Behind culture there is community, family and love and there is division, judgement and hatred. There is faith, compassion and acceptance and there is condemnation, betrayal and exile. If understood and embraced, culture can unite. If misapplied and scorned, culture can isolate.
My friend, Whitney, told me a story about a girl she knew in college who was afraid of foreigners. If anyone of a different ethnicity was near, she would do her best to avoid them. She didn't know how to communicate with them and she had no interest in trying. Her fear stemmed from an ignorance to any culture different from her own. One day, Whitney invited her friends over for dinner including this girl with a phobia of foreigners. Whitney dressed up in a tunic and scarf to hide most of her face. When the girl arrived she took one look at Whitney and walked the other direction. She spent the whole night trying to avoid one of her best friends unknowing that hidden under a foreign dress was a person she admired and respected. At the end of the night Whitney took off the scarf revealing herself to her friend. Her friend was in shock that the scary foreigner was actually one of her best friends. This is a perfect demonstration of how we let culture divide us. Behind the blinds of cultural differences there are individuals with the same worries and desires as you or me. When embraced culture can unite us and teach us more about our self and our place in the world. When scorned culture wraps us in a dark cloak of ignorance.
