The American Dream Reconsidered (or Reconfigured)

Power, properly understood, is the ability to achieve purpose."

- The Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.,

Where Do We Go From Here:

Chaos or Community?

Wow!  Just wow!  That our country could be so deeply divided as to allow for the election of a President-elect so clearly lacking in character and competence should be a wakeup call for us all.  The question is whether we will learn from this lesson that is already deeply painful now and will doubtless become immeasurably more so in the next four years.

I'm moved to compose this piece by two friends with whom life circumstances afford me the opportunity to keep in contact via Facebook, but I'm thankful for this virtual bond because, in their messages to me, I was inspired to reconsider my reaction to this week's events.  I still see them as tragic and dismaying, but I also now see an opportunity within them.  As Einstein noted some years ago, it's actually in the midst of difficulty that we find opportunity and, as Churchill astutely observed, the optimists among us will focus on the latter.  So I'll choose to be optimistic and invite you to join me....

The first friend from whom I heard was a former work colleague with whom I hadn't communicated in years.  She was so saddened by the election results and the implicit - and possibly explicit - sanction that they give to our fellow citizens to express more freely their commitment to the -isms that continue to afflict our society.  This being said, she noted that she detected a sense of hope in the spontaneous protests and the pledges of many of the more (self-professed) progressive among us to respond proactively, positively and constructively.  All this she was motivated to share with me - openly, honestly and reflective of a still raw woundedness - after we'd been out of touch for at least five years or more.  And she was motivated to share this with me because my FaceBook posts over the year indicate to her that I'm one of her camp, the progressives who believe in an ever more inclusive, equitable and truly free society.  In my own pain over this horrific outcome, I was actually more disposed to respond cynically, but her faith in me inspired to reclaim my own hope.

The second message was from a former college friend with whom I'm actually closer virtually than when we were in school lo those many years ago.  She decided that in order to close the last chapter and start a new one that she would delete all of her previous posts of a political nature, go radio silent for an indeterminate time and then reemerge with a reformulated strategy and commitment to a new worldview and the action plan to help realize it.  I respect her thoughtful approach ... and yet her way, I realized, didn't work for me and therefore I was called to a different and equally authentic approach: I'm leaving my posts up so that I can review them periodically to insure that my commitment to evolve is happening.  They are a reminder to me of my participation in a system that didn't work well enough to be sustained and thus while that system is being torn down in the next four years, I have to have a different approach to what comes after.

Accordingly, I'd like to start with two simple premises that underlie my still evolving but materially different worldview and approach:  First, we have to go back to the past to find a greater future and, second, that our goal is not to restore what will almost surely be lost but to create something even and ever better.

Why do we have to go back to the past to light the way to our greater/better future?  Because the strategist/conceptualizer of this new and better world is, sadly but also thankfully, in our past.  Reflecting the paradox of life, it's sad that he left us too soon and it's great that he accomplished so much while he lived.  I'm referring, of course, to the late Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.  And he is our beacon for a new world not just because he's the greatest moral exemplar for our public life in our country's history but also because he was an underappreciated social strategist whose conception of a new and better world could and, I contend, should guide us now.  Simply put, in his last book, Dr. King asked a question of us the answer of which should be our greater better future:

Where do we go from here: chaos or community?

While this week's election result may suggest to many (or even most) that we're headed toward chaos, I would suggest that perhaps its truer import could be toward community, at least in the long run.  Let's face it, in his campaigning, Mr. Trump showed himself to be a most inhumane individual whose societal prescriptions would be intentionally hurtful to many of our fellow citizens.  And that his supporters would overlook these twin failures of character and competence makes the wound that much more painful.  And the violence and hatred-driven racism, xenophobia, sexism/misogyny, heterosexism, etc., that we've witnessed in the first few days since his election suggest that the chaos has already begun.  When we add to it the public promises to dismantle much of the progress that we've made on so many fronts under the current Administration, you have to conclude that the chaos will continue - and possibly even get worse/more painful - for some time (if not for the next four years in their entirety).

But here's why, while I agree that we will experience a great deal of soul-wrenching chaos, the ultimate result could be a renewed and greater sense of community if we so choose.

(And, no, I don't live in one of those states that just legalized marijuana, so I'm not smokin' somethin'.  Hear me out, please.)

Why were so many of our fellow citizens willing to overlook the President-elect's inhumanity?  The early data is conclusive: not because they agree with or support it - and, in fact, many don't - just that this was a secondary concern for them, far behind that of their perceived economic, social and political marginality.  And Mr. Trump was the only candidate to do two critical things: first, to acknowledge their fear and anger and then wrap himself in it and promise to be their champion and, second, to exploit it for his own benefit.  They didn't elect Mr. Trump to be the inhuman leader of our country - which is an added benefit for some and an abhorrence for many (if not most) - they elected him to blow up the unresponsive and uncaring system/Washington as we know it.  They elected a political terrorist not a reformer (which were their only two real choices).

Now, two questions immediately assert themselves:  First, can Mr. Trump blow up Washington?  Second, what will replace our current system?  I think the obvious answers are first, "no," and second "we don't know," neither of which are good for us.

First, there's a difference between not liking something and blowing it up, between feeling alienated from and thus angry at something and wishing it not to exist.  I agree that our political elites have structured our society in a way that has marginalized many if not most ... but the sad reality is that many of those who voted for Mr. Trump have also been voting for the (mostly Republican) elites whose policies have disenfranchised them over time.  I understand your anger at a system that has hurt you ... but you can't escape the blame for your own role in helping it to do so.  And the rest of us shouldn't have to suffer because of your emotionally unintelligent (over)reaction.

Second, another culpability: with as complex a life as we live in our society, it's absolutely irresponsible and insanely dangerous to blow up our current system in favor of one that hasn't been carefully and proactively crafted to replace it and thereby function better.  Now some of you will want to claim that the President-elect supplied a vision for a greater America ... but tell me, explicitly, what that means?

One element is the repeal and replacement of Obamacare, right?  With what type of healthcare system?  Health Savings Accounts (HSAs)?  This has been candidate Trump's primary suggestion.  Think about this for a second: is the HSA a health plan (or an accessible system thereof like with the Affordable Care Act)?  Nope, not by a long shot.

While an HSA will help you save for your healthcare premium and out-of-pocket expenses in a tax-advantaged way, it won't actually provide you coverage.  So, following a favorite Republican orthodoxy, you'll just buy your coverage in the open market, right?  Except that absent the healthcare exchanges at the national and local levels, actually finding out what's available to you, what these plans offer and at what cost is a real challenging thing to do.  And, assuming even that tens of millions of our fellow citizens can navigate through this complicated maze, many will be refused coverage because of pre-existing conditions ... so the repeal of Obamacare also signals the end of their access to healthcare except on a pure, full cost out-of-pocket basis.  Given that the top reason that people declare bankruptcy in this country is because of crushing medical debts, the reality of a post-ACA healthcare system is that it will lead to an increase in these ranks, especially from those who are economically marginal to begin with.

