't see where allies come from, how trust must be built slowly over time. I'll be the first to admit I am trash as an ally. I give money to some causes (food bank, foster kids, books for the incarcerated, etc.), but I'm definitely not doing enough to help everyone I can. I too must change, even if the change is to be more present, to be "new" and "improved" in the way we sell products: just a bit more of myself out there.