We Have Met the Enemy and He is Us....

When the comic strip character Pogo first uttered these eternally insightful words, it was in the context of the first celebration of Earth Day in 1970, when a dawning awareness of the need for our species to live in ways more harmonious with and respectful of our only habitat resulted in a more mindful reverence for our planet.

And yet today, many of a certain political affiliation deny science and the virtually inescapable evidence that the way we live materially impacts our environment in a negative way, even leading to seismic changes that threaten our long-term well-being.

We have met the enemy and he is us.

We continue to struggle to affirm life in our violent society and yet the proliferation of guns has become a secular religion for some and a craven abetting by our ostensible legislative representatives.  Factual evidence be damned, the few who brook no common sense approach to the personal possession of lethal force are protected in their right to endanger the rest of us by politicians who are bought and paid for by an insidious and immoral lobby.

So children continue to die needlessly and more mass shootings occur such that they've become part of the fabric of our daily lives.  Somehow we've chosen to value the prospect of potential protection over the reality of a less violent life.

We have met the enemy and he is us.

Thanks to march of technology and our instantaneous ability to communicate, a longstanding problem of police brutality has come to the fore of our collective consciousness.  Even though poor urban communities generally and African-American and Latino communities in particular have experienced often oppressive and overly lethal policing for years, thanks to videos, body cams and FaceBook Live, we now see this unfortunate carnage in real time.

And yet our national nerves are so frayed that a movement espousing the acknowledgement that Black Lives (should) Matter as much as others do is labeled a hate group by too many individuals and a craven right wing media.  It is shouted down by those who claim that All Lives Matter - and don't generally acknowledge the unpleasant and all too evident untruth that this implies - and/or that Blue Lives Matter, as if any of us could or do disagree with this.  All lives do matter, but they are not equally threatened, under attack or disenfranchised in our society now, as data from myriad sources indicates.  That a long disenfranchised group - reeling now after the repeal of much of the Voting Rights Act due to the craven rash of state-level Voter ID laws that have a disproportionate impact on their ability to exercise the most fundamental of American rights - is met with derision, dismissal and attack for seeking to have its humanity affirmed, respected and addressed in our society is both telling and damning.

We have met the enemy and he is us.

Most recently, we've become embroiled - largely involuntarily it would seem - in a discussion of what is acceptable personal and public decorum and demeanor.  One candidate for our presidency has consistently embodied many of the -isms that plague our society - most recently taking sexism/chauvinism to unparalleled public heights - and seems largely lacking in contrition (and, sadly, many of his supporters seem to love him all the more for this...).

And yet who among us thinks that it's a good idea to have a different set of personal conduct standards for people that depends on their level of wealth and their gender?  Who among us doesn't realize that this ugly vestige of a slowly dying patriarchy is an all too real affront to half of the population, including our very own mothers, sisters, wives and daughters?  Apologies for the crassness, but which one of our female loved ones would we support being grabbed by her genitals?  And who among us can excuse such inhumane banter - although it's hard to believe that it's just this given the multitude of women who've stepped forward in recent days to attest to their unwanted receipt of such dehumanizing treatment - and yet think that such a person - who has yet to display any real contrition and seems energized in his own defense of such boorishness - should be our leader and, indeed, leader of the free world?

We have met the enemy and he is us.

Truth be told, this is all quite simple, but not easy:

If we want an America - or, indeed, a world - that is better, then we have to begin to act this way.  If we want our society and world to be more humane, then we must act this way towards each other and especially with respect to those who differ from us in terms of race, religion, gender, sexual orientation, national origin, etc.  If we want all of our children to have a chance to pursue the American Dream, then we must structure our society in a way that affords them this chance.  If we want our daughters to have the same opportunities as our sons, then we have to treat them equitably and demand that others do, too.  And if we want a society that is compassionate and constructive, then we must hold our leaders accountable to making it that way.

But if we choose not to pursue these aspects of our individual and collective better angels, then, indeed, Pogo is sadly proven right yet again:

We have met the enemy and he is us....