Unbridled anger is dangerous, especially when it leads to self-harm....

Or, consider this example:  One of things that's supposed to make America Great Again is to repeal much of the regulation to which businesses are subject currently, ostensibly because these constraints make America less competitive in the cutthroat world economy.  Let's look beyond the reality that the American economy is faring quite well relative to those of the rest of the developed world and zero in on one of the proposals made by the Republican candidate: to repeal the Dodd-Frank and other post-2008 Crash regulations that were designed to prevent our relatively unrestrained and lightly regulated financial industry from engaging in the unbridled pursuit of profit that led to the world-wide economic collapse of eight years ago and the resulting Great Recession.  But wait, you say, perhaps the President-elect and his minions intend to replace this commonsense (though admittedly a bit unwieldy) regulation with a less onerous version.  Nope.

The expressed intent has been to allow our financial industry to be virtually completely unfettered in its pursuit of ever greater hundreds of billions despite the clear and present danger that this represents to us.  So, did our fellow citizens who wanted to blow up our system realize that in voting for Mr. Trump it actually meant endorsing the idea that we'd put ourselves at greater risk of national economic armaggedon?  Probably not.  But, then...

Unbridled anger is dangerous, especially when it leads to self-harm....

And a final, painfully obvious example: the promise to bring all of those "good jobs" back to the heartland, which is the number one present that our economically marginalized could ask for.  That this is pure fantasy and completely implausible on its face makes its near universal embrace among Trump voters that much more painful and amazing in a very bad way.  Think about it, the President-elect is proof that this won't happen: in his own clothing manufacturing enterprises, just to use a single example, he has his personally branded items made overseas in factories with much lower labor costs than would be the case here in the U.S.  To put a point on it, the first run of those ubiquitous red "Make America Great Again" hats was made in China!?!  Now, how, exactly, is a businessman who's lowered his own costs and fattened his own profits by shipping his own manufacturing opportunities overseas going to get others to do so en masse?

Their anger has blinded them both to economic reality and their candidate's own disproof of their fantasy, which has not only damaged their lives - just how delusional and alienated and angry are they going to be when it turns out that their fantasy-promising leader isn't, in fact, more powerful than the twin realities of globalization and macroeconomics?!? - and is certainly tragic for them, but it also has subjected the rest of us who knew better and decried this from the very beginning to the economic, politcial, et. al., uncertainty and instability that will result when this undeliverable promise goes unfulfilled.  Again...

Unbridled anger is dangerous, especially when it leads to self- and other-harm....

So now what?  Now that we realize that we're in for a real clusterf@#k when reality asserts itself in a painfully obvious way, what can or should we do?  Thankfully, there's not just an answer, but it's a great one and it comes from a person who left us almost a half-century ago.

When the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., first began to speak about his concept of "The Beloved Community" back in the mid- to late 1960s, our reception wasn't exactly enthusiastic.  After all, in 1967 when he began to work on his aforementioned final book that explained this concept, our society was in the midst of chaos: not only was the economy shaky, but there was massive social unrest as a spate of riots had erupted in many of our major cities, a passionate anti-(Vietnam)war movement was making its presence felt and being met with harsh resistance from the authorities in power at the time and, in the Black community, 'Negro' leaders like King were beginning to be considered passe' and losing influence to the newly empowered, younger Black Power advocates.  And along comes Dr. King talkin' about a Beloved Community....

Truth be told, at the time, we were too enervated and scared and confused and overwhelmed to listen, understand and embrace his wisdom then ... but we sure better do so now.  While there are many aspects to this concept, for our purposes today, I'd like to concentrate on two: its commitment to inclusion and its commitment to class- vs. race-based political and economic solutions.

As he had throughout his adult life, Dr. King never wavered in his belief that we are all God's children, even if we choose not to be loving to our neighbors.  Accordingly, in Where Do We Go From Here: Chaos or Community?, he argued passionately for us to seek to be what we now call "inclusive."  He reminded us that "In a multiracial society no group can make it alone," and that "To succeed in a pluralistic society," across racial/ethnic/et. al. boundaries, "strength will only be effective when it is consolidated through constructive alliances with the majority group."

Let's think about this for a moment:  If we accept the premise that in a polyglot society like ours we need interracial, interethnic, interreligious, intersex, inter-everything collaboration, then we'll need to have alliances with the majority group.  From the perspective of race, for example, for the next quarter-century or so, that means that minority groups will have to have alliances with whites.  And after the mid-2040s when American becomes a 'minority majority,' whites will have to have alliances with People of Color, et. al.  In other words, in order to have harmonious relations, we must all work together toward progress (especially across racial, ethnic, et. al., lines), cognizant that we are, in Dr. King's words, "bound together in a single garment of destiny."

Dr. King also called for a "revolution of values" that would "honestly admit that capitalism has often left a gulf between superfluous wealth and abject poverty, has created conditions permitting necessities to be taken from the many to give luxuries to the few, and has encourage (sic) smallhearted men to become cold and conscienceless so that ... they are unmoved by suffering, poverty-stricken humanity," or, as one writer put it recently, the people in the back of the room who've been left behind amidst our 'progress.'  Certainly America is wealthier and more powerful than ever before, but studies show quite consistently and conclusively that this wealth is ever more concentrated at the top and that the inequality in the allocation of our material gain is widening.  One source of Mr. Trump's election was this urgent, angry cry to feel recognized as someone at risk in our economy or even as someone who's already sliding backward.  He acknowledged their alienation and their pain ... and they overlooked his myriad flaws and lack of experience or competence, so now we're all at risk....

But if we think back to the final programmatic thrust of Dr. King's life, his Poor People's Campaign, we'll notice a marked difference in strategy and approach that was both controversial and divisive at the time: the PPC was class- rather than race-based.  Dr. King understood that in order to increase the influence that he sought for African-Americans, he had to reach out to other similarly positioned groups, especially the poor whites who actually outnumbered them.  So he began to focus on their common condition - economic disenfranchisement - and not their racial and/or social realities (and differences).  He understood what his detractors did not at the time: that in collaboration, the numbers of the collective poor were too large to ignore, but the alienation of each group separately was an insufficient foundation for organization.

And this class rather than race focus should be ours now: we should seek to unify all of those being left behind in our top-skewed modern capitalism.  One thing that's clear - and made clearer still by the actual popular vote totals in our recent election - is that numbers matter and that the more voters there are, the more influence they will have in key strategic locales.  In this week's epically critical election, almost half - 45% - of us who are registered to vote didn't (and, of course, there are millions more of us who are not even registered).

Imagine if everyone who could vote did.  Imagine if our leaders had to respond to the call of the more than 80% of our fellow citizens who are middle or working class.  It would be much harder to continue to ignore the concerns of those who derive the least benefit from their leaders' upper income and class bias, wouldn't it?

Which is why we need to reach out to Mr. Trump's supporters - including those of callow character who've begun taking his election as an excuse to engage in horrific -ism-based behavior - and to listen to their concerns and to craft a plan - together with them - to address our super majority's needs.  The better able we are to develop a solution that improves the current fortunes and future opportunities of the majority of our citizens, the better off we will all be.  The challenge will be whether or not we can rise above our historic and current differences - especially race and ethnicity - and work together to achieve a more just and equitable society, especially from an economic perspective.

