It cannot be history until you stop living it… Part II
by Jack GrantI hadn’t planned to write upon this topic.
However, the Commissar at The Politburo Diktat has stimulated in my mind a few thoughts I feel need to be said.
First however, I present the topic that stimulated this writing, then some history.
The topic:
The resolution on lynching passed today is being used by some very prominent bloggers on the left-wing to attack Republicans who did not co-sponsor the bill, despite the fact that the passage was unanimous.
With his typical, honorable self-consistency, the Commissar condemns this invocation of lynching by the left to score political points just as he did a prior summons of this horrific imagery that was utilized by the right.
A personal aside here, there are times I get so disgusted with what I read in blogworld I am tempted to walk away from this strange yet enthralling occupation completely. Then I find someone as honorable and self-consistent as Stephen, aka the Commissar, and it reaffirms my faith that there are more than a few out there who are not blinded to the point of insanity by their point of view.
To return from the personal aside, using the “non-sponsorship” of a bill seems rather weak as a way of attacking a Senator of a particular party, especially when there were members of BOTH parties on the “non-sponsorship” list.
What about the history I mentioned?
The history is personal.
I have written about this long ago, I’m not even sure it remains in the archives of this weblog due to my changing hosts and configurations a few times, so it bears repeating here.
The name of the town I grew up in was Southaven, incorporated as an actual town the year I graduated high school, before that it was a mere development named by a group of builders seeking to attract buyers.
Why the name Southaven?
It was south of a development in Tennessee named Whitehaven, right at the state line between Tennessee and Mississippi, built in the mid to late 1960s; a development the nature of which was changing during the 1970s when Southaven was created.
I will not insult your intelligence by saying why Whitehaven was named as it was, just outside the city limits of Memphis, Tennessee, in that turbulent era.
Such was the environment in which I was raised.
The year before I graduated high school, signs appeared around town telling of a KKK meeting in the grounds behind the Jaycee building, an intense irony if you know of the mission of the Jaycees.
This isn’t to condemn the Jaycees, however. I want to give an indication of the tenor of the times, even in 1980, in a supposedly more enlightened age that supposedly followed in the South upon the heels of the racist 1960s.
When I was a Boy Scout, I heard Scoutmasters routinely use a word once commonly used in the South of the United states to refer to people of dark skin color, the word that I find more offensive than any curse word in the English language. A word I cannot bring myself to type, and the thought of saying aloud brings to mind the taste of shit in my mouth. The only word that brings to mind such strong negative and offensive feelings in me.
What needs to be said?
It is this:
Now, as an adult in the early years of the 21st century, I see political hay being made utilizing the apologies for the absence of condemnation of atrocious behavior towards people, unforgivable acts performed solely because of the color of the skin of those people.
I hear people using the same atrocious word in a compound with “sand” to describe Arabs because a small number of Arabs have managed to perpetrate horrific acts that resulted in the deaths of over 4000 people, deaths of people who were not solely Americans.
I see people using the acts of a few to condemn the whole of a race, of a people, of a religion, as if the acts of individuals were sufficient to convict all. If that criterion were followed, then Western Civilization, the origin of those condemning others now, would have been eliminated half a millennium ago.
I read people with a bare grasp of simple arithmetic trying to use complex, multi-layered data presented in the form of statistics to prove their cases of war, genocide, and annihilation.
I see people with less than a high school understanding of the scientific method trying to use the exaggerated statements of a press only interested in sensational headlines to disprove the assertions of scientists who have spent years studying problems and searching for solutions to those problems.
Everyone can now throw rocks at anyone, because everyone is now a self-appointed expert:
Today I made an appearance downtown
I am an expert witness because I say I am
And I said gentlemen, and I use that world loosely
I will testify for you, I’m a gun for hire, I’m a saint, I’m a liar
Because there are no facts, there is no truth
Just data to be manipulated
I can get you any result you like
What’s it worth to you?
Because there is no wrong, there is no right
And I sleep very well at night
No shame, no solution, no remorse, no retribution
Just people selling t-shirts
Just opportunity to participate in the pathetic little circus
and winning, winning, winning
-Don Henley, The Garden of Allah
And upon reading and hearing the chorus of apologists, those participating in the pathetic little circus, only interested in winning, winning, winning, I hear this song:
Big man, pig man,
ha ha, charade you are
You well heeled big wheel,
ha ha, charade you are
And when your hand is on your heart
You’re nearly a good laugh
Almost a joker
With your head down in the pig bin
Saying “keep on digging”
Pig stain on your fat chin
What do you hope to find?
When you’re down in the pig mine
You’re nearly a laugh
You’re nearly a laugh
But you’re really a cry.
-Pink Floyd, Pigs (Three Different Ones)
I have both witnessed and been subject to discrimination.
It is not a matter of politics. It is not a matter of winning.
It is merely a matter of mindless hate.
Just as are many of the issues being used by both sides, supposed fundamentals that are really peripherals, nonetheless suitable for hyping and using to sharpen their spears of their partisans.
I wish I could say “how pathetic” and move on to the adult discussions that need to occur.
Sadly, however, the truly necessary discussions are drowned out by those interested in winning, winning, winning, despite the charades they are.
Left-wing, right-wing, I don’t give a fucking damn who “wins”.
I just want my country to be successful.
I don’t foresee success, or even survival, by following the path we are currently traveling.
Yet I do not foresee success by listening to the left-wing, because they offer no viable alternative.
It cannot be history until you stop living it.
We cannot refuse an opportunity to appear to “make points” by making hay over the atrocities we committed in the past over race.
We cannot even get over race issues even now, 30 years later.
We cannot even get over issues related to “church versus state”, after over 215 years of nationhood based upon separation of the secular from the religious.
It cannot be history until you stop living it.
Race-based discrimination is not the only mindlessness I’m referring to here.
Do your own math.
When will we move on to address the real problems facing us, putting aside the “my side should win or else” mentality of internal politics that is blinding us to the external threats?
We are on the road to our own destruction, and that destruction will arise from within, just as it has done for every other seemingly strong civilization. The list is long: the Babylonians, the Egyptians, the Greeks, the Romans… and those are just the ones familiar to us insufficiently educated in truly world history, those of us in the West.
Read your history, and heed the warnings you will find, if you choose to see beyond your own partisan short-term gain.
Technorati Tags: commentary, opinion, personal, politics
Trackback URL (right-click and choose the copy shortcut/link option)
“I hear people using the same atrocious word in a compound with “sand” to describe Arabs because a small number of Arabs have managed to perpetrate horrific acts that resulted in the deaths of over 4000 people, deaths of people who were not solely Americans.”
I’ll put aside discussion of the words, and disagree with something more substantive.
If only the reality were as you say, I’d be with you 100%. Instead, I’m only with you part-way.
9-11 was not the product of a small number of Arabs. It was the product of a widespread culture of tens or hundreds of millions of people who knowingly preach or harken to hatred of America and Americans. When it is coming from the highest and holiest mosques in the religion, when it is coming from high spokespersons, when it is coming from nearly all of them, and when there is exactly zero counter-cry, then I think in fairness we can no longer ascribe this to the acts of a few fanatics.
That fact (imo, see any number of Google searches for proof), that indeed a large, possibly majority, swatch of a religion and a race has taken it upon themselves to hate America and Americans, in a minor or major way, is a large part of why some otherwise reasonable folks are saying unreasonable things. (I put aside any discussion of the true racists and bigots who will latch onto anything, or nothing, for their hate) What makes it worse, and amplifies the frustration (leading to shrillness), is the fact that many otherwise intelligent, moral, and reasonable people put their heads in the sand over this because it just doesn’t fit into their view of the way the world ought to be.
“I see people using the acts of a few to condemn the whole of a race, of a people, of a religion, as if the acts of individuals were sufficient to convict all. If that criterion were followed, then Western Civilization, the origin of those condemning others now, would have been eliminated half a millennium ago.”
Hmmm…and is that so very different from using the acts of a few to condemn a whole military, or war, or administration, or nation?
Racism is wrong, and reprehensible (to say nothing of stupid). But it’s also wrong to pretend that race does not exist, that people do not act in ways relating to race. Isn’t part of the reason we are having such difficulties the fact that many Arabs see this as a racial issue, of non-Arabs imposing their will on Arabs, or invading “Arab lands”?
Taken individually, I agree with a lot of what you complain of. Taken as a whole, though, I do not. You tell only half the story, you complain of only half the wrongs, you fail to allow for any human fallibilities in your countrymen while you ask we excuse them in others.
This is NOT about making relativistic moral excuses. It’s about trying to see the truth, about trying to understand why people behave the way they do, about trying to reach difficult, imperfect choices about what to DO in a *very* imperfect world. It’s not enough to say what we shouldn’t do.
If people would all behave in a civilized fashion we wouldn’t be having this discussion. But a lot of people won’t, and so here we are, all 6 billion of us. What now?
By DSmith on 06.15.05 02:19
Jack,
In more than one way, I agree with you. I even agree with you about ‘making points’ by supporting a social gesture. However, I do NOT think it is a social gesture or making points to formally apologise for slavery.
Note your next article which you posted. Memorial to WWII victims of the communist regime. Interesting. See, I believe that slavery was an atrocity the US and other nations for that matter visited upon a people of color, just because they could, and many of those people’s lives were destroyed in that process, by death, torture, beatings, confinement, subjugation and a lack of freedom our forebears enjoyed. To me, that was a war, and in fact an issue (not the entire reason, however) over which this country fought a war, dividing the nation. Lynchings (the subject of the Senate resolution)of these folks were part and parcel to this history.
We apologised for our abuse of the Japanaese Americans. Little enough. We have even provided some reparation. The resolution, which was not signed by some members (the same group who have repeatedly followed the same path over these issues is shameful, for them and us). It makes me sick. I could give a shit about the politics. I don’t care about political points. But, the same thing that makes you sick and me for that matter, using verbage to denigrate people and subjugate them in that manner, should make you sickened that these supposedly enlightened and educated politicians wouldn’t sign on to a simple resolution of apology should really piss you off. (Ofcourse, this symbolic gesture by the Senate is one way of getting away from reparation issues much less a REAL APOLOGY for mans-inhumanity-to-man, i.e. SLAVERY, something the US has never done to date.)
It is important to me that we acknowledge we are not a perfect nation, that we take responsibility for our actions, that we learn from these mistakes and take heed in the future. That is called honour, Jack. So, no, I do not agree with you here.
From my post:
Continuing prejudice in this day and age….
Tuesday, June 14, 2005 at 10:06PM
Posted by Sinequanon
Maybe I shouldn?t continue to be so naive, and shocked when I see, witness, or hear of this behavior toward others. Especially with some views toward people different from the American norm, but, I AM! I am also disgusted, especially with the following:
SENATORS FAILED TO CONDEMN LYNCHING: The Senate yesterday issued a ‘rare’ formal apology (its first of any kind to African Americans), expressing regret ?for having rejected decades of pleas to make lynching a federal crime.? Could there possibly be a less controversial resolution? Surprisingly, the answer is yes. Several senators waited until the last minute to add their names to the resolution, when they knew it was scheduled for a vote. And outrageously, at least six senators refused to co-sponsor the resolution.
LIST OF SHAME:
* Sen.. Richard Shelby (R-AL)
* Thad Cochran (R-MI)
* Trent Lott (R-MI)
* Lamar Alexander (R-TN)
* John Cornyn (R-TX)
* Kay Bailey Hutchison (R-TX
By Sinequanon on 06.15.05 14:24
DSmith,
I take your points, with a grain of sand. Your google seach shouldn’t be proof to you of anything, because you don’t and the people who pontificate on the issue haven’t taken the time to find our if the Arab world hates us. They may now, due to this retributive war.
The thing is, your are confusing race with culture. They are different things. Race is a small portion of culture. Culture is the ‘norms’ of a group, which you are trying to describe. Race is, in very basic terms, the color of your skin and ethnicity the place of origins: i.e. Persian, European, Pacific-Islander, etc. Factually, Persian ethnicities are racially considered: come one, guess!!!
That’s right: WHITE
I don’t agree with much of your premise(s), in the issues, you reference, I agree with Jack.
By Sinequanon on 06.15.05 14:34
The Commissar is an Equal Opportunity Critic
Stephen points out Right Wing exploitation of the lynching meme in criticizing the fillibuster compromise, the other day, and yesterday points out an equaly ridiculous exploitation by Left Wingers of the “so called Appology,” by the U.S. Senate for not…
By In Search Of Utopia on 06.15.05 15:28
I had a boyfriend in HS from Pakistan. He is now a very successful doctor, neurology, and is American. He is an immigrant, married to an American girl. His parents keep themselves very traditionally. My friend no longer flies as he says it is dangerous to look Middle Eastern and fly. Everyone thinks he’s a terrorist. He LOVES America and all it stands for.
He said to me two years ago, when we reconnected by phone to plan our HS reunion, “I don’t understand how Americans can call us all such names such as RagHeads. Yet, they have no problems putting a bunch of ‘ragheads’ on their front lawns every Christmas in a Nativity Scene.”
By Boudicca on 06.16.05 05:21