Tyler Perry's Straw is a Lesson on Empathy in a world of Cruelty

Have you ever felt the sheer fear of swiping your card and wondering if it's going to get declined due to insufficient funds? Or maybe you've skipped a meal or gone vegan for a week until your next salary gets credited. I've been there, but yet, dare I say: I'm privileged.

If you’re one of the lucky ones in life, you are blessed with a car, a home, a decent job that pays the bills and the comfort of knowing where your next meal will come from. Privilege is knowing you have the security of a roof over your head, a cheque that won’t bounce and a family that doesn’t go hungry.

The movie Straw, written and directed by Tyler Perry, moved me. It opened my eyes to the poverty that's right in front of us sometimes…even if that poverty doesn’t always look like beggars. It also opened my eyes to the desperation that comes with poverty. So many things could have prevented the tragedy of Janaiah robbing the bank, if her boss had been a bit more empathetic, if the bank had been a bit more lenient, if the landlord had been a bit more gracious and not given her the eviction notice. But if we contextualise this with reality.. how many of us really have grace for people when they owe us money? People say, “It’s just business, it isn’t personal,” but when you fire someone and they go broke with a family to feed it becomes personal.

Although some may say it’s just a movie, I on the other hand, was deeply impacted by it and truly felt sorry for the series of unfortunate events that unfolded in Janaiah’s life, knowing that things like this happen to people all the time, especially, if I might be so bold as to say, to people of color..where they’re wrongly brutalised by the police and afraid for their life just because of the color of their skin. It’s cruelty that turns others cruel, but it’s also kindness that can turn people to kindness.

Let’s take a page from this movie and ask ourselves if we’re really caring for those in need. Are we really looking after the single mothers, those who are struggling to pay their rent or afford their medication? Or are we simply patting them on the back, saying “I’ll pray for you brother” and then walking away like nothing happened? We need to open our eyes and be aware of the poverty and suffering around us, we need to be aware of the racial injustice and be a part of the solution in treating everyone equally, the way we’d want to be treated. We are blessed to bless others, not to continue blessing ourselves.

The good Samaritan isn't just a parable that Jesus told for us to have a cute story in our back pocket. Today not many of us will walk past a body that's been beaten and bruised. The reality is however, everywhere today people are being beaten by the system. Poverty is all around us. Suffering, lack, pain, fear - it's everywhere. Maybe we can't end poverty, maybe we can't end world hunger but maybe we can open our eyes and look beyond our needs and our own family. Maybe we can choose kindness, compassion and generosity. Maybe, just maybe, that may save a life.