Such a class-based approach will be both a recognition and effective address of "disappointment that produces despair and despair that produces bitterness, and that the one thing certain about bitterness is its blindness."  It will be an acceptance of and effective response to the reality that "America must be a nation in which its multiracial people are partners in power" which "is the essence of democracy."  And it will be effective proof that we both acknowledge and act in accordance with the wisdom that "This refusal to be stopped, this 'courage to be,' this determination to go on 'in spite of' is the hallmark of any great movement."

Will it be easy?  No.  Absolutely not, even.  Groups that have rarely collaborated don't typically have the relational skill and necessary good will to partner effectively, at least initially.  And let's face it: there's a long history in our society of racial and ethnic groups being pitted against one another to their mutual detriment (while the ruling elites that encourage the fight continue to profit thereby).  But because of rising inequality, rural and rust belt whites now find themselves as vulnerable and suffering economically as their Black - and also Brown - counterparts.

The solution is not the competition among them to be at the top of the bottom, but the collaboration between them to insure that in a rising tide they all rise comparably and equitably.  The solution is not the sort of political tribalism that results in a shared disenfranchisement, but a conscious collaboration that results in common wealth and the improvement of the commonweal.  The solution is not handing power to a malevolent, craven beneficiary of a rigged (economic) system, but seizing political power nonviolently and collectively to wield it in a way that reflects that we are "seeking to make the world and our nation better places to live" for ever more of our fellow Children of God.  And, the solution, as we seek to refashion our society and our world in more economically, socially, politically, etc., inclusive ways, is that we recognize that "Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that" and that "Hate cannot drive out hate: only love can do that."

These are the contours of the Beloved Society, that we value everyone and seek our collective - and each person's individual - progress.  I may be naive, but I have a belief that this may be a watershed moment in our shared history.  That we've finally done something so reckless that it may lead many of us to reconsider long-held beliefs and, in so doing, to find that we share common ground with others whom we may have perceived very differently in the past.

Call me crazy, but I think that tired, hurt and angry as we all are, we may finally be open to trying something radical like the Beloved Community.  And is this any crazier than the reality that we just chose the least qualified candidate in our history over the best qualified candidate in our history because, despite his utter and literal embodiment of every -ism that continues to plague our society, he made a significant number of us feel heard for the first time ever or at least for the first time in a long while?  Call me crazy, but I think that after the implosion of the Trumpian fantasy, we may be able to harness the even more intense disaffection toward the positive, mutually beneficial ends of the Beloved Community (including because at that point, we'll have even less to lose...).

The only healthy answer lies in one's honest recognition

 of disappointment even as he still clings to hope, 

one's acceptance of finite disappointment

even while clinging to infinite hope.

- The Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.,

Where Do We Go From Here:

Chaos or Community

Where Do We Go From Here: Chaos or Community?

"Writing is the way I think things through."

- Sister Joan D. Chittister, OSB

Amidst what is a disorientingly powerful sense of dismay, today I need to clear my head and begin to think things through carefully, as, I suspect, do many of us.  What happened yesterday/earlier today was indeed historic ... and saddening ... and concerning ... and worthy of note and consideration.  But in order to consider what's occurred and learn from it, we must, as Sister Chittister notes, "go beyond the freedom of being wrong to be honest enough to see life as it is, rather than the way we are told it is supposed to be" (or that we want/wish it to be).  And so I write....

And invite you to join me on the journey....

The election of Mr. Trump and apparent broad rejection of Ms. Clinton is truly a one-two punch in the gut for many of us.  With respect to the latter, it's hard to fathom how a supremely qualified candidate who also happens to be a woman could be successfully branded as untrustworthy - despite repeated, verified fact-checking that showed her to be the most truthful candidate in both the primaries and general election - while generating a depth of quite personal antipathy that seems somehow far out of proportion.  (I was and am no ardent HRC fan either, but I respect her and couldn't see anything that she's done in this election cycle that's worthy of such disrespect and vitriolic ad hominem attacks ... but, then again, I've been saying the same thing about President Obama for eight years now, so....)

With respect to Mr. Trump's election, one one level, I understand it perfectly well: his anti-establishment theme tapped into a deep wellspring of resentment - expressed in myriad ways including political 'enragement-engagement' and racism/bigotry, xenophobia, sexism/misogyny, religiocentrism, etc. - of those whose standing in our society has been eroded by the realities of late 20th and 21st century globalization, American trade policy and brilliant but craven (and largely domestic) politics.  To paraphrase the great Chris Rock, I'm not sayin' he should've done it, but I understand.

But what I can't wrap my head around - not since the announcement of his candidacy 18 months ago nor since the reality of his election in the wee hours of this morning - is his utter unfitness, with respect to both character and competence, to be the occupant of the highest office in our representative democracy and, indeed, to become, de facto, the Leader of the Free World.  There is no gainsaying that America has just elected its most openly bigoted/racist, sexist/misogynistic, xenophobic, narcissistic, etc., president in decades (if not a century or more) who's a repeatedly proven pathological liar with a thin-skinned sensibility, hair-trigger temper, proclivity to vindictiveness, and seemingly complete aversion to learning, growth and magnanimity to help us navigate through the ever more complex, diverse and dangerous times in which we live.

Or, put differently, perhaps I was/we were naive to believe that White Privilege wasn't so ultimately powerful still.  And before you're tempted to say that this wasn't Privilege writ large(r than ever in history), just consider any of the following:

Mr. Trump will follow an urbane, thoughtful and unfailingly prepared African-American who, for the past eight years, along with his family, has been a model of grace and decorum amidst historic obstruction and disrespect.  Still not convinced?  Then answer this question: could Mr. Obama have been elected as a thrice-married, serial philanderer without fixed principles or policies nor any relevant experience in governance, all the while stoking racial, ethnic, religious and gender-based bigotry and hatred?  Of course not ... which is the proof of the profundity of the still-extant and ultimately powerful Privilege: we've just elected a man with absolutely no relevant or transferable experience and expertise to, arguably, the highest (and most demanding) office in the world.  Let that sink in....

Alternatively, considered from the perspective of gender, how can we explain his selection over likely the most qualified candidate ever who just happens to be female?  Again, the same question: could Mrs. Clinton have been selected as her party's candidate were she a willfully unprepared sexual abuser with a history - and future - replete with major litigation that alleges massive fraud and sexual assault of a minor, among other ignominious (proven and prospective) claims?  No (f'in') way!  Which is how you know that Male Privilege is still alive and well in our country.

And when you combine White Privilege with Male Privilege, you get a Leader of the Free World without the temperament, qualifications/experience or emotional competence/fitness to serve in what is the ultimate position of power in our world.  Let that sink in....

Now breathe in slowly and deeply ... and, while exhaling, begin to pray....

(Lord, help us!  Please!)

