Who is my neighbor?

Throughout the history of the United States there has been a tension between those accepted as “Americans” by the dominant culture, and those who are rejected. The marginalized have repeatedly challenged the dominant culture to expand its boarders to include other groups. Takaki recounts how different groups have laid claim to the “rights” declared by the dominant culture, in a sense challenging those on the “inside” to be consistent with their own ideals. This is strikingly different from, say, radical socialism, which calls for the marginalized to rise up, overthrow the bourgeoisie, and take their place by force. Inherent in the American story, as told by Takaki, is a gradual expanding of the scope of the constitution, bill of rights, etc. Thus even the most progressive movements in this story are essentially conservative, because they want to hold onto the rights the majority reserves for themselves.

I have observed before that many of the ethical failings in our history, perhaps most, can be traced back to a truncated definition of person, human being, individual, etc. First we had “all men are created equal,” thereby excluding women, then we merely extended the sphere of ethical obligation to include white people. Today this language comes up in the abortion debate, where arguments frequently rest on questions like: to whom do we extend “personhood” to? Who can we agree to feel ethical obligation to? Abortion is a complex issue and I do not want to hastily draw conclusions here, but merely use it as an example. In the light of history it behooves us, I believe, to err on the side of over expanding our definitions of “us,” of “person” and “neighbor” rather than on the side of limiting these definitions to the smallest agreeable set of individuals/entities. I recall the exchange between Christ and an "expert in the law" in Luke 10 (the good Samaritan passage). "But the real question is, who is my neighbor!" the expert declaims. It is notable that Christ does not identify who "my neighbor" might be, but rather focuses on "who acted or behaved like a neighbor in this story?" It seems that, rather than getting the right definition of "person" or "individual worthy of ethical concern," we should rather seek to behave neighborly in all things.

DSM