In our culture, we act as if there is only one definition of a symbol — “an authoritative summary of faith or doctrine.” That’s why we get upset when people don’t stand for the national anthem. That’s why we fight for the right to fly the confederate flag.
However, I think the more realistic definition is “an arbitrary or conventional sign.”
Symbols are just that — symbolic. A narrative that someone else created and we decided to believe in.
My problem with symbols is not as much their arbitrary nature, but with the fact that they are fixed. They construct boundaries. They focus on scarcity. They are based in fear — the fear of change, as the prizes won by the people who established our present-day symbols can only be protected if the symbols retain “meaning.”
Symbols restrict freedom, not afford it. One cannot be free by opposing another. My freedom does not depend on your loss of freedom. On the contrary, my freedom inherently affirms yours.
The paradox of symbols lies in the fact that they are supposed to be shortcuts — allowing us to quickly identify things. Yet they also act as a barrier that prohibits us from seeing the possibilities that lie outside of them.
Instead of blindly following symbols we should ask ourselves: What do the symbols I believe say about me? What do they say about the world I want to live in? What can undo our attachment to symbols that we disagree with?
Symbols can change. The symbols that divide us, that ostracize people, that threaten our safety — those symbols must change. We have the power to change them.
Whoever merely follows symbols without questioning their value, their relevance, and their impact on others is simply repeating the past.