So, now what?  I can think of at least three things that those of us who are self-considered to be more progressive and inclusive than Mr. Trump and his supporters appear to have been/are:  First, we must listen, carefully, deeply/empathetically and fully, to those whose anger and disaffection have driven this regrettable outcome.  Second, we must collaborate with them to develop a set of philosophies and policies that are both more equitable and inclusive than those of our recent history.  (In essence, we must apply the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.'s wisdom in the year or two before his assassination: we must be class-based in our approach to fashioning the boundaries and rules of our society - especially those of an economic nature and those that define access to opportunity - rather than race- or religion-based, etc.)  Third, we must coalesce quickly and devise a resilient defensive strategy for what is likely to be one of the most deleterious and hurtful first 100 days of any presidency.

And that's just where our work starts (or, for many, where the battle continues...).  We still need to address the level of ignorance and lack of education and life skills, especially from a social/societal perspective, in our populace, too many of whom are not appreciating the reality of the knowledge- and service-based world in which we live (which requires a very different academic and skill preparation than did our more manual/blue collar/manufacturing-based past).  Even though the dominant political party continues not to acknowledge the reality of Climate Change, we must become far more proactive in advocating for a more thoughtful and prudent approach to our environment and the one planet on which we can and do live now.  And we must learn to live together better as brothers and sisters or risk perishing together as fools, as MLK noted a half-century ago.

Perhaps this is wishful thinking, but in my heart of hearts, I actually believe now is the time to begin to fight without ceasing to realize Dr. King's vision of the Beloved Community.  Certainly the interests of the majority of our fellow citizens are served better therein, even if the majority clearly don't yet perceive this.  In part, this passionate belief is also driven by the realization that much of what has undergirded this popular - and populist - uprising represents a regression to the past, effectively (if cynically) represented in Mr. Trump's "Make America Great Again" slogan.  There is no example in human history of a culture or country able to go back - in effect, to devolve/revert - in order to progress, as emotionally (and politically) attractive a prospect as this may be.

The world is more evolved but complex than it ever has been and will only keep becoming more so.  It's up to us to understand this, develop a comprehensive and inclusive plan to address it and then to invite those motivated at the moment by fear and angst to choose to take the steps forward with us into this better future for us all.  But if we fail to organize and advocate virtually immediately, based on the President-elect's promises as a candidate and the behavior of his most virulent supporters thus far, this next four years could be a very damaging time indeed and an ill-advised and misguided repudiation of the progress that we've been making - admittedly unevenly and in a poorly distributed way - in recent years.

Our time is now and the challenge is great, but we must either choose to champion a more inclusive and equitable future or prepare to suffer an unimaginably painfully regressive one.

This continues to be our charge, our vision and our rallying cry, even if we don't have the leader that we would have preferred for the next four years.  But we're in the long game of our lives, so, as challenging as it may prove to be in the short run, we have to stay focused on that day in the future - hopefully sooner rather than later - when, to paraphrase the great Dr. King, all men and women can live in a country in which they're judged by the content of their character rather than the color of their skin or their gender or their economic status, etc., and they have equitable access to opportunities to live the Reverend's and our American Dream.

And, as he shared with us so memorably on that long ago, sweltering day in our nation's capital, consider his prophetic vision and broaden his constituency to all Americans (as in when you read "Negro," consider that he was actually speaking to and for all of us, so we should read it this way...) ... and you'll realize that we, too and still, have a Dream today:

It would be fatal for the nation to overlook the urgency of the moment. This sweltering summer of the Negro's legitimate discontent will not pass until there is an invigorating autumn of freedom and equality. Nineteen sixty-three is not an end, but a beginning. And those who hope that the Negro needed to blow off steam and will now be content will have a rude awakening if the nation returns to business as usual. And there will be neither rest nor tranquility in America until the Negro is granted his citizenship rights. The whirlwinds of revolt will continue to shake the foundations of our nation until the bright day of justice emerges.

But there is something that I must say to my people, who stand on the warm threshold which leads into the palace of justice: In the process of gaining our rightful place, we must not be guilty of wrongful deeds. Let us not seek to satisfy our thirst for freedom by drinking from the cup of bitterness and hatred. We must forever conduct our struggle on the high plane of dignity and discipline. We must not allow our creative protest to degenerate into physical violence. Again and again, we must rise to the majestic heights of meeting physical force with soul force.

The marvelous new militancy which has engulfed the Negro community must not lead us to a distrust of all white people, for many of our white brothers, as evidenced by their presence here today, have come to realize that their destiny is tied up with our destiny. And they have come to realize that their freedom is inextricably bound to our freedom.

We cannot walk alone.

And as we walk, we must make the pledge that we shall always march ahead.

We cannot turn back.

There are those who are asking the devotees of civil rights, "When will you be satisfied?" We can never be satisfied as long as the Negro is the victim of the unspeakable horrors of police brutality. We can never be satisfied as long as our bodies, heavy with the fatigue of travel, cannot gain lodging in the motels of the highways and the hotels of the cities.  We cannot be satisfied as long as the negro's basic mobility is from a smaller ghetto to a larger one. We can never be satisfied as long as our children are stripped of their self-hood and robbed of their dignity by signs stating: "For Whites Only."  We cannot be satisfied as long as a Negro in Mississippi cannot vote and a Negro in New York believes he has nothing for which to vote. No, no, we are not satisfied, and we will not be satisfied until "justice rolls down like waters, and righteousness like a mighty stream."

I am not unmindful that some of you have come here out of great trials and tribulations. Some of you have come fresh from narrow jail cells. And some of you have come from areas where your quest -- quest for freedom left you battered by the storms of persecution and staggered by the winds of police brutality. You have been the veterans of creative suffering. Continue to work with the faith that unearned suffering is redemptive. Go back to Mississippi, go back to Alabama, go back to South Carolina, go back to Georgia, go back to Louisiana, go back to the slums and ghettos of our northern cities, knowing that somehow this situation can and will be changed.

Let us not wallow in the valley of despair, I say to you today, my friends.

And so even though we face the difficulties of today and tomorrow, I still have a dream.

It is a dream deeply rooted in the American dream.

I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal."

I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia, the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slave owners will be able to sit down together at the table of brotherhood.

I have a dream that one day even the state of Mississippi, a state sweltering with the heat of injustice, sweltering with the heat of oppression, will be transformed into an oasis of freedom and justice.

I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.

I have a dream today!

I have a dream that one day, down in Alabama, with its vicious racists, with its governor having his lips dripping with the words of "interposition" and "nullification" -- one day right there in Alabama little black boys and black girls will be able to join hands with little white boys and white girls as sisters and brothers.

I have a dream today!

I have a dream that one day every valley shall be exalted, and every hill and mountain shall be made low, the rough places will be made plain, and the crooked places will be made straight; "and the glory of the Lord shall be revealed and all flesh shall see it together."

This is our hope, and this is the faith that I go back to the South with.

With this faith, we will be able to hew out of the mountain of despair a stone of hope.

