A new month has arrived, a new year is around the corner and for some, 2017 can’t get here fast enough. Natural diasters, escalating civil unrest and a contentious election campaign have left many with frayed nerves and perpetual headaches, particularly as they imagine what changes the new administration and the president-elect’s cabinet choices could bring. It can especially be hard to view the near future with optimism, for example, when others believe that your gender, religion, ethnicity, sexual orientation and immigration status designates as you part of the riff-raff incapable of “making America great again.”
In the aftermath of Facebook feuds, broken friendships and threatening behavior, some people recognize the anxiety others are feeling and want to stand out as allies to their causes. What many have decided to do is follow the trend of wearing safety pins on their clothes, a visible symbol meant to demonstrate willingness to create a ‘safe space’ for victims of hate. The gesture is meant to be a comforting one and there are probably some very sincere wearers who will intervine when someone is being mistreated. But once that victim is bruised or bullied, what comes next? What if deflecting the danger isn’t as cute or as trendy as the pin they wear?
This is what came to mind when Vogue magazine recently made a cringe-worthy effort to recalibrate safety pins as accessories for a high-end fashion spread. In last month’s issue, an article entitled “10 Ways to Wear Safety Pins Post-Election and Show Your Support” offered suggestions to cop the latest “ready-made, sequined-embellished pieces” and featured ways to assemble them on a $569 sweatshirt, a $1795 handbag and $695 low-top sneakers (!). And if regular drugstore safety pins clashed with the couture, diamond-encrusted pin earrings from Barneys could set off the look at $1065 a pair (insert hard eye roll here).
As one can imagine, the tacky and tone-deaf images earned viral scorn and sarcasm across social media: “Coming soon: how to make your cancer ribbon pop this holiday season.” “You want to act like you support minority communities, buy this $1000+ safety pin broach instead of donating that money.” “$695 safety pin shoes, ‘sort of giving a [expletive] has never looked better.'” Wow Vogue….elitist much? A write-up enlisting readers to “take real action” should look like a list of organizations to join, not a catalog for Sak’s Fifth Avenue.
It’s that type of disconnect that is turning America from a recognized beacon of freedom around the globe into what was once described in George Orwell’s famous novella, Animal Farm: “All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others.” Men, women and children, citizens or not, are often targeted for being different and the solution doesn’t lie in superficial emblems and empty lip service. It isn’t enough for someone to broadcast a rehearsed message telling citizens to “move forward as one” after months of hurling debate slurs and Twitter insults; one has to move beyond their perceptions and privileges to educate themselves. Diversity is here to stay and those uniquenesses should be celebrated rather than shunned.
The Chinese saying, “May you live in interesting times,” is an appropriate one for the years ahead. If harmony is the goal, it cannot be acquired by devaluing the majority for the benefit of a few. Talk is cheap, trends fade and using stereotypes to terrorize fellow human beings will descend society into something other than “great.”
