Loyalty and resistance

Not all loyalty looks like obedience.
Sometimes, the most meaningful form of loyalty is to resist.

✨ Brightest Stars in Dark Times ✨

I was reminded of this by my dog, Sisa.
One day, I threw a ball into a place where I was convinced she could not reach it.
Instinctively, I told her not to go.

She paused.
She looked at me.
Then she looked at the ball.

For a brief moment, it felt like a decision was being made.
And then she went for it.
Against my command.

She ran, jumped, pushed herself further than I expected.
And she made it.

I remember feeling surprised at first.
Then something else followed.
I felt proud.

Not because she disobeyed me,
but because I understood something I had overlooked.
Sisa was not blindly loyal.
She trusted, but she also judged.

In that moment, her “no” was not a rejection of me.
It was an expression of her own awareness and capability.

And it made me think about a concept from ancient Greece: parrhesia.
Parrhesia is the courage to speak or act truthfully, even when it means going against authority.
Not rebellion for its own sake,
but an act of care and responsibility.

In many areas of life, we reward loyalty when it looks like agreement.
In politics, in institutions, even in academia,
silence is often mistaken for commitment.

But blind loyalty does not protect systems.
It weakens them.

What keeps systems healthy is something more demanding.
The colleague who raises a concern.
The advisor who tells an uncomfortable reality check.
The citizen who refuses to normalize what should not be normalized.
That is not disloyalty.
That is parrhesia.

Perhaps what we need is not less loyalty,
but a more courageous form of it.
The kind that stays.
The kind that cares.
And, when necessary, the kind that resists.

Sometimes, even a dog reminds us of that.