With this faith, we will be able to transform the jangling discords of our nation into a beautiful symphony of brotherhood. With this faith, we will be able to work together, to pray together, to struggle together, to go to jail together, to stand up for freedom together, knowing that we will be free one day.

And this will be the day -- this will be the day when all of God's children will be able to sing with new meaning:

My country 'tis of thee, sweet land of liberty, of thee I sing.Land where my fathers died, land of the Pilgrim's pride,From every mountainside, let freedom ring!

 And if America is to be a great nation, this must become true.

And so let freedom ring from the prodigious hilltops of New Hampshire.

Let freedom ring from the mighty mountains of New York.

Let freedom ring from the heightening Alleghenies of Pennsylvania.

Let freedom ring from the snow-capped Rockies of Colorado.

Let freedom ring from the curvaceous slopes of California.

But not only that:

Let freedom ring from Stone Mountain of Georgia.

Let freedom ring from Lookout Mountain of Tennessee.

Let freedom ring from every hill and molehill of Mississippi.

From every mountainside, let freedom ring.

And when this happens, and when we allow freedom ring, when we let it ring from every village and every hamlet, from every state and every city, we will be able to speed up that day when all of God's children, black men and white men, Jews and Gentiles, Protestants and Catholics, will be able to join hands and sing in the words of the old Negro spiritual:

                Free at last! Free at last!

                Thank God Almighty, we are free at last!

The Time for Radical Humanism is Now....

My soul honors your soul.

I honor the place in you where the entire universe resides.

I honor the light, love, beauty and peace within you,

because it is also within me.

In sharing these things we are united, we are the same,

we are one.

- Unknown

The time for Radical Humanism is now. Every day that we wait to practice it, more lives are afflicted rather than affirmed and each of us becomes just a bit more wounded by the world not healed by it.

What is Radical Humanism, you ask? Essentially, it's a doctrine of my own imperfect formulation, a reflection of my evolving (and hopefully maturing) worldview, a distillation of the learnings with which life has gifted me both voluntarily and involuntarily and a concept that I'd like to share with the world in hopes that it touches and enriches the lives of all who encounter it.

(It's also not to be confused with the concept of the same name developed by M.N. Roy in the mid-20th century, which was primarily political - democratically so - in its focus.)

Let's start with Humanism and then I'll share how I got to the Radical construct that I'm now trying to preach. According to that modern bedrock source of knowledge Google, Humanism is "an outlook or system of thought attaching prime importance to human rather than divine or supernatural matters. Humanist beliefs stress the potential value and goodness of human beings, emphasize common human needs, and seek solely rational ways of solving human problems."

Well, I'm good with most of that except for the "solely rational ways of solving human problems" part because I'm not sure that we humans are capable of solely rational ways. And I believe that "solely rational" crowds out the often higher dimensions of life - like love - which are not always (or ever) purely rational.

In a sense, my concept of Radical Humanism is similar to what that other fundamental fount of modern knowledge, Wikipedia, suggests of the Religious Humanism and Ethical Culture movements of the 19th and 20th centuries, that they were "an integration of humanist ethical philosophy with religious rituals and beliefs that centre on human needs, interests, and abilities." Further, with respect to Ethical Culture, Wikipedia notes that it was "religious in the sense of playing a defining role in people's lives and addressing issues of ultimate concern." In a sense they were non-theistic religions, which is a core component/tenet of Radical Humanism (for reasons that I'll explain momentarily).

Originally I was drawn to Humanism because of its emphasis on our common/shared humanity rather than an idiosyncratic religious orthodoxy that would separate us. Let's face it, in our world, there are literally hundreds of ways to conceive of and worship God or Allah or YHWH or Hu or Brahman or Olorun or....

So starting with a religious premise seemed limiting to me. What I've come to believe is that we need to get beyond or rise above religion as we know it in the modern world, as it constrains and divides us. Think about it: so much of the strife in our world has a religious cast to it, regrettably. For some reason we are not able to allow each other to see and follow God differently ... so we need to find a way to get beyond this limitation so that we can celebrate, affirm and enhance life for all of God's/Allah's/YHWH's/etc. children. Before we are Christian or Hindu or Buddhist or Jewish or Muslim or ... we are human beings and this fundamental equality-in-commonality must be what we value most.

But this does not mean that I favor a solely secular or rational basis for our relations, either. Failure to acknowledge the unique personality-spirit-soul in each of us is a mistake, I believe, because, again, it limits us. When I acknowledge the unique life force that is within you - beyond just the shell of your body - I have a more holistic and thus higher/more profound appreciation for you, for your very being.

I've come to believe that the Hindus have captured this beautifully in the concept of Namaste, which Rita Geno describes in her Yoga Journal article "The Meaning of Namaste" as representing "the belief that there is a Divine spark within each of us that is located in the heart chakra. The gesture (of Namaste) is an acknowledgment of the soul in one by the soul in another." We are more than flesh, we are soul, too, and perhaps even more so....

So, so far I've gotten to getting beyond a sole focus on rationality and/or religion as the basis for how to relate to each other to honoring the whole of our unique humanity (i.e., both the body and soul in each of us) and now for a final component (at least at this juncture of my refining this concept): Passionate Proactivity.

I have come to believe that we need to be passionately proactive in honoring, nurturing, celebrating and protecting each other's humanity. It's not enough for us to wish each other well - although this would certainly be a huge step forward - because this is largely passive. In order to affect real change in our relations and thus in our world, we must act and, in fact, be proactive in honoring, nurturing, celebrating and protecting each other's unique humanity.

It's this holistic positive intent - and, indeed, commitment to action - that then becomes our primary spiritual and behavioral focus. Not only do I have to treat you well actively - which is the physical/behavioral component of this weltanschauung - but I have to be positive in my intent toward you and your soul as well. 

(For example, we've all known situations in which, though we've behaved acceptably toward another, we've actually had malice or certainly less than positive feelings in our hearts while doing so.  This is why the must be positive spiritual intent as well: because these situations represent missed opportunities in that we could have acted/behaved even better toward others had our spirit been right/positive.)

This positive intent/soul force is in fact a tenet of three major (Eastern) religions - Jainism, Hinduism and Buddhism - as formulated in the concept of Ahimsa, which means "not to injure." As Wikipedia notes, "Ahimsa's precept of 'cause no injury' includes one's deeds, words, and thoughts." So, to practice Radical Humanism, not only must we refrain from violence physically, emotionally and psychically, but we also must proactively exhibit this positive intent in our thoughts, words and deeds.

So what is Radical Humanism? The belief that we are called to honor, nurture, celebrate and protect the unique person and personality in each of our fellow human beings by being passionately and proactively positive in both our intent and our behavior, our physical force and our soul force.

But what's radical about this, you ask?

Look at our world and how we actually behave. In this sad, violent and too often dismaying time and place in our journey as a human race, conscious, proactive positivity is indeed a radical act. And that it should be all-consuming - our 'True North,' our guiding and animating principle in life, etc. - is as well. Virtually every one of us can agree that we need to behave better toward each other, but few of us see this as our guiding/default approach to life and to all of those other souls - especially those who may be unknown or different or in other ways represent "The Other" - with whom we find ourselves on this shared journey.

