Of Xenophobia and Instinct

In the wake of the terrorist attacks in Paris, the social media world, the media world in general, and the general world in general, have all erupted in mourning, debate, accusations and incriminations. The responses are neither surprising or new. But their very consistency lends itself to self-analysis and potential learning. Though neither seems likely.

The first response of many is one of fear and fight. The attack in Paris is seen as a threat to all Western life in a way that the similar bombings in Beirut a few days earlier were not. In a way we can understand and, more importantly, imagine happening to us, the way death and destruction caused by war on a country's own soil is not. Paris is a proxy for all the West and demands a response because it is us. We cannot so simply turn away.

The world is too large to grasp and appreciate, so we reduce it to similarities and the familiar. In so doing we deny its truth, we miss the universalities disguised by surface differences. We look for ourselves in everything and miss it everywhere.

So we vow revenge. We demand action. We send in the planes and drop the bombs and trust that we kill for noble reasons, out of self-defense, and our actions are in no way comparable to the enemy's. That we have killed more civilians on their side than they have on ours is irrelevant. That the extremists have killed more of their own kind than ours is irrelevant. They are all the same if we lack the ability to tell them apart. If we kill them all we will surely get the right ones among them.

At the same time, we flight as well as fight. We call to close our borders. To expunge those who might be the enemy simply because they belong to the same general group of people. We do this only when the attack comes from a minority, a segment of society that is easy for the majority to disparage and eliminate. When white men commit atrocities, when Christians commit disgraceful acts in the name of their god, we cannot run away. Because we are them.

The other is the greatest threat to the self. It challenges everything held dear; it weakens every belief and threatens every foundation. It brings us together in defense of the common good and unites individuals into a community. And in so doing, we lose our selves to the masses and the war is already lost.

We look for a simple answer and the obvious truths. Bad people exist. They are a threat to us. If we eliminate them we will be safe. But people are merely the pawns of movements, ideas brought into action. We make no attempt to find the root cause or change the thought process. If people hate us for our militarization and interference, we will send our military to interfere some more. We believe those who tell us it will work this time, in spite of so recent memory that they've said that before. We'd rather believe the obvious lie that comforts us than an inconvenient truth that scares us more. We need satisfaction now - justice is swifter through violence than education.

The grand gesture is rarely a lasting sentiment. The immediate response seldom a solution. If we have any hope to make change, to improve life, it will only come piecemeal, over generations. What is done long after the fact will decide what comes next.

There is naked evil in the world, and Islamic extremists represent one face of it. But there are many forms of hate, many ways in which we deny what's noble about humanity and reduce ourselves to an instinctive drive to survive at all costs. When we vilify those of with different beliefs because a tiny percentage have wronged us, when we show compassion for those who look like us but turn our back to those of a different color, when we respond to hatred in kind, we lessen ourselves.

We can resist. We can pause to consider and use our higher principles and rational brains to seek understanding and learn a new approach. We don't need to cower in fear or strike out in anger. We can fight back and show strength through character instead of belligerence. Doing so would take a bravery I fear we lack. It would value the long-term result instead of immediate satisfaction. It would value all people equally and improve the world for more than just ourselves. It could work. It won't happen. It's why I mourn for Paris - not because of the immediate tragedy, but because it belongs to a world where it will inevitably happen again.

Empathy, or lack thereof, appears to be the core problem of human relations. We misunderstand, miscommunicate, and misrepresent each other in a constant struggle to declare our own truths to be universal and undeniable. We simply lack the ability to think in a way other than how we’ve learned to think. If we are forever limited by our own experiences we will never come to understand the other until we experience more than ourselves.

Securing the high ground

I wrote earlier about the second amendment and why I feel it has no place in the current debate over how to handle guns in America. But since then there’s been another mass shooting (several, really, like there are every month in this country, but one in particular that’s captured the media’s attention), and I feel the need to address the fundamental arguments I hear from those who support (demand) the right to own guns, I’m writing again to make my position more clear. Gun-right advocates do have a case to make, but it’s one without morality.

The first thing they’ll say is that the constitution guarantees them the right to bear arms. I took  this apart in detail, but let’s just stick to the fact that no reference to a conclusion drawn by others represents an argument on it’s own merits. Just because some people thought it was a good idea a long time ago does not make it a good idea today. You have to at least state what their argument was and why it’s still valid. That’s hard to do because we don’t really have their argument – merely a lot of conjecture on what their reasoning was. And the words they used suggest it was based on a need for a militia which holds much less sway in a world where standing armies with nuclear weapons are the norm. So let’s move on.

Gun rights advocates argue against any restrictions because they say criminals wouldn’t follow any new laws anyway. Laws don’t prevent bad people from getting guns so we shouldn’t pass any more. There are so many logical problems here. First, if laws don