Anywhere with diversity has conflict. This is inevitable with the existence of individuality. Nowhere is without conflict because there is no group of people devoid of differences. Diversity is a catalyst of conflict– so if “we are a community, diverse”, we must accept that conflict is a part of our reality.
It's hard to accept the less-pleasant aspects of anything you value– a community, a person, even an institution. Yet with the acceptance of individuality and diversity in our community, we must accept the conflict that it will bring. To love something, we must see and accept its whole. Accepting that we are naturally different, we can be honest when sharing the conflicting opinions and perspectives we have. This will allow us to empathize with each other, and gain a more holistic view on something as complex as conflict. Accepting the conflicted nature of our community is the first step in overcoming it.
In the case of the Israel-Palestine conflict, we cannot deny that CA took action where many other institutions did not. CA did not blatantly skirt around the conflict– an effort did exist. But the candor that many had hoped for was lacking. If we skirt around the fact that there are clashing opinions in our community, we cannot move forward. Just like with grief or addiction, the first step is accepting that there is a problem. We can't be compassionate right now if we don’t see the reasons why compassion is currently so necessary. If we want to “build peace”, we can’t skip the part where we are conflicted just to get to the happy ending. We can't surround a delicate subject with so much fluff that its true form is being denied.
These conflicts affect us as an entire community, so we must face it as such. When we were split into groups at the Peacebuilding Assembly, we did not face the conflict as a community. We cannot effectively “reflect” in a space that isn't as diverse as the reality of our community. Splitting us into these groups to reduce diversity is an active effort to avoid conflict. CA is avoiding conflict. If we are in denial of conflict we are scattered, and cannot come together to face it. That is stopping us from progressing.
Understanding all of the different perspectives in a conflict is hard. I don't believe kids or adults have quite figured it out yet. But we need to try harder, because I know we can do better. We all have an intuition in our unconscious minds that guides us on how to act in conflict. In our enlightened moments, we sort of know the ideals that can be applied– but conflict is ugly, and it so rarely brings out the best in us. War is barbaric, war is messy, and war is emotional. There is a torrent that is unleashed into the world, and its weight and power is something that can’t be fully understood. Of course conflict is hard to tackle. CA needs to face it alongside the people in our community who have no choice but to. We need to support each other, try to understand each other, and move forward together. That is how we can show love to our community.
I believe we all have the desire to be right. We have to remind ourselves that we are trying to understand, not trying to be right. Being “unconstructively righteous” means that we revel in being right so much that we aren't finding a way forward. It's dangerous, and I feel we are tittering on that edge. Being right isn't always adjacent to progress. If we cannot accept being wrong, or if we get too focused on being and staying right, we stifle our ability to move forward. It's easy to say CA's efforts are “failing”, because you'd be right. But focusing on that is not constructive. We need to strive to understand, not be right. With understanding we can empathize. With understanding, we can see from other perspectives and connect with people that have differing views. That is how we will move forward.
Conflict rarely brings out the best in anything. As a community we are avoiding conflict, tackling a plethora of differing perspectives, and too focused on being right. But in conflict, we are required to grow the most. We have to find compassion in conflict, we have to find empathy in conflict, and we have to accept conflict to do so. Once we do that, we can try to understand. Understand each other, understand how we can come together as a community. Only then can we face conflict with candor. Only then, can we move forward with love.