The Shoes of Others by Alex Barclay: say yes to empathy, equality and love

With one step at a time, you can feel the life of another person, and, with love, transform your own.

Every day, I put myself in other people’s shoes: tiny ones, big ones, blood-spattered ones, expensive ones, cheap ones, shoes with torn soles on people with torn souls.

I write crime novels and fantasy; I write from the perspective of mothers and fathers, girls and boys, cops and robbers, killers and kings. Yet, I’m only one of those things.

Like all writers, I spend time living other lives, seeing other perspectives, asking questions of other people, and learning from the answers. The longer I’ve been doing it, the more I believe that everyone should put themselves in other people’s shoes.

No matter who you are or who you love, love is beautiful, powerful, life-affirming, and healing. When love begins, it has a defining energy; this is our purpose for being here.

There are few things in life as powerful as the spark of attraction, that brilliance that shines from a heart, that physical surge. A heart is a heart and to whomever it bonds, the mechanism remains the same. From this, love grows, passion burns. But it all starts with a spark.

For those who say that homosexuality is against nature, I say: to stifle that spark is against nature. Nature created that spark. And it’s one of its finest gifts. Even for those who say “what they do in the privacy of their own bedroom is their business”, I say: this isn’t about bedrooms, it’s about life outside walls. It’s about hopes and dreams and equality and acceptance.

When I hear of people struggling with their sexuality, I often think – is it their sexuality they’re struggling with? Or is the struggle, in fact, with society’s reaction to it? Would people struggle with something if, once revealed, it would be celebrated? I didn’t struggle with my sexuality, but I know I would have if I felt that what came naturally to me would be met with rejection or derision or violence. And there is a further struggle: how can a loving gay person possibly recognise him- or herself in the description of “sinner”? How could they possibly recognise their love as “unnatural”? Is love to be divided into heterosexual and homosexual? And is heterosexual love the only love to be respected and celebrated? Love is about unity.

I know that I would find it unbearable to have to hide the part of myself of which I’m most proud – my capacity for love. It would feel cruel to have that limited by others; to have it accepted only to a point, to be brought to a border created by people who don’t know me, and told I could not cross.

To anyone who is considering voting “no”, please spend time in the shoes of those whom your vote will affect. This is not an X that ends in a box. That one X will move like a hollow-point bullet. You can’t turn your head away from what happens next, from the injuries you will cause, from the damage you will do. Exclusion, for any reason, crushes spirits.

To come together to exclude is no worthwhile legacy. There has already been too much of this. To push anyone to the periphery condemns them to suffering; the world becomes a hostile environment, depression is almost inevitable, suicide becomes an answer when it should never be, where it might never have been otherwise. People who can’t thrive in their love, fade away.

To anyone who is considering voting “no”, remember the times in your life when you were suffering. Remember when your heart was broken, or you felt lost or you were lonely or sick or suicidal. Remember when you had your beloved to turn to. Now, think of how it would be not to have been able to do that, or to have to do that in secret.

To anyone who is considering voting “no”, remember when you fell in love, and how natural it felt. Remember how you saw someone, and your heart was lifted, how you walked across a dance floor, you reached out your hand, you danced, you met again, you met again, you fell in love. Remember telling your family and friends that story, remember telling them about the adventures you went on. Remember telling them you were getting married. Remember your wedding day. Remember announcing a pregnancy, or your approval to adopt. Now, think of how it would be not to have been able to do that, not to have been able to see your joy reflected in the faces of your family, friends, and colleagues, not to have your love celebrated. Think of every beautiful, life-affirming milestone in your life passing silently by or being reduced to fit only into a tiny, private world.

May 22nd, 2015 is a big day. Everyone deserves a “big day”. Everyone deserves a big life; full, rich, happy, open and accepted.

So when you wake up on that day, get up, and get dressed. Today, you’ll be walking in your own shoes. Please make that walk a meaningful one. Do justice to that spark. Do justice to your lifted heart, to beautiful love, to enduring love.

Cast your mind back, and cast a kind vote. Ask yourself, “Do I want to better the lives of loving people?” And vote in a way that says: “I do.”

With love to all who love,

Alex Sparkly

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Killing Ways by Alex Barclay is published by HarperCollins out now