I hear this phrase often. And sometimes I say it myself.

But it’s started to bother me.

Because what actually is “common sense”?

Has it really disappeared? Or are we just looking for it in the wrong place?

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Over the past while, I’ve been thinking about why xenophobia, withdrawal, and “us and them” thinking are so strong here — and in many other countries too.

If you hate everyone else, you lose the ability to learn from them.

You can’t see:

  • what systems of theirs actually work,
  • what solutions they’ve found,
  • how they organise education,
  • how they make property ownership transparent,
  • how they fund community matters.

If you exclude the other, you exclude the possibility of learning too.

This isn’t a moral question. It’s a strategic one.

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But the other thing that occupies me even more:

Do we even know why we hate?

From real, personal experience? Or from an inherited story?

Perhaps our grandfather had a bad experience. Perhaps at the family table, “they’re like that” was said often.

The specific story disappeared long ago. The emotional charge remained.

And we carry it forward.

Automatically.

Perhaps this is the real inherited legacy. Not facts that are passed down, but fears.

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And this is where common sense comes in.

Common sense isn’t about qualifications. It’s not about IQ.

Common sense is when emotion doesn’t take over completely.

When I’m able to ask:

  • Is this impulse mine?
  • Or did I simply inherit it?
  • Am I genuinely speaking from experience?
  • Or am I repeating a story?

If we don’t ask these questions, we’re not thinking — we’re just reacting.

And reacting easily becomes a political tool.

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Hatred isn’t only morally destructive. It’s intellectually destructive too.

It narrows perspective. It oversimplifies reality. It manufactures enemies where what’s actually needed is problem analysis.

And in the meantime, we don’t even notice that we’re taking away our own ability to learn.

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Perhaps common sense hasn’t disappeared.

It’s just got lost in the noise. In the fear. In the identity battles.

Perhaps what’s needed isn’t more outrage. Not more justification for why we’re right.

But more questions.

Do I actually know why I think what I think?

If we started from here, perhaps many things would look quite different. ❤️