Bruce Whealton: Career, Interests and Values

In my previous post, On Becoming a Liberal, I wrote about the idea of a “bleeding heart liberal.”  I ended by saying that I am and was motivated by a passionate desire t protect and to be protected.  I can remember this desire developing in childhood.  I was very shy throughout child-hood, and into early adulthood.  I was very small always and as a younger child, that really brought out that sense of vulnerability and fear of being hurt.  It wasn’t just that, though… There were numerous areas of my life where I felt the desire to be protected.  My maternal grandparents were very protective and strangely enough, I often found myself embarrassed by that.  Not always, though, did I feel embarrassed.  Sometimes having them speak up for me was such a wonderful feeling.  It made me feel loved and valuable, worthy of protection. 

As time went on, over the years, I became increasingly sensitive to the needs of others and their vulnerability to harm, or other forms of vulnerability.  Especially, later in life, when I wasn’t the one who was vulnerable any longer, I acted at times, as I would want someone to act on my behalf, or as I would have wanted someone to act if they thought I was being hurt.  The idea of one person intimidating another person was not something I could stand or accept.  I had to act.  I would start confronting a parent for striking, or spanking, their much more vulnerable child.  It was what I truly desired that someone would have done for me.  Isn’t that how we are supposed to act?  Do onto others as you’d have them do onto you.  And the corollary to that for me was do for others what you would have wanted someone to do for me, if I was in that situation. 

The desire for power was never something I had ever wanted.  I never felt the desire to have power over another person (other than in a very rare instance where a person means to harm me, which can be avoided by avoiding bad parts of town late at night).

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