Compromise IS American, And That's the Problem

James Wagner, the president of Emory University, wrote an editorial on how compromise is a good thing, is fundamental to how the US operates, is a higher order for a good cause. It's important, he states, for getting by, for learning how to negotiate, and for political discourse.

He outlines this all in his Letter from the President, “As American as … Compromise.”

He's wrong about pretty much everything. Citizens and students don't become better and wiser citizens and students through compromise. We do through listening and experience and higher ordered thinking and going through the wringer of experience and critical thinking and listening again and again. And we learn through history, especially history of the marginalized. And we make connections and we consider again and again how these connections are relevant to not just ourselves but those inside and outside our neighborhoods, those who work for us, those who make our products, those who are in our prisons, those the majority society consider less-thans.

And we repent where we need to repent. We recognize the evil and the grave mistakes that we as a society and a people have done and in many ways continue to do and we take that evil seriously in order to exorcise it from our collective and individual actions.

But James Wagoner demonstrates that White America has yet to repent. Has yet to listen or make connections or consider history or the present through non-privileged perspectives. Has yet to consider amends because it hasn't made a conscious choice yet to repent of the very horrible sins that made it phenomenally rich.

To much of White America, the three-fifths compromise was a necessity in order "to form a more perfect union." The ultimate compromise on slavery - which allowed it to operate mercilessly for generations and allowed its primary stakeholders undue influence in US politics - wasn't appalling, wasn't a sign that the United States was based more on slavery and destruction of human beings and families than on its alleged "freedom." No. According to Wagoner (and many textbooks from my own childhood), the need to bring the two opposing sides together for the lofty goal of making a United States was a "higher aspiration."

Higher, apparently, to minds in the 21st Century, than an unequivocal call for the end of any form of slavery, than for an end to the slave trade or the end to considering human beings as chattel.

Compromise may sometimes be a negotiable we have to work through. But consider what there is to negotiate. The so-called "Third Way" isn't necessarily a better way because it's more expedient. In the case of the Three-Fifths Compromise, the lives of millions of African and Black slaves were disregarded and then monetized for political "purity" of white folks. That's not a good thing. Not back then. Not now. In the case of the so-called Fiscal Cliff, the lives of millions of poor people hang in the balance of a highly politicized scandal of American-styled "justice."

It is a great evil that rich, white men can claim the stakes for everyone else and then dress up their card game as a noble pursuit.

Insert tired Frenchie joke here.

The underclass is not something to "balance" or compromise on, are not tokens, are not poker chips.

NOTE:
With his response/clarification, Wagner apologizes for his insensitivity, makes some profound statements that gave me pause to think that he would retract his earlier statement, but then doubles down on the "higher aspirations" language and reprints the original.

Why not just admit it was a complete failure? Are the "chattel" not worth it?

Fear and Loathing on 9/11

Now, the American people have got to go about their business. We cannot let the terrorists achieve the objective of frightening our nation to the point where we don't conduct business, where people don't shop.

- George W Bush (October 11, 2001)

9/11. Thousands of Americans were murdered senselessly through acts of aggression.

I can't but think what might have been. If we had true visionaries, true leaders, some ten years ago. But our society is one based on greed, consumptive consumerism, and violence. And our leaders are in place to keep us on task. And so that is the route we went. We could have stood in union with the suffering around the world. We could have moved towards lasting internal and international peace. But we were told - and we bought - that shopping is brave, that retribution is psychologically healing, that violence is strength.

We reacted through war and buying until we killed nearly a million people and destroyed many other lives through our economic policies.

from Dr. K Trotter blog

As I ponder and think back through my own natural jingoistic reactions, (how upset I was when I saw fewer flags on one block than on another. How I laughed at jokes at local Muslims' expense. How I wanted to get them sumsobiches) I wonder that 9/11 should have been a time for somber solidarity - for recognizing that even America is fragile. That we are connected to the thousands upon thousands who die daily in countries ravaged by starvation, AIDS, malaria, genocide, widespread poverty, oppressive regimes, and (largely connecting all these dots) globalization.

Globalization, by the way, was one of the primary rallying points for the Al Queada terrorists. When we deploy American imperialistic forts throughout sacred shrines, we are dismissing people groups and what is most important to them. How do we rationalize that our felt needs are more important than theirs?

