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One of the greatest human limitations besides our short life span, is our self-centeredness. We think first and often only from personal perspective, and we act first and often only for personal interests.
But mankind is not always like that. When humanity is in its infancy and childhood, we rely heavily on each other for survival, everything is shared. Cooperation, selflessness and Good Sameritanism are our first nature.
Doctrines like individualism, human rights and personal liberty appear much later in human history, and are still imperfect theories, or in many ways even adverse to the best human interests overall, as attested by greed, selfishness, fierce competition, inequality, polarization, monopolist and fraudulent business practice, the concentration of wealth in the hands of a few, the spread of pornography and violence, the influence of money on politics, the destruction of the environment, the alienation of marriage, the disintegration of family, homosexualism, and gun culture, etc.
Mankind is still in its adolescence too self-centric to understand the relation between personal interests and communal interests.
Perhaps the most important lessons tango teaches us are that we are interdependent rather than independent, that our well-being is inseparable from that of others, that we cannot be happy unless all are happy, That cooperation and sharing serve us better than competition, that human rights are the communal rights of the mankind as a species, not just personal rights, and that self-discipline and self-control are important attributes of what make us human.
Tango tells the other side of the human story. It awakens the better part of the humanity in us, I hope, and suggests a way for us to live together in peace and harmony through cooperation, generosity in spirit, loftiness of purpose, and altruism.
Wherever we go and dance, tango always reminds us that love, despite our many limitations, is what holds us together as a couple, people, nation, and species.
