Skip to content

Letter: The politics of fight or flight

Where are the leaders who will role model this path forward?
30690376_web1_Letters-logo-2-660x440

The politics of fight or flight

The pandemic did not polarize our community into us and them — fight/flight did. COVID highjacked the nervous system of every single one of us, triggering pandemic of fight/flight trauma responses. The science we all can trust is the neurobiology of trauma.

Powerlessness, lack of control, shifting ground, instability, not knowing who or what to trust, where is the truth? what is the truth? has herded all of us into a wreckless collision with fear, anxiety, suspicion, blame usurping our collective charity for one another. Collective trauma — we are all in this together.

Many of the candidates in the upcoming municipal elections are reflecting and fueling our community’s fight/flight trauma — based polarization. Both sides are jockeying for power over the other, and both sides are naturally resisting such oppression. Self-righteous boasting of your triple vax status is just as toxically divisive as ranting about the World Economic Forum’s influence on Cowichan Valley governance. Both are fear-based responses. Balance is the new world order, and individual accountability for calming our emotionally reactive nervous system is the Great Reset of our time. We have all suffered equally and we are all compassion fatigued.

Vote for inclusion, not exclusion. Vote for curiosity, not suspicion. Stop finger-pointing, start listening. Unplug from hysteria. Immerse in nature. Breathe deeply. Reset to collective common sense and out of collective trauma. And where are the leaders who will role model this path forward?

Kendra Thomas

Duncan