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Last week, I had a great conversation that will appear in our April episode of Gaining Advantage, a conversation that left me thinking all weekend and even influenced a presentation I gave.
Vestigial organs are organs that seem useless, likely useful to our ancestors but atrophied over many generations, or a leftover from an ancestral organism. In humans, the best-known include wisdom teeth and the appendix.
However, humans still need both of these organs. Wisdom teeth help us chew tough materials. problem isn’t with the teeth themselves; rather it’s because we tend to eat a lot of food that has already been processed by machines, so our jaws atrophy. We have the right amount of teeth — our jaws get too small for them.
The appendix plays a role in supporting our immune system, except we live in a relatively sterile society, so its need to fight invasive organisms isn’t met, and it fights our bodies instead. Calling these organs “vestigial” is a myth of privilege, ignoring their needs in environments unlike most of ours.
The same holds for the body of humanity. Each of us is important, and our existence contributes to the whole. I’ve known people used to providing care for others who found themselves suddenly or gradually more in need of receiving than they could give. They felt guilty, useless, and burdensome. But the joy they experienced in giving care was given to those who cared for them. But no matter what you give or receive from the rest of humanity, you are just as valuable and needed as anyone else. Your value isn’t determined by what you contribute, but by your existence as part of the global body politic. And the more we learn from a broad range of each other’s experiences, the more we grow. And the more we serve each other, the stronger we get collectively. So thinking of any person like a vestigial organ is also a myth of privilege. If we don’t have room for someone in the world, maybe our viewpoint has atrophied. If we ignore the needs of forgotten members of our species, we shouldn’t be surprised when they fight back.
Assemble your party, and consider not just whom you need, but whom you can include. |
