on Borders and Birdnests

When we talk about borders, we’re talking about lines on paper. There’s a line from Superman IV, which I’ll admit is not a very good movie, where Superman tells his audience-

“I just wish you could all see the Earth the way that I see it. Because when you really look at it, it's just one world."

In Prometheus, which I’ll defend as a very good movie, the crew finds ancient remains on an alien planet by pointing out a massive, perfectly cut runway, and noting-

“God doesn’t draw in straight lines”.

Sometimes it helps me to imagine a bird nest in the side of some cliff. Eggs hatch and these baby birds are fed and learn to fly. Some pass away, but some live long enough to lay their own eggs in this cliffside. And without their knowledge, those birds are legally Athenian birds, and then they’re birds owned by the League of Corinth, and then they’re birds owned by Alexander the Great, and then they’re Roman birds, and then they’re Greek birds. Some birds migrate away and never return, some new birds visit the cliff and build their own nests. But the whole time they’ve just been laying eggs in the same cliff, generation after generation.

We can say all this but we can’t forget how powerful borders actually are. Those lines on paper can, and often do, separate families and justify violence, or hate, or both. But the point is, we should never let the conversation become too focused on whether the cliffside is an Athenian cliffside or a Persian cliffside. Our minds should be on showing compassion to the birds that call that cliffside their home.

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If you’d like to listen to my single exploring these themes, you can find the video here.