We-makingDaniel Vaarik

Who are “we”?

Every definition of “we” changes the world

Humans

Old people

Parents

Startuppers

Etc etc etc

We-making is always they-making

The creation of “them” is vital for making “us”

Some “we’s” and “they’s” are fairly new

Generations

Nations

Car owners

In Spring 2010. Theatre NO99 created an experiment.

An audience member was asked to come to an empty stage.

People were encouraged to join her. “Because she is so lonely down there!”

People started coming to the stage to support her.

Soon many people filled the stage.

But not everyone left the seats.

And even after being asked many times, some people never went to stage. Suddenly there were “we” and “they”. The audience was polarized.

Unfortunately...

... polarization is also a main mechanism of making sense of the world…

...it is also the easiest way to get votes in politics

“If you came from the planet Mars, it would have been harder to make distinctions between the new guard and the old. But you could tell that the new ones were happier, they wore Baltman ties. The old ones were sad and angry, they had monochrome ties from the Leningrad trouser-factory number 3”. (Daniel Vaarik, “Praktikaaruanne”, 2012).

I’ve been polarizing too

Absolute “we” is impossible

… since “we” always requires “them”...

... since without different viewpoints the world as we know it, would end.

!

“We”/“They” creates suspicion

Who are these strange “they”?

Are some of the “they” among us?

Is this person perhaps an agent of the “they”?

Violence can secure the “we”

“Violence gives some form of certainty ...” (Arjun Appadurai, Fear of Small Numbers)

Minor differences as major anger points

In fact, minor differences can become the least acceptable ones. How dare you come between us while we are ALMOST “we” now?

Animals as “we”

Swans are seen as part of natural “we” in Estonian media.

Cormorans are seen as intruding “they.

Jokes as symbolic violence upon “them”

nationalities

gays

Government and “we”

Official “We” becomes destiny

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How nations define “we”

Ethnic

Multiethnic

“Estonian Russians or Putin’s”?

Bringing the “we” together

Push: military, money, legal stuff

Pull: soft power, culture, inspiration

Maintaining the “we”

Not so much what is said, but how it is said

Avoid final polarization

Don’t say that: “who is not with us, is our enemy”

Learn to stop the radicalization cycles

Mandela: a master of soft power or a pussy?

Symbolics of “we”

If apology, then pure

If monument, then beautiful and inclusive

Silent gradualism of “we”

Role models

Everyday practice

that every “we“ is imaginary

In the end, remember…

We can imagine very different “we’s”

Thanks.