9/11/01 should have been a moment of recognizing our shared humanity, the fact that we are all precious, that we all bleed, that we can live in moments of fear. But it became a time for more hubris. Instead of asking, "Why does violence happen to any of us?" we asked, "Why should violence happen to US?"


Now is the time to reflect. Now is the time to empathize and hear the suffering of not only our next door neighbors, but of our neighbors in Cambodia, in Nigeria, in Laos, in Ukraine, in Mexico, in the Phillipines, Puerto Rico, in North and South Korea, in Vietnam, in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Now is the time for healing and strength that can only be found by banding together.

Christian Nation?

According to research revealed in this Slate story, Americans are twice as likely to report regularly attending Christian church services as to actually go to church services with any sort of regularity. Which, apparently, means that we're no more religious than, say, Europe.

But of course, there's more than meets the eye, right? A few thoughts:

1) Since we're basically a nation of functioning secularism, it doesn't make sense (as if it really ever did) to call ourselves a "Christian" nation. It, of course, makes even less sense to blame all of our societal ills on atheists, (h/t Alise) as this poor letter-to-the-editor author does.

2) There's that disturbing trend of mixing religion (and particularly, Christianity) with nationalism/patriotism. One should not confuse one for the other. Scary path, that is*.

I kid you not, this is a real poster at this church's website.

3) Going to church - or not going to church - doesn't make one a Christian. Following Christ does (and although different faith traditions have differing opinions on what that means, I will only say that simply reciting a prayer is *not* following Jesus). Within that, though, I do think that it's important for people who follow Jesus to be at church - or more importantly, to be church. To be in communion with others who share in the stories, the tragedies, the heart breaks, the hope, the lives, the burials, and the bread and wine of Jesus' body and blood. I do believe that the act of faith-community is an essential one.

But... I'm meeting more and more people who do not feel welcome in a church body. And that troubles me. It troubles me that people do not feel welcomed in the one place where they should feel invited. After all, wasn't it Jesus who gave refuge to the adulteress when the townspeople wanted to stone her (and curiously left out her partner)? Wasn't it Jesus who made the dreadful, scary, mixed-race Samaritan the hero of one of his most famous stories? Wasn't it Jesus that welcomed the outcast sinners and tax collectors and fishermen and zealots and women into his close circle? Wasn't it Jesus who went out of his way to touch the poisonous lepers? Wasn't it Jesus who moved the merchants out of the temple so that the lame and blind can come in?

How, then, can Christian churches - who are to live as the communal embodiment of Jesus - not be able to embrace those who think/act/look/believe just a bit differently? Many of our churches have such a hard time with people with mental tics (depression, bipolar disorder, schizophrenia), for example. Is this because they don't fit in with our particular notions of normalized Americans? Americans first, Christians second? Or is there another kingdom that Christians belong to? Is there another national identity that trumps all others - in which there is neither slave nor free, male nor female, Greek, pagan, or Jew?

*/Lame Yoda reference.

Forget solidarity, we need individualitism

By the time I get to Arizona, cont...

All classes are canceled that:

1. Promote the overthrow of the United States government.
2. Promote resentment toward a race or class of people.
3. Are designed primarily for pupils of a particular ethnic group.
4. Advocate ethnic solidarity instead of the treatment of pupils as individuals.

Let's address these point by point, eh?

Most people wouldn't have a problem with the first point. It makes sense. I'm sure that there are all sorts of Pottery/Bomb-Building classes happening in middle schools throughout the state. They need to be abolished post-haste, before pimply twelve year-olds take down our elected officials with their pencils and flowers.

But the truth of the matter shines when this is connected to the state's other recent laws, designed to move out the Latino population (whether citizens or "illegals"): A bad, short-sighted ploy by Republicans to ensure their supremacy. In the words of The Answer Sheet,

[State Superintendent of Public Education] Horne has wanted to limit [a Mexican-American studies program in Tucson] since he learned several years ago that Hispanic civil right activist Dolores Herta told Tucson high school students that “Republicans hate Latinos.”

This act, of course, dispels such silly rumors...

