Labels are for Canned Food not People

“Once you label me you negate me” ~ Soren Kierkegaard

"... We should not say ‘I am an Athenian’ or ‘I am a Roman’ but ‘I am a citizen of the Universe" ~ Stoic Philosopher King, Marcus Aurelius (Roman Emperor).

Interviewer to Bruce Lee: “Do you still think of yourself as Chinese or do you ever think of yourself as North American?”

Response from Bruce Lee: “You know what I want to think of myself? As a human being. Because, I mean I don't want sound like ‘As Confucius say,’ but under the sky, under the heavens there is but one family. It just so happens that people are different.”

“My friends, I am no Christian ... I am neither Jew nor Gentile, [Muslim] nor Theist; I am but a member of the human family, and would accept [truth] by whomsoever offered— that truth which we can all find, if we will but seek—in things, not in words; in nature, not in human imagination; in our own hearts, not in temples made with hands.”
“Thus let us associate; not as Jews, not as Christians, not as Deists, not as believers, not as skeptics, not as poor, not as rich, not as artisans, not as merchants, not as lawyers, but as human beings, as fellow creatures, as American citizens, pledged to protect each other’s rights—to advance each other’s happiness”  ~ Frances Wright (1795-1852)

I spent several years trying on several religious and secular ideological "hats." During that process of discovery and personal growth I tried on several different labels as well. With each new label came a new set of frustrations and limitations. I soon began to question this need to be labeled altogether. Today I reject all labels.

The biggest problem I have with labels is that they box you into a small set of opinions and conjecture – Republican, Democrat, Christian, Muslim, Agnostic – thus forcing you into a mold and a preconceived mask people react to. Side note: I don’t think the label Christian even existed when Jesus and his earliest followers were alive.

The minute we label someone we have categorized them and put them on a shelf like canned food; this impedes us from truly listening to them and learning from them. Instead we have the label (Atheist, Agnostic, Christian, Jew, Muslim, Republican, Democrat, etc.) and all the baggage we have accumulated in our mind pertaining to that label. We have made that person the spokesperson for all others who hold that label, both those who left a good impression and those who left a bad one. This inevitably creates confusion, division, and misunderstanding as the person who reacts to your label is not reacting to you and your unique person or common humanity; instead they are reacting to the preconceived notions of what ideas he or she thinks are in your thought cloud; by this I mean the thought cloud that appears above a cartoon character's head in a comic strip that signifies his or her thoughts. It's as if we are not experiencing each other as flesh and blood human beings, but are just looking above each other's head at their thought cloud and deciding to like them based on that rather than their character and deeds. It is as if when we are labeled we are walking around with a stamp on our forehead like a can of food to be put on the shelf.

I say peel off the label because we are not products on the shelf, we are human beings. Let us realize that thought clouds like real clouds move and dissipate. In other words, we change our minds all the time. How many times throughout your own lifetime have you changed your mind about something? We are more than our current thoughts and opinions. We are beings in constant transition from birth to death, from babies to teenagers and onward. We are experiencing beings of love and laughter, pain and struggle, family and friends. We are time bound mammals with mammalian ideas and perceptions and thus we are not infallible. We are not human labels, we are human beings.

Labels are over-simplistic caricatures that hardly ever accurately capture a person’s entire point of view. This is where much confusion develops: are you a left-leaning republican, a more moderate democrat, a strong or weak atheist, a progressive, moderate, evangelical, protestant, or other type of Christian? Why do we need these labels anyway when the person can just tell you what they think, believe, and perceive, etc?

Labels limit communication and true understanding, for once we hear a label our mind often either shuts off, “Oh, they’re a [fill in the blank]___, I don’t need to listen to that,” or we go, “Oh, she is a ____, like me, so he/she must be right.”

Why not just allow the person a minute or two to describe their position in their own words rather than confine them to a cookie cutter image of your making?

Even the atheist community, that prides itself on individuality, has sometimes fallen victim to this mentality of narrowing people into tight boxes of conformity. When non-theist authors have rejected the atheist label I have seen many in the self-proclaimed atheist community boo them and chastise them; for even though they are essentially of the same "irreligious tribe" the need to label runs deep.

 We all feel driven to label one another because we evolved as social species that over the centuries sought to differentiate between the trusted tribe and the rival tribe that can harm us. But today we live in a global village with technology that allows us to communicate beyond barriers and realize our common humanity; and understand one another's story and thus diminish the innate "us and them" fears and worries.

Once again, we have become human-labels instead of human-beings. It is as if we treat each other like canned food, to pick off the shelf or reject based solely on the label.

