If you don’t like it then can you put a pin in it?

A couple of weeks ago I had the opportunity to visit a new doctor.  I didn’t feel heard or seen by my last doctor, so I was eager to find out how I would feel about this new doctor.  I am happy to say she was kind and I felt heard.  The doctor seemed genuinely curious about me and what direction my life was going in.  She was so enjoyable to be around I actually wished I had asked her to go for coffee when my visit ended.  At the end of the visit she took me to the nurse’s station to set up getting my blood drawn.  When we arrived at the nurse’s station I noticed a cloth rag doll.  On further investigation I realized it was a doll version of our president and it had pins in it!  It was a president voodoo doll.  I was surprised, and at the moment I was really amused.  I asked the nurse if I could take pictures of it.  “Sure!” she said, “if you want you can stick some pins in it.”  I wasn’t interested in sticking pins in it.  Soon after I took the photo I sent the picture to my friends and family.  Most people send back “haha” or “lol”.  A couple of people sent “Love”.  I also received some memes in response back.  All the memes were jokes on the president.  Some of them I thought were a little too crass.  Wait a minute!  Too crass?  I was sending out photos of a president voodoo doll.  What made a meme “cross the line”?

Later the next week I was studying the bodhisattva vows.  These are 4 statements that are repeated in the meditation sessions I attend with my Buddhist friends.  These vows are:

Sentient beings are numberless; I  vow to help them.

Greed, hatred, and ignorance rise endlessly; I vow to abandon them.

Dharma gates are countless; I vow to open them.

Buddha’s way is unsurpassed; I vow to embody it fully.

These vows are not ones to be taken lightly.  Yet, they are impossible to achieve.  How can I help all sentient beings I know personally, let alone ALL sentient beings?  I realize that as much as I may try, I will not know everything  - so ignorance will always be with me.  There will always be a dharma gate that I will need to enter.  Everyday I am learning.  While I learn a little more every day, those dharma gates are countless. I will have infinity minus the one thing I learned today, to learn tomorrow.  Much like the infinity of Dharma is the way of the Buddha.  So many personality features to improve on.  So how do I manage to say these vows and not feel like a complete failure? I mean if I’m never going to get there, why bother?

I look at the bodhisattva vows as a path of continuous improvement.  I see them as my values rather than my goals.  When I think of goals, I think of a checklist.  Like when I go to the supermarket and remember to get all the groceries I think, “Ok that is done.  What is next?”  I’m complete.  I don’t need to worry about them tomorrow.  Alternatively, my values are things that I continually strive for.  I grow them like a garden.  The garden must always be tended to or the weeds grow, the plants grow thirsty, or the fruit withers.  I work to treat the bodhisattva vows the same way.  At every morning meditation that I attend I recite the vows and remind myself, “Oh yeah, I want to be little better today.”  Honestly, every day is not an A+ day.  Some days I’m lucky to slide by with a C.  But I get to start again.  I get to go back to those values and say, “Oh yeah, I want to be a little better today.”  As Maya Angelou once said, “Do the best you can until you know better.  Then when you know better, do better”.

So as I mentioned, I was studying these vows and I thought, “I practice Buddhism.  These are vows I should not be taking lightly.  I should be treating everyone with kindness.”  Now don’t get me wrong here.  I certainly shouldn’t be a pushover.  If someone is treating me unfairly or their words completely disagree with what I believe that doesn’t mean I should just accept their behavior and acquiesce.  At the same time I feel I should have compassion for them.  They are a person just like I am a person.  They have hopes and dreams, they get scared and have fears just like I do.  If I am not comfortable around them I can stay away from them or turn off my tv.  So is sending a photo of a voodoo doll out to all those people okay?  I’m not so sure...

A few months ago I was talking to my brother.  He was telling me about how he had gone to the doctor and he really didn’t like her.  What didn’t he like?  A number of things.  But the biggest thing that bothered him was that she was a supporter of the president.  How did he know that?  Well, while he was in his appointment with the doctor she chose to talk about how much she supported the president.  Wow I thought.  That’s totally inappropriate!  Way to make my brother feel uncomfortable.  Gratefully he moved on and found another doctor.  I don’t believe that one is sharing his political beliefs.

So, how is it okay for my doctor‘s nurse to have a president voodoo doll but not okay for my brother’s doctor to be a president supporter?  It’s not.  Just because my beliefs align with my doctor’s nurse doesn’t mean that her nurse get a free pass to share their political beliefs in the office.  Granted the doll was on someone’s desk tucked away in a folder stand, but it was still in the office.  Is this president voodoo doll even okay at all?  If they had it in the privacy of their own home and they were sticking pins in it?  Is it a safe way to get frustrations out or just a method of violent communication?  I just don’t know.

In the early days of the pandemic I wrote a blog post titled, “Dualism Sucks” https://www.rockymountainyogigirl.net/new-blog/dualism  In this post I talked about how much it bothered me that people were taking sides over the pandemic.  Here we are 7 months later and days away from the presidential election.  I see memes for both sides.  How about the fly in the vice president’s hair during the vice presidential debate.  That received lots of memes.  Were they okay?  

Don’t get me wrong.  I’ve shared many a meme this election.  My family, friends, and I pass them around freely and try to find the cleverest one.  Are these okay?  Are they kind?  Is it all just tongue and cheek?

I can’t speak for everyone I know, but personally I am angry and frustrated with the current administration.  I think the environment is being thrown away, people of color are being treated unfairly, women are struggling, the LGBTQ community is in fear of losing rights, the pandemic has been handled irresponsibly, and I could go on.  I believe in my right to vote as a way to voice my opinion and work more proactively to create a more inclusive society.  I have placed my ballot in a ballot box in my city.  I have made donations to organizations and candidates that I believe will make a difference in the areas of society that are important to me.  I have read books on these topics to get a better understanding of what people are going through that are feeling the challenges of our society.  Many of these challenges aren’t new.  Many have been going on since the first immigrants came to America.  I agree that it is time for change.   It’s been coming for a long time.

So back to the doll.  Should we have voodoo dolls of presidents or not?  Can I say, “The president comes to a debate and bullies his competitor.  He talks over him.  He’s being unkind.  He doesn’t deserve my kindness - he deserves a voodoo doll!”  Is that right?  My dad used to always say, “You know, 2 wrongs don’t make a right”.  But we have to push back or we’ll be pushed over!  It’s so hard.  It’s hard because I believe we need to work together.  The tribalism of us vs. them has reached such a resounding set of screams.  It’s a sad state of affairs really.  I don’t want to be one of the screamers.  I want to be one of the olive branch holders.  I want us to come together realizing we need to make good for all not just for some.  I want real news to be “the news” and not be engulfed with conspiracy theories.  That’s one of the reasons I don’t support Facebook anymore.  I don’t want to encourage a space that promotes false messaging.  So for that and other reasons I chose to just walk away.  I realize that sometimes we need some comic relief.  Tensions are so high, we need something to laugh at - hence a voodoo doll of the president.  I don’t want to be the woke police.  I don’t want to be the one who says, “Sorry you can’t have any fun that’s dangerous for society”.  But it is.  When Jews were starting to be ostracized in Germany they were being made fun of for big noses.  Cartoons came out with big noses.  How did this caricature leap to being a systematic genocide?  At what point should the alienation of a group of people be stopped?  Should voodoo dolls happen?  I’m really not sure.  What I do know is that what seemed funny initially when I saw it just seems sad now.  I’m sad that as a society we are the us vs. them and I have caught myself up in the taking sides.  It’s going to be a long week folks.  No matter where we end up on the other side of the calendar I hope it’s closer together.