The Freedom of Being an Outsider

Musings on refusing a 'tribe'

When I first began this Substack in January, 2021, I spent many a post pontificating about ‘what I stood for’ and ‘who I wanted to be’… classic existential stuff for a young-achiever-just-about-to-turn-thirty.

Something I wrote about then, and still holds true now, was my reluctance to sign up to any political label, or party, or ‘tribe’. I’ve never been a paid up member of any political party (as far as I can remember!) and I feel nervous ascribing my views and beliefs to any one group¹.

Why?

I’m not entirely sure, to be honest. I think part of me balks at what I perceive I would have to ‘give up’ if I declared any formal affiliation: my agency, my independence, my freedom of thought. There is a level of toeing the line that comes with any group membership, which makes sense, but feels like an imposition I find personally challenging. That is not to say I am not aligned with specific perspectives, in solidarity with and supportive off particular groups and causes I believe in and so on. After all, you cannot resist oppression and tyranny on your ones! But, I suppose, I enjoy being a freelancer or a free agent in all senses of the word - economically, culturally, politically, philosophically. I am most comfortable in the position of outsider.

Funny, no?

I am fascinated by this internal contradiction in myself. I wonder, is it a position made from a place of strength, or fear? I write so much about collectivism, community, belonging and unbelonging, yet oftentimes the places I most gravitate towards are places where I am an interloper, alien and unusual and somewhat uninvited. Why do I so enjoy observing cultures unlike my own, those dominant and domineering, remote and inaccessible? Why do I revel so much in the thrill?

Whether it’s my time on the rigs or as an F1 reporter, ski-slopes or horseback, the desert or Fair Isle, if it’s a place people are surprised to see me, I’m gonna beeline straight there.

What is that about? Why so drawn to worlds I don’t see myself in more than those I do? Is it curiosity, or voyeurism?

Many years ago, I came across an article that said that in the United States, the stats of women matriculating in engineering didn’t consider the racial differences between students. Now, I can’t find the piece (I spent a while looking!) but the vibe was this: Black and Asian women weren’t leaving engineering at the same rate as white women...and perhaps that was because there was strong cultural/gendered expectations on the white women from their white male colleagues. That is to say, the men in the engineering school - majority white - had such strong gendered expectations of women, but those expectations were racially coded, and had most impact on white women, so, women in the same racial category. This was why, the piece argues, more white women proportionally dropped out than any other racial group…

Now, how robust this research was, I cannot be sure. But what I do know is that it reflects my reality while studying engineering. It was true that the majority of the boys I studied with had strong, often sexist, takes on what women should and shouldn’t do, but somehow, they didn’t apply them to me - or at least, I didn’t feel that bothered by them, like those takes applied to me. Was it hubris, or was it because I felt so outside their cultural context?

All this is a roundabout way of saying… perhaps I love being an outsider because being on the outside is its own form of freedom?

me performing as a dame in a panto - participating in british culture that is definitely not mine, el oh el

There is a type of liberation in not being legible. There is a power in it, or at least I have learnt to find one, where those around you don’t understand you or why you make the choices you do. For me, being an outsider grants me the illegibility that I transform into my liberty.

You might argue that what I speak of is a lesser form of freedom, one that isn’t ‘true’, or ‘full’, or ‘complete’. Real freedom, you might say, is the agency and ability to live life on my terms within the cultural contexts one is borne from, but yall - that feels far off. That would be a world without patriarchy, white-supremacy, the current iteration of capitalism, etc etc etc. It feels like a heavy lift.

This way, I get to do me, in the world we’re currently in, and not in the future.

That could be true.

Or perhaps, this is my way of coping with never having felt like I belong. By telling myself a compelling story, I turn a wound into a strength.

Or maybe, I just don’t like being told what to do, and this is my convulted justification for it.

Ha!

What do you think? How do you relate to in-groups and out-groups and labels and tribes? Do you like being an outsider? Do you resent it? Let me know!

1. I think of being Muslim as distinct, not quite ‘signing up to a group’ but signing up to a faith that is between you and a divine being that is unmediated by any other human… but that’s for a separate post