Two Worlds
Most people grow up within a society that dictates what is normal. In a democratic society democracy is normal, but for the boy or girl who has grown up in a tribal society, where the chief and the shaman call all the shots, the concept of voting will likely seem strange and foreign.
I grew up in two worlds.
I grew up within the larger society of Copenhagen, Denmark. State of law, free public healthcare, high taxes, the works.
But I was born and raised in Freetown Christiania, a somewhat autonomous village situated inside of Copenhagen.
A village that allows no cars, where smoking weed is about as common as drinking alcohol, a community of about a thousand people that is ruled by consensus democracy and self-governance. A community that has no police force and no prisons, and where the highest punishment for breaking the law is exile.
In Christiania there are stores and boutiques and youth clubs and a kindergarten, but no school. School happens in the outside world, within Copenhagen proper.
In school we were taught that milk comes from cows on big dairy farms, but there were a few goats in Christiania that were milked. At school we were taught that all people looked similar when naked (I so hope sex ed is better now than it was then), but there were a few naked people running around in Christiania, and they did not look alike at all.
As you can see, these were small things, most of the time, but they did build up this inner conflict within me. Who was right? What voice should I listen to? And if certain people say they have the answer, but I see that it's not true, what else are they wrong about?
The answer came to me when I was eight, and it was startling in its simplicity.
The voice I should listen to was my own
.I've been trying to do that ever since. |
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