And, finally, some of you will want to discount Radical Humanism and say that it's just Love. Maybe. But since we clearly don't know how to do a good job of loving each other, let's try practicing Radical Humanism instead....

When we look at modern man, we have to face the fact that

modern man suffers from a kind of poverty of the spirit,

which stands in glaring contrast 

to his scientific and technological abundance.

We've learned to fly the air like birds,

we've learned to swim the seas like fish

and yet we haven't learned to walk the Earth as brothers and sisters.

 - The Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

Seeing a different world and seeing the world differently....

Not everything can be changed;

but nothing can be changed until it is faced.

- James Baldwin, "As Much Truth As One Can Bear," 1962

Like a moth to a flame I return to James Baldwin periodically, to nourish my soul and steel my backbone, and to emerge, not burned, but fired up both to live passionately in the pursuit of a more perfected reality and also to use this English language to express, deeply, indelibly, accurately, eternally.

And so it is again that I have returned to JAB - the "A" standing for "Arthur" - in this case through the impressive prism of the The Cross of Redemption: Uncollected Writings, an outstanding collection deftly edited and introduced by Randall Kenan.  These writings, a diverse compendium of fiction, non-fiction, book reviews, profiles and letters, give us not only a sense of Baldwin's evolution, both personal and literary, but also of a journey through an elevated existence, one raised by the insight and unparalleled eloquence of this singular author and, really, writer.

In the Introduction of the book, subtitled "Looking for James Baldwin," Kenan marvels at the sheer range of his skill and craft: Baldwin wrote fiction (at both short story and novel length), he wrote non-fiction, he wrote book reviews (initially to give himself "discipline" in his writing), he wrote travelogues, he wrote (biographical) profiles, he wrote letters.  He wrote.

And because he wrote we can all both see a different world as well as see the world differently....

Because of his profound gift, I am also inspired to attempt to record glimpses of my own journey, snapshots along the path, so to speak.  I don't pretend to do so as inimitably as the great James Baldwin, but in his honor and inspiration: I write because, through him, I've come to understand and feel what writing can do, can mean and can evoke ... and so I write.

And I regret.  I regret that I really (re-)discovered and began to appreciate Baldwin at mid-life, too engrossed in my own experience to be guided by his in my youth.  I regret that I can only meet the man in his prose and a few videos and documentaries about his life: certainly he was even more in the flesh.

And I regret that, as he paid similar homage to Shakespeare, I will never write like Jimmy wrote ... but I'm so thankful for the inspiration to try.  Not so much to write like he wrote - I'll never reach that unclimbable peak - but to discover my own singular voice and, in so doing, to share with the world my unique perspective.  I'll never speak James Baldwin's language, but I can achieve greater mastery of my own....

I always have to recover after reading Baldwin, literally to take a break to give my mind and soul an opportunity to digest and recuperate.  Reading Baldwin is like starving and then being given free rein at a banquet: invariably one overindulges and needs to be resuscitated, to take some time to come down from the sugar rush of incredibly savory fare (some of which itself can be based on topics most unsavory, actually) and to retreat back into the real world from that glimpse of the eternal one that one experiences in a Baldwin-induced thrall.

As he noted in the 1962 essay, "As Much Truth As One Can Bear," "What the writer is always trying to do is to utilize the particular in order to reveal something much larger and heavier that any particular can be."  And so it is with his own writing: through his gift, invariably we are moved to grapple with the "something much larger and heavier" and in so doing are both ennobled and enervated, raised and yet laid low, by the profundity of his observation, insight and prescription.  I always emerge from Baldwin more passionate and committed ... and then I need to go lay down for a while to prepare for the reengaged and elevated battle....

A large part of the reason that I rest is to gain the strength to address the profundity of his observation and the eloquence of its elucidation.  His framing of issues and opportunities is immaculate, and his address of them is raw, aching and naked such that we are left with indelible, timeless wisdom and reproach.

Cannot one hear the prescience of this 1964 indictment-as-observation resonating today?

Americans are the youngest country, the largest country, and the strongest country, we like to say, and yet the very notion of change, real change, throws Americans into a panic and they look for any label to get rid of any dissenter.  A country which is supposed to be built on dissent, built on the value of the individual, now distrusts dissent at least as much as any totalitarian government can and debases the individual in many ways because it places security and money above the individual....

How incredibly this puts Colin Kaepernick, Black Lives Matter, Occupy Wall Street and so many other grass roots social movements in our contemporary society into a certain light and relief.  As it did with the Civil Rights Movement and the nascent anti-war movement a half-century ago....

And the range of his piercing insight: so incredible as to be confounding.  For example, in the same piece as that from which the above quote is taken, "What Price Freedom?," and in the very same paragraph, this:

I am trying to suggest that in order for me as a black citizen of this country to begin to be a free man here, in order for that to happen, a great many other things have to happen.  I cannot be, even if I wanted to be, fitted into the social structure as it now stands; there is no possibility of opening it up to let me in.  In the very same way, in the Deep South, Christian churches do not have many Christians in their congregations, and when I move into the congregation, and when the church itself embraces all Christians, the church will have had to change.

He did not describe himself as a "black gay man," but can we not hear in this trenchant plea a theme that survives to this day, that the Christian church will struggle to open itself fully and truly to all, including the poor, those of Color, to women (especially in sacramental roles) and to the LGBT community?

And as we draw to the close of what certainly has to be the most contentious presidential race in modern history, we are essentially called to choose between two very different visions of our future.  Hence, it's prudent that we be mindful of what Baldwin observed so long ago:

Societies are never able to examine, to overhaul themselves: this effort must be made by that yeast which every society cunningly and unfailingly secretes.  This ferment, this disturbance, is the responsibility, and the necessity, of writers.  It is, alas, the truth that to be an American writer today means mounting an unending attack on all that Americans believe themselves to hold sacred.  It means fighting an astute and agile guerrilla warfare with that American complacency which so inadequately masks the American panic.

In the glow of his legacy, perhaps we hear the echoes of his insight in the writings of Coates, Thurston, Whitehead and Mengestu, Danticat, Adiche, Smith and Gay, to name but a few of those of African descent, and many others who challenge the increasingly inequitable and unjust status quo through their writing.  And yet none of them approaches our Jimmy....

So back to Baldwin I go, seeking to be appalled and amazed, alternately crushed and resurrected, by his piercing insight into his topics and his prose, respectively.  And though tired, and occasionally haggard, I will emerge so much the better for it, emboldened both by the struggle and the possibility of liberation glimpsed through his writing, safe in the knowledge that, for me, the Book of Baldwin in my secular bible....

And yet one is compelled to recognize that all these imprecise words are attempts made by us all to get to something which is real and which lives behind the words.  Whether I like it or not, for example, and no matter what I call myself, I suppose the only word for me, when the chips are down, is that I am an artist.

