A New Perspective: MIMETIC ISSUES OF VIOLENCE
My work in East and Central Africa has been growing to address Gender-Based and Violence with regard to the world’s most marginalized peoples; the LGBTQIA community, we have added the word “Sexual” to directly confront the most profound aspect of Gender Based Violence; thus the new phrase: Sexual Gender Based Violence. Our Conflict Transformation Training for Trainers course has gone through several adaptations and integrations since 2013. Crossing Lines Africa in conjunction a member organization in the Pan African Peace Network is developing an intervention dubbed: Sexual Gender [LGBTQI]-based Violence abbreviated as SLGBTQIV under two main components; Journey to Healing for LGBTQIA survivors and Transforming Stereotypes with Stakeholders (Faith Leaders and Community).
Mimetic theory allows us to see the deep truths that much of the Peace we seem to see is violent, always produced at the expense of a victim, and is built upon lies about the guilt of victim and the innocence of the community.
This Mimetic theory relates much with sexual gender-based violence. There are aspects such as power, status, rights, autonomy, authority, faith and values etc… as assigned to Gender identities by our social norms in society, these aspects can be root causes to SLGBTQIV or contributing factors that aggravate the prevailing injustice against the LGBTQIA community. Mimetic desire leads to escalation as our shared desire reinforces and enflames our belief in the value of the object.
The much desired Utopian vision of Social cohesion deeply calls us to consider the violence which exists as a result of “mimetic dynamics” because humans (both victims/ survivors and offenders/ aggressors) do consciously and unconsciously desire to be and have that which others possess, this is evident in the biblical account of mankind’s early life illustrated in the story in Genesis 4.8; where Cain murders his only and younger brother Abel. By mimicking others in terms of our aspirations, interests and needs, humans end up in conflict. It has become a clear indicator in our justice work that the possible realization of social cohesion in non-inclusive interventions happens only when tensions are ventilated, however the ventilation of existing tensions happens by redirecting the violence at the “scapegoat”.
The primary means for avoiding total escalation comes through the “scapegoating mechanism”, in which conflict is resolved by uniting against an arbitrary other who is excluded and blamed for the chaos, with the assumption that when the guilty party is gone, the conflict ends and peace and social order return to the community. Achieving peace in this way is only possible, however if the excluding parties unanimously believe that the person or people group expelled is truly guilty. Therefore the “scapegoats,” regardless of their actual crime, have always carried the weight of all of the community’s transgressions. Because of this Mimetic origin, conflict transformation in Sexual Gender (Male/Female) based violence context will only be possible when the “straight & narrow” have intentionally or unintentionally found a substitute victim (scapegoat) upon whom tensions are expressed. What I mean here is that humans (victims/ survivors and offenders/aggressors) have an inherent curiosity to know what lies beyond the borders of social convention and conformity, we see this in the biblical account of the temptation of man in Paradise, Genesis 3.1-24.
The LGBTQI community experiences freedom from social convention and conformity, the same freedom is also much desired by the other straight and narrow community. This is why social cohesion for the straight and narrow survivors/victims or offenders/aggressors in Sexual Gender Based Violence can only be achieved by easing tensions which often are manifested in the violence re-directed towards the LGBTQIA community.
The same is true for the LGBTQIA community, they genuinely aspire to experience freedoms on the other side of their borders associated with the social convention and conformity as experienced in the straight and narrow communities, we see this as LGBTQI communities push to have formal marriages, homes, children and live normal lives like others, this social cohesion for the LGBTQI community (which is part of their healing journey as well) will only be realized when tensions are eased and this will be manifested in violence against those they mimic; the straight and narrow. As a result we have decided that our SLGBTQIV intervention will be fully inclusive of all sexual gender groups acknowledging needs and interests of all in the sexual gender domain.
Mimetic origins of violence cannot be ignored, the aspiration of the human spirit is part of our growth, it is an instrument with which we grow and aspire to exist in spaces and status. All of human culture is built upon the edifice of scapegoating. This reading of culture, inspired by insights into the innocence of the victims made available in the Jewish and Christian scriptures, has made possible an increased awareness of this scapegoating mechanism and its effects, so as to interrupt these processes and achieve a different kind of peace.
This challenges us to be very intentional on gender mainstreaming, protection mainstreaming in our inclusion processes. Because if we do not make these serious considerations, our indicators of healing and development i.e. social cohesion, will become sources of violence in themselves, against the “scapegoats” even when we do not intend to direct the violence to them. Speaking of “scapegoats” these are human beings and lives are at stake.
When a church community obtains peace through violent expulsion of a scapegoat, they cannot perceive that it is their own unanimous violence which produced the peace. This blindness on the part of the church members with respect to what they are actually doing – killing an innocent victim – is the one essential element required for the scapegoating mechanism to work. Church members in the scapegoating mechanism hold an authentic belief in the guilt of the victim, a guilt seemingly demonstrated by the restoration of peace.
The power of Christianity lies in the “unveiling” the scapegoat mechanism! If we fail at this, then we have failed in our very essence of the great commission: Matthew 5.9; Blessed are the Peace makers, they will be called children of God.
This article describes the heart beat at the frontlines of our Peace and Justice work in Uganda, reaching East and Central Africa.
Story by: Philip Kakungulu
Crossing Lines Africa – Uganda
Pan African Peace Network
For more on mimetic violence and scapegoating, you can read Rene Girard’s seminal book I Saw Satan Fall Like Lightning. Click here to order.
You can also read more at the website for the International Association for Scholars of Mimetic Theory: Click here.
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