Pres. Obama: Democracy demands getting inside “the reality of people who are different than us.”
“You can’t do it if you insist that those who aren’t like you because they’re white, or because they’re male…that somehow they lack standing to speak on certain matters.”
Former U.S. President Barack Obama delivered a passionate speech today at the 100th-anniversary celebration of Nelson Mandela’s birth in Johannesburg, South Africa.
In it, he expressed that in order to make democracy work, we have to follow Mandela’s example of teaching our children (and ourselves) to “engage with people not only who look different but who hold different views.”
“This is hard,” he added. “Most of us surround ourselves with opinions that validate what we already believe, and the people we think are smart are the people who agree with us.”
Obama insisted that democracy demands us to “get inside the reality of people who are different than us so we can understand their point of view.”
“Maybe we can change their minds,” he said, “but maybe they’ll change ours.”
Obama encouraged his listeners not to “disregard what opponents have to say from the start,” that it affects democracy when you insist that those who aren’t like you “because they’re white, or because they’re male,” somehow don’t understand what you’re feeling, “or lack standing to speak on certain matters,” said Obama.
He then used Mandela’s story to drive home his point. “In prison, Mandela studied Afrikaans so he could better understand the people who were jailing him. And when he got out of prison, he extended a hand to those who had jailed him, because he knew that they had to be a part of democratic South Africa that he wanted to build.”
Mandela himself wrote, “To make peace with an enemy, one must work with that enemy, and that enemy becomes one’s partner.”
Read the full transcript here.