- James Baldwin, "The Artist's Struggle for Integrity," 1963

Seeing a different world and seeing the world differently....

Not everything can be changed;

but nothing can be changed until it is faced.

- James Baldwin, "As Much Truth As One Can Bear," 1962

Like a moth to a flame I return to James Baldwin periodically, to nourish my soul and steel my backbone, and to emerge, not burned, but fired up both to live passionately in the pursuit of a more perfected reality and also to use this English language to express, deeply, indelibly, accurately, eternally.

And so it is again that I have returned to JAB - the "A" standing for "Arthur" - in this case through the impressive prism of the The Cross of Redemption: Uncollected Writings, an outstanding collection deftly edited and introduced by Randall Kenan.  These writings, a diverse compendium of fiction, non-fiction, book reviews, profiles and letters, give us not only a sense of Baldwin's evolution, both personal and literary, but also of a journey through an elevated existence, one raised by the insight and unparalleled eloquence of this singular author and, really, writer.

In the Introduction of the book, subtitled "Looking for James Baldwin," Kenan marvels at the sheer range of his skill and craft: Baldwin wrote fiction (at both short story and novel length), he wrote non-fiction, he wrote book reviews (initially to give himself "discipline" in his writing), he wrote travelogues, he wrote (biographical) profiles, he wrote letters.  He wrote.

And because he wrote we can all both see a different world as well as see the world differently....

Because of his profound gift, I am also inspired to attempt to record glimpses of my own journey, snapshots along the path, so to speak.  I don't pretend to do so as inimitably as the great James Baldwin, but in his honor and inspiration: I write because, through him, I've come to understand and feel what writing can do, can mean and can evoke ... and so I write.

And I regret.  I regret that I really (re-)discovered and began to appreciate Baldwin at mid-life, too engrossed in my own experience to be guided by his in my youth.  I regret that I can only meet the man in his prose and a few videos and documentaries about his life: certainly he was even more in the flesh.

And I regret that, as he paid similar homage to Shakespeare, I will never write like Jimmy wrote ... but I'm so thankful for the inspiration to try.  Not so much to write like he wrote - I'll never reach that unclimbable peak - but to discover my own singular voice and, in so doing, to share with the world my unique perspective.  I'll never speak James Baldwin's language, but I can achieve greater mastery of my own....

I always have to recover after reading Baldwin, literally to take a break to give my mind and soul an opportunity to digest and recuperate.  Reading Baldwin is like starving and then being given free rein at a banquet: invariably one overindulges and needs to be resuscitated, to take some time to come down from the sugar rush of incredibly savory fare (some of which itself can be based on topics most unsavory, actually) and to retreat back into the real world from that glimpse of the eternal one that one experiences in a Baldwin-induced thrall.

As he noted in the 1962 essay, "As Much Truth As One Can Bear," "What the writer is always trying to do is to utilize the particular in order to reveal something much larger and heavier that any particular can be."  And so it is with his own writing: through his gift, invariably we are moved to grapple with the "something much larger and heavier" and in so doing are both ennobled and enervated, raised and yet laid low, by the profundity of his observation, insight and prescription.  I always emerge from Baldwin more passionate and committed ... and then I need to go lay down for a while to prepare for the reengaged and elevated battle....

A large part of the reason that I rest is to gain the strength to address the profundity of his observation and the eloquence of its elucidation.  His framing of issues and opportunities is immaculate, and his address of them is raw, aching and naked such that we are left with indelible, timeless wisdom and reproach.

Cannot one hear the prescience of this 1964 indictment-as-observation resonating today?

Americans are the youngest country, the largest country, and the strongest country, we like to say, and yet the very notion of change, real change, throws Americans into a panic and they look for any label to get rid of any dissenter.  A country which is supposed to be built on dissent, built on the value of the individual, now distrusts dissent at least as much as any totalitarian government can and debases the individual in many ways because it places security and money above the individual....

How incredibly this puts Colin Kaepernick, Black Lives Matter, Occupy Wall Street and so many other grass roots social movements in our contemporary society into a certain light and relief.  As it did with the Civil Rights Movement and the nascent anti-war movement a half-century ago....

And the range of his piercing insight: so incredible as to be confounding.  For example, in the same piece as that from which the above quote is taken, "What Price Freedom?," and in the very same paragraph, this:

I am trying to suggest that in order for me as a black citizen of this country to begin to be a free man here, in order for that to happen, a great many other things have to happen.  I cannot be, even if I wanted to be, fitted into the social structure as it now stands; there is no possibility of opening it up to let me in.  In the very same way, in the Deep South, Christian churches do not have many Christians in their congregations, and when I move into the congregation, and when the church itself embraces all Christians, the church will have had to change.

He did not describe himself as a "black gay man," but can we not hear in this trenchant plea a theme that survives to this day, that the Christian church will struggle to open itself fully and truly to all, including the poor, those of Color, to women (especially in sacramental roles) and to the LGBT community?

And as we draw to the close of what certainly has to be the most contentious presidential race in modern history, we are essentially called to choose between two very different visions of our future.  Hence, it's prudent that we be mindful of what Baldwin observed so long ago:

Societies are never able to examine, to overhaul themselves: this effort must be made by that yeast which every society cunningly and unfailingly secretes.  This ferment, this disturbance, is the responsibility, and the necessity, of writers.  It is, alas, the truth that to be an American writer today means mounting an unending attack on all that Americans believe themselves to hold sacred.  It means fighting an astute and agile guerrilla warfare with that American complacency which so inadequately masks the American panic.

In the glow of his legacy, perhaps we hear the echoes of his insight in the writings of Coates, Thurston, Whitehead and Mengestu, Danticat, Adiche, Smith and Gay, to name but a few of those of African descent, and many others who challenge the increasingly inequitable and unjust status quo through their writing.  And yet none of them approaches our Jimmy....

So back to Baldwin I go, seeking to be appalled and amazed, alternately crushed and resurrected, by his piercing insight into his topics and his prose, respectively.  And though tired, and occasionally haggard, I will emerge so much the better for it, emboldened both by the struggle and the possibility of liberation glimpsed through his writing, safe in the knowledge that, for me, the Book of Baldwin in my secular bible....

And yet one is compelled to recognize that all these imprecise words are attempts made by us all to get to something which is real and which lives behind the words.  Whether I like it or not, for example, and no matter what I call myself, I suppose the only word for me, when the chips are down, is that I am an artist.

- James Baldwin, "The Artist's Struggle for Integrity," 1963

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....

Standing Up by Sitting Down (and Why This Still Matters)

"I love America more than any other country in this world,

and, exactly for this reason, I insist on the right to criticize her perpetually."

- James Baldwin

And now Colin Kaepernick.  Star professional athlete, winner in America's economic game and now self-professed freedom fighter.  How terribly inconvenient ... and instructive.

The hubbub that has followed Mr. Kaepernick's extended social commentary in support of his decision to sit in protest during the National Anthem is both virulent and sadly familiar both societally and personally.