The second point gets into more clowdy territory, though. Particularly when dealing with modes of ethnic identity, to study the history and culture of one particular ethnic group could leave those not in that group feeling left out or even hurt by accusations. However, bad stuff happened. Winners got the spoils and tend to still receive the spoils as a result. Those same winners get to write the history in such a way where it seems inevitable that they would be the natural winners and that the losers, of course, would lose. Losers, otoh, don't have a history, amirite? At least that's what I was taught...

Resentment is in the eye of the beholder, of course. White supremacists (like those who drafted the "Papers Please" Law and see also this) are always going to feel resentful of other cultures, especially when these other cultures (whether they be Black, Jewish, Arabian, Eastern European, Latino, Latin American, East African) possess pride in their history, food, clothes, holidays, customs, etc. Which is why white supremacists have an abiding NEED to show up to Cinco de Mayo festivities as gangs with their US flag t-shirts.

The third point is fairly explicit, though. As is the fourth point. And the fifth if you count the fact that the state is also grading and forbidding teachers who have "strong accents."

The point is: White Americanism is the de facto ethnic group. To argue that a history class tailors to one particular ethnic group is to miss the point: all study of history comes from a particular cultural viewpoint. All of it is tied into identity. There is no such thing as a purely individualized individual.

Pure make believe.

And there never was outside of romance novels and horrible fan fiction either*. No one person lives in a vacuum. We all have family, expectations, music, perceptions, learning procedures, foods, language, etc., etc. that come from others, that bleed through our pores whether or not we want to acknowledge it.

Kind of like xenophobia.

And if we were xenophobic, we'd have to wave goodbye to humanity, including this. And I'm not willing to settle for that.

*I know what you're thinking. "Aren't those two the same?" Short answer: no! Your treatise on a secret love affair between Princess Leia and a time-traveling Spock remains unpublished while Danielle Steel is, inexplicably, still selling through major distributors. Sucks, but such is reality.

Immigrants cause crime?

Blame Lou Dobbs. Or nativism. Or Dan Stein and his inexplicably mainstreamed hate-policy group, FAIR. Or the 24/7 news culture that somehow leaves us less informed and more afraid than ever before.

But these reports - shooting up everywhere, throwing impossible-to-verify data on the ground in retaliation against migrants - defy any and all logic whatsoever. Not just logic, but experience, and research to boot. I won't spend all day trying to gut the lying numbers, since they do not add up to reality and any quick research will point out that Dobbs and his racist friends* can't admit - they're lying racists who use irrational fear to bring people on the fence to their side. Well, some people on some fences...

It says something fundamentally ugly, however, about American tribal culture that we can so easily believe such unfounded, irrational and perverted lies about our fellow humans simply because THEY (immigrants) are not US (Real Americans).

This is my observation living amongst many cultures: It's not the migrant populations who tend towards violence.** Rather, it's those populations who have tried and failed to assimilate to American cultural norms - those who have looked deep into the heart of domestic imperialism - those who have seen the hard work, toil, sweat, and dropped blood of their parents, aunts and uncles, grandparents and cousins go for naught, but in fact repaid in viciousness, exploitation, burned crosses and ambush parties. These - the second and third and further generational Americans - are those who tend to resort to violence. They've learned from the United States what it means to be ugly.

And sometimes, sadly, they give in to the hopelessness.

Rather than hurting our migrant neighbors by repeating, reposting, accepting, or - often worse - ignoring those who tend to link violent crime with immigrants, we need to offer them and their children a path to hope.***

After all, isn't that what being an American is supposed to be all about?

*To counter the charges of xenophobia, Dobbs' supporters point to the fact that he has a Latina wife. But then I could make an illustration about the different meanings of "love" using goats, but I think I'd rather not...

**Actually, undocumented immigrants tend to become the victims of these crimes rather than perpetrators because their victimizers know that they are in constant fear of deportation and that the police often have their hands tied by laws that, in effect, do not favor much of their population.

***In fact, we should also offer the Dobbses hope too, for as long as they continue to buy into the vicious lies, they continue to not only imprison the new Americans and darker-skinned people, but also themselves. One of us be chained, mofos, we ALL be chained.