Victor Lee Lewis and Liberation for All
Victor Lee Lewis is a deep and close friend and co-mentor who has been investigating areas similar to the ones of interest to me as well as many others for decades. Our weekly conversations have been going on since about 2009, though his influence has been going on less intensively since the late 1980s. Victor was mentored by the late Erica Sherover-Marcuse whose definition of liberation has become a cornerstone of the NGL framework: “Liberation is both the undoing of the effects and the elimination of the causes of social oppression.”
Victor’s framing goes beyond identity politics to emphasize liberation for all, an approach that is fully consistent with NVC and the vision of everyone mattering even as we are aiming to care, specifically, for specific groups based on differences in power and privilege. His image of all of us being in the same boat and not on the same deck has been pivotal in understanding the complexity of how to move forward within the polarization and division that characterize our times. Victor advocates for unconditional, unilateral, and universal solidarity. All the packets in the “Power, Privilege, and Liberation” category, and especially the first one: “Liberation for All, Part One: Understanding Liberation, Power, and Privilege” could not have come into existence without his support, challenge, and collaboration.
NGL Lineage