Societally, the outcry has centered on a number of familiar themes: that his protest is being executed in an incorrect (read = most often described as "disrespectful") way, that as a highly-paid athlete he has no reason to complain, that he's dissing those in the military who have served and currently serve to protect his freedom, etc.

(Please note that I left out an NBC commentator's ignorant comment that he's not black [enough] and a Fox commentator's asinine suggestion that since he was adopted by a white family, he's had it good [and, thus, conceptually, shouldn't complain].  Don't even know where to start with such maddening ridiculousness....)

Personally, a number of my FaceBook friends have reflected this in terms like "I disagree with his method,"  "it's disrespectful," "what's he got to complain about?," "he should have set up a foundation like other athletes," and, in effect, my favorite, "his approach is so wrong that he's obscuring the focus on the issue."  Hmmm.

OK, let's get this out of the way:  My view is that the sitting in protest during the playing of the National Anthem is not the way that I would have chosen, but it's a bold, courageous move and worthy of our support of his exercise of his First Amendment right to free expression.  And it's completely beside the point to focus on how he chose to protest - and revealing that so/too many have done so - and totally necessary that we focus on what/why he's protesting.  And I do believe that the choice to focus on the how over the why is not accidental but too often a purposeful evasion consistent with a more general and troubling trend in our society.

But back to the hubbub:  A trend that is both disturbing and instructive to me is that the post-Kaepernick focus has been split along racial lines.  Disproportionately in the media, those who've chosen to focus on how the quarterback registered his dissent have been white, while most of those who've defended it are other People of Color (PoC) like him (although, thankfully, more of these supporters are turning out to be veterans of all colors who support his right to free, peaceful expression).

So, too, with my FaceBook friends: all of those who have focused on and complained about his method are white, and all of those who have supported it - including those who may not have like his method - are of Color.  Hmmm.

Let me 'make it plain': we still have a huge race problem in this country and need to address it head-on.

My white friends' objections have been as vehement as those nationally relative to Mr. Kaepernick's method and decidedly muted when I've noted their style preferences and then asked them to address the substance of the issue.  My Friends of Color (FoC) have generally expressed their ennui and exasperation at the focus on method and have instead noted with pique that the 'method dissenters' seem unwilling to move beyond this to addressing the issues that the quarterback has highlighted.

And few 'method dissenters' have listened to his entire position as shared in that almost 20-minute informal press conference during which he detailed his dissent, while many of my FoC have.  Again, not surprising, but revealing.

One of my friends suggested that he was concerned about the issues raised, but focused virtually exclusively on how this was done.  When I asked him how he would have preferred that Mr. Kaepernick express his dissent, he was noticeably muted other than suggesting, in effect, it should have been some other way.  When I kept pressing the point and asked if he were aware of any protest or protest movement in history that was conducted in a way that met with wide acceptance in our society, he was similarly muted.  When I mentioned that, a half-century ago, the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., was reviled for moving beyond to the fight for civil rights to question both the Vietnam War and the staggering economic inequality in our society, he acknowledged that he was aware of this but had nothing else to say about the underlying issues that Mr. Kaepernick highlighted.

One of my favorite exchanges about this situation occurred with one of my friends who's an avowed political conservative.  After a number of objections - the most substantive of which was that the approach taken obscured the focus on the underlying issues - she made some suggestions about what Mr. Kaepernick should have done, including the aforementioned 'set up a foundation.'  When I pointed out that hundreds of current and former professional athletes have foundations that are doing admirable work but receiving a level of recognition nowhere close to the quarterback, she was noticeably silent.  When I mentioned that part of the problem is that too many are focused on the approach and not the underlying issues, she suggested that perhaps Middle America wasn't responding because it didn't see this as an issue that affects it.

Bingo!

And that's a huge part of the problem: that so many are not concerned with the clear and historic differential in how rights are respected and opportunities are allocated in our society as a whole and therefore choose to be uninvolved because it doesn't affect them directly is part of the why these life-limiting discrepancies are still so pervasive in our society.  Selfish indifference and societal equity don't work well together.

That these responses differed along racial lines reminded me yet again that our perspectives are so far apart because our experiences are.  Almost all of my white friends can afford to focus on the method over the issues because they are not directly affected by them.  And, sadly, they seem to prefer to focus on the style over the substance because it allows them to avoid dealing with the latter.  I have only seen one of them post about or express alignment with addressing the myriad underlying issues about which Mr. Kaepernick is dissenting - and her husband is African-American and her children thus biracial, so she's not insulated from the issue.  In sum, those who don't have mixed families or close relations of Color have chosen to express outrage at being challenged to consider horrible issues too often hidden by the status quo rather than at the issues themselves; they've expressed concern about being disturbed but not about the disturbing realities of the lives of too many of their fellow citizens.

At this stage in my life, I'm not surprised or overly disappointed by this reality.  I accept - but am still disappointed by - white apathy.  What I've learned over time is that this concerning reality isn't uninformed but conscious: I've yet to find a white friend who doesn't understand the issues at some basic level, but virtually all of them indulge in the privilege of being sufficiently unconcerned as to be uninvolved.

I get the desire to indulge in the insulation that American success affords: to some extent, those of us of Color do the same to the extent that we can.  But we also have to explain to our childen what a classmate meant by saying "Nigger" in a kindergarten class, we also have to walk the tightrope of preparing our children to be singled out while encouraging them to focus on fitting in and we unfailingly have to have 'The Talk' with our teenage sons, none of which are shared experiences.

So our experiences are different and thus our appreciation for and approaches to race-affected issues are, too.  Until this gap narrows, it will be much harder to address the issues that affect us all (even as they affect those of Color disproportionately).

P.S.  No, I don't like Mr. Kaepernick's choice to wear socks to a recent practice that depict police as pigs.  That sort of, in effect, name-calling, wasn't helpful in the '60s, either.  Did the police often feel more like an occupying force than a cadre of those dedicated to protecting and serving us then?  Yes.  And now?  In too many locales, the same is still true.  But a peaceful, respectful protest - like kneeling during the anthem (as numerous other notable African-American athletes and societal leaders and other PoC have done over the years) - is better than directly disrespectful and unhelpfully provocative expression.

One of the reasons that I respect Mr. Kaepernick's choice of kneeling is just this: he's not defaming anyone but, in sitting down, is standing up for what matters to many of our fellow citizens that we too often choose not to see.  I am ever mindful that despite our (inauthentically) hagiographic fawning over the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., and the late pugilist and humanitarian Muhammad Ali, they were, in their time, reviled for their timidity to challenge the status quo of our society that, in their day as in ours, too often found both PoC and the poor disproportionately disenfranchised.  Yes, we appreciate the many things that continue to make America great ... and we also absolutely must continue to keep the work that we need to do to insure a more equitable access to opportunity and well-being in our country in the forefront of our minds and actions.  This isn't an either-or situation but a truly life-changing both-and opportunity and this is why sitting down/kneeling is an important way to stand up to our natural tendency to choose comfort over conscience....  

"Every man must decide whether he will walk in the light of creative altruism

or in the darkness of destructive selfishness."

- The Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.