An essay I wrote in college I though was interesting.
In general, I tend to avoid conflict. Maybe I’m just getting old and tired, but I find dealing with conflict exhausting at this point in my life. After all, there is so much negativity in life already without dealing with a bunch of drama if it can be avoided. However, avoiding conflict isn’t always an option, or at least a good option. To be perfectly honest, I don’t mind “losing face”, but sometimes an issue is bigger than myself. After all, I have spent the last two years trying to be a good example to the world outside of my own micro-culture. I am a transgender woman living in the midst of a conservative Christian environment. For me, losing face personally means losing face for my in-group. With this consequence in mind, I sometimes feel I must confront rather than avoid a conflict.
About a year ago, I was at a business that I had reason to frequent on a regular basis. As it happened, I needed to use the restroom. The problem was, I didn’t know where the facility was located. After a few minutes of looking, I ran into the building manager. I felt an all too familiar tightness in my belly as she began to tell me how to find the men’s room. “Why do we have to do this today?”, I remember asking myself. I took just a moment to take a deep breath, then began to speak.
Having lived a significant portion of my life as an Evangelical Christian, (a belief system I am not longer associated with), I knew the conversation I was about to have was not going to go well if I did not allow the woman to feel she was being respected for her beliefs. However, I knew that I also needed to insist on my reality being respected as well, not just as a matter of saving face for myself, but for the good of the entire transgender community. Clearly, I was going to have to adopt an integrating strategy if I was going to make any headway in the ensuing conversation.
“Um, do you not believe that transgender women should use the lady’s room?”, I asked.
“No”, she answered. Clearly the woman intended to take up a dominating strategy.
I knew I would not be able to insist upon anything with the woman. To do so would only escalate her efforts to maintain her position in the matter. Having been in this position many times in my life, though over a myriad of different topics, I began to use questions rather than statements, hoping to coax the answers from the woman in a way she would not take as my placing any demands on her. For nearly half an hour, I allowed the woman to consider questions I hoped would not come across as threatening to her sensibilities. With each small victory, I would then steer the conversation to another level of understanding. In a conversation that started out with the woman stating that I “was a threat to young girls using the bathroom”, (a notion that I am infuriated by), ended with her agreeing that my using the correct restroom was in her best interest as a business owner. I am not sure if I was more relieved by my having dispelled the conflict or by actually being able to use the restroom after so long a conversation.
Fundamental Christians, as a micro-culture, link personal morality with self-face. I do not wish to embellish this thought but suffice it to say that I left this religious system with well thought out reasoning. I knew that if I challenged the woman in any way, she would feel compelled to defend her face as though she were defending her morality. I find it annoying that I had to lead the woman into seeing how allowing me to do something so petty as using the correct restroom would serve to bolster her perception of her moral uprightness.
Cultural groups can be based on any number of factors. The conflict ended in a win-win because I tried as best as I was able to show both respect and understanding for the woman’s culture. In this case, the main divide was over religion, but the divide could have been over ethnicity, race, or any number of other factors. Regardless, I believe whatever strategy one employs to dispel conflict, showing a high level of regard to the other party’s face is very important. To this end, I feel we all need to be diligent in increasing our understanding of other cultural groups.
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