To know how to change a mind, you must learn how to change a river.
One way to change a river is to introduce wolves into the ecology.
In 1995, the rivers of Yellowstone National Park were riotous and inhospitable. Along the banks of these turgid rivers thrived large herds of deer who lived an idyllic life. But this docile scene papered over an invisible violence.
Scientists, ever the gods of violence, introduced wolves in order to displace the deer. Imagine the hatred they must have felt towards the wolves for robbing them of their absolute liberty. To the privileged, equality feels like oppression.
The wolves were the de facto defenders of the forest. Those trees quintupled in size in just six years. Their roots embraced the river, caging it. Their branches welcomed new birds, new songs. They fell into the shape of dams, built by beavers, who could transform rot into home.
A more egalitarian ecosystem emerged where all could share in the gamble of life alike. Perhaps the deer secretly understood that their life of leisure was rapacious and unsustainable. Or perhaps they were bitter with spite like a general waging a war of attrition. One wonders what stories deer tell themselves.
We call this process widespread trophic cascade.
To change a mind, you must learn how to change a river.
One way to change a river is to introduce wolves into the ecology.
In 1995, the rivers of Yellowstone National Park were riotous and inhospitable. Along the banks of these turgid rivers thrived large herds of deer who lived an idyllic life. But this docile scene papered over an invisible violence.
Scientists, ever the gods of violence, introduced wolves to displace the deer. Now, imagine the hatred they must have felt towards the wolves for robbing them of their absolute liberty. To the privileged, equality feels like oppression.
The wolves’ purpose was to defend the forest. Those trees quintupled in size in just six years. Their roots embraced the river, caging it. Their branches welcomed new birds, new songs. They died in the shape of dams, built by beavers, who could transform rot into home.
A more egalitarian ecosystem emerged where all could share in the gamble of life alike. Perhaps the deer secretly understood that their life of leisure was rapacious and unsustainable. Or perhaps they were bitter with spite like a general waging a war of attrition. One wonders what stories deer tell themselves.
We call this process a widespread trophic cascade.
Similarly, for new pastures of understanding to emerge, there must be a widespread cognitive cascade.
To change a mind, you must know how to change a river.
Thoughts flow like water flows like rivers flow like rapids sometimes violent sometimes placid.
For every social justice movement to succeed, there must be wolves with teeth and trees with roots to strike a balance of violence in our tributaries of thought.
There must be patience for the slow growth of sustainable systemic change but also understanding for the violence of urgency. Because injustice affects real people in the real world right now. That’s why black lives matter right now. Why we must be idle no more when never again is right now.
For anything to have changed, Martin Luther King Jr., needed Malcolm X and Malcom X needed MLK.
King understood that the language of love could unite peoples against systems of oppression that were and are invisible to all us coddled white moderates, who freeze on matters of race like deer caught in headlights.
Malcolm X saw how racism was a forked-tongue language whose were themselves violent, whether they be a susurrus or a screech. He knew a Million Man march could not stop the local lynch mob, who understood only the lash of their tongue.
Together, despite their differences, the forest and the wolf bent the arc of the moral universe towards justice and became, for all of us, the better angels of our nature.