Another problem with labels is that it tends to create divisive tribalism and limit our desire to get to know our fellow human beings. When I was an X (X = religious or secular ideology) I limited myself to a specific X vocabulary speaking X lingo, reading mostly X books, and constantly reinforcing my X worldview. I never read the opposing point of view or I did so rarely. Instead I was constantly reinforcing my own ideological stance and sticking to my narrow social circle because it made me feel secure and proud as part of the in-group. Isn't it time to move beyond divisive labels as one species living on the same planet?

“He drew a circle to keep me out,
A thing of scorn, and a thing to flout.
But love and I had the wit to win:
We drew a circle that took him in.”
—Edwin Markham

Some will protest and say, “All of this is naïve. We need labels to organize ourselves around an ideology we believe in.” My response is, ants organize themselves without wearing conceptual stamps on their foreheads. Again, are treating our fellow human brothers and sisters like canned food by stamping them with a label to reject or embrace rather than actually getting to know them and their point of view? If we must categorize in order to organize why not just organize around a methodology or a descriptive phrase, which I have attempted to do with the title of this blog, “cosmic oneness and rational wholeness” which isn’t a label but a brief description of my practical philosophy.

If I am in the mood to express my thoughts on an issue I give a description of my point of view rather than giving out a label. Because I know that all labels are flawed and limiting thus negating the person touting the label; and again, when you label yourself another person may have a limited or skewed view of what that label represents. Thus, you end up defending a caricature of yourself rather than presenting your true self to that person. It only takes a little more time and patience to describe your views rather than blurt out a label as if you’re a stamped can on the shelf of a grocery isle at the store; asking to be hand picked and accepted into someone’s categorically segregated grocery cart; thus turning you into a mass produced product, a memetic robot, in the consumerist world of ideas.

Some will say, “Well, you are an American aren’t you?” I would say, “I’m a human being having an American experience.” I have been to Brazil, France, Germany, etc., and they are as much a part of mine and your humanity as the American experience is. There are certain American ideas I resonate with but there are also other countries whom I agree with too, how they do things politically. Yes I agree more with how America is run politically but the point is that I am more than an American, I am a human being.

Finally, labels imply a permanent solidity in your thinking and imply cognitive infallibility as if you are set in your ways; as if you are perfect and you never change your mind. I know I have a limited and fallible human mammalian brain that makes cognitive mistakes and perceptual errors all the time; and I believe that if the reader is humble they will agree that their brain is also subject to the same errors. The fact is that I have changed my mind several times and so have you. I am open to new data and new departures in thinking; thus I hold my opinions tentatively lest I fall victim to pride and close-mindedness.

We are not human-Doings: we're not our job, our clothes, or that trophy.

We are not human-Thinkings: what are we between thoughts, when thinking fades and silence flows, who are we then?

We are not human-Labels: Christian, Muslim, Jewish, Hindu, Atheist, Republican, Democrat, etc. Does any label fully encapsulate you? Aren't labels better for canned food rather than complex persons?

You and I are not human-Believings: have we not changed our minds millions of times and altered our beliefs and opinions after new experiences and new data and evidence? Aren't subjective beliefs tied to fallible cognition and fallible human perceptions?

You and I are not human-Forms (static and unchanging): are we not impermanent systems but are beings in constant change and transition; growing from babies to teens to adults then dieing. As organic systems we are made of more empty space in the atoms that compose our mammalian bodies than material stuff.

We are human-Beings: human experiencers, human wonders, human primates/mammals, human earthlings, human brothers and sisters.

We are all impermanent cells in motion, related to all living organisms on the evolutionary Tree of Life. We are one earthly family, one species under the sun. We are all experiencing the same reality as mammals, i.e. we are all subject to cognitive and perceptual error as earthlings limited by our five sense perceptions, cultural influences, linguistic limitations, and the laws of biology and physics. Thus, when we are honest with ourselves the humble among us embrace the ultimate mystery of our existence. We give up claiming certainty in make-belief and conjecture and learn to enjoy the present moment while growing to our full potential like flowers in bloom and caterpillars turning into butterflies.

We have grand potentiality as meaning-making mammals finding our own individual purposes and realizing our higher meaning and our existential value on the hero's journey.

I am not a label. I am a manifestation of this mysterious expanding force of nature we call life. Those who wish to paint themselves by numbers based on what is on the box of their ideology are welcome to it. As for me, I wish to be taken off the shelf. I have unpeeled the label from my forehead and embraced my human beingness. I am not a label on a memetic can of conformity. I am the ingredients of life. I will not restrict my pallet but will allow my brush to be free to dip in the colors of diversity and paint on the boundless canvas of life; free as a bird soaring toward the heights of my fullest humanity.