“I Am Not Other,” a spoken-word performance piece for 6 to 8 actors, written & directed by Joey Madia (2005–10) for Seven Stories Theatre Company, Inc.

[Staging Note: A variety of ladders, boxes and chairs are used to create levels and stage pictures as this Spoken Word piece is performed. Actors should speak to one another as well as to the audience]

VOICE: This is for Claudette Colvin and Rosa Parks…

EVERYONE: Control the Word and You Control the World…

VOICE: Throughout its history, Humankind has waged wars of Hate upon its own.

VOICE: Country against country, culture vs. culture, city vs. town, group against the one, one against the Other…

VOICE: Violence is societal,

VOICE: Violence is domestic,

VOICE: Violence is sexual,

VOICE: Violence is racial,

VOICE: Violence is mindless,

EVERYONE: Violence brings the night…

VOICE: Violence grips our schools, our temples, churches, mosques;

VOICE: The media and TV show violence all the time;

VOICE: Violence can be physical, emotional, psychological;

VOICE: Violence can be war, or a harsh word to a child;

VOICE: Violence ruins freedom;

VOICE: Violence is a CHOICE.

{Under the Voices above are the whispered voices of the Dark Chant: HATE, ANNIHILATION, DESECRATION, SEGREGATION, WAR, AND PREJUDICE; this stops after the word “CHOICE”}

VOICE: Words have power.

VOICE: Words from a book or a play…

EVERYONE: “Friends, Romans, Countrymen, lend me your ears!”

VOICE: Or a charismatic speaker…

EVERYONE: “We have nothing to fear but fear itself!”

VOICE: Can motivate the masses to act. To rise up or lay low, to initiate change or perpetuate myths through inaction and tolerance for policies they know to be wrong.

VOICE: Preying on the poor, the desperate, the socially outcast.

VOICE: In the beginning was the Word, passionate and full of Life; then there came the Voices of Anger and of Battle;

EVERYONE: HUZZAH!

VOICE: At the end will there be Screams? Whimpers? Whispers? Silence?

VOICE: Is there safety in such silence?

VOICE: Is there any strength in rage?

VOICE: Let us say now what needs to be said. Come together instead of breaking apart—categorizing, stigmatizing, labeling, and limiting what another person or group of people can be or achieve.

VOICE: What do you do when you don’t fit into the boxes they use to categorize and track minorities?

VOICE: They ask you to check Other.

EVERONE: Other??

VOICE: I am not Other—I am a person—I am Every One of Us. But I am not Other. I am all of You and I am the Uniqueness of Me.

VOICE: The nineteenth-century philosopher Soren Kierkegaard said: “If you label me, you negate me.”

VOICE: People with disabilities are often referred to by their disability, rather than being seen as an individual.

VOICE: Look at that handicapped kid!

VOICE: That poor family… You know their daughter is Autistic? They’ll have to take care of her for the rest of their lives!

VOICE: Pity isn’t the answer…

VOICE: It’s about Understanding.

VOICE: And Respect.

VOICE: Respect for who you are. For what you Feel and what you Think.

VOICE: The burning of books by suppressive governments and fundamentalist religious groups narrows our vision and limits our Possibilities. The suppression of writers and writing has been an attempt to Control the Word.

VOICE: Control the Word and You Control the World.