Dignity and Degradation
Nature Girl
Thread Starter
Join Date: Mar 2002
Location: By The Lake
Posts: 60,328
Dignity and Degradation
You are reading from the book Touchstones.
There is no king who has not had a slave among his ancestors, and no slave who has not had a king among his.
--Helen Keller
The human race is a huge mixture of dignity and degradation and every man inherits the blend. We can respect the slave in us for his endurance and suffering. And the king in us earns our respect for his leadership and justice. Are we ashamed of who we are or where we have come from? Then we may have to look deeper and ask if we are really different from any other man.
Do we believe we must conform to some mold of acceptability, some proper appearance? Are we so focused on the surface that we miss the deeper values of our humanness? Sometimes we take on a reverse smugness and become judgmental of the person who looks successful or speaks well. We think, "I can't like him, he's in a different class." We all need acceptance and respect, and in this program we are equals from the first day.
God, grant me the self esteem to accept the whole mixture that comes together in me and in the people around me.
There is no king who has not had a slave among his ancestors, and no slave who has not had a king among his.
--Helen Keller
The human race is a huge mixture of dignity and degradation and every man inherits the blend. We can respect the slave in us for his endurance and suffering. And the king in us earns our respect for his leadership and justice. Are we ashamed of who we are or where we have come from? Then we may have to look deeper and ask if we are really different from any other man.
Do we believe we must conform to some mold of acceptability, some proper appearance? Are we so focused on the surface that we miss the deeper values of our humanness? Sometimes we take on a reverse smugness and become judgmental of the person who looks successful or speaks well. We think, "I can't like him, he's in a different class." We all need acceptance and respect, and in this program we are equals from the first day.
God, grant me the self esteem to accept the whole mixture that comes together in me and in the people around me.
Member
Join Date: Oct 2004
Location: uk
Posts: 3,054
My humanity is a measure of my humanity - if I behave inhumanely towards another it's my own humanity I lose, if I de-grade (lower the status of) another human, it shows I have lost my humanity. I cannot reduce the humanity of another.
My dignity is my humanity, my humaness.
My dignity is my humanity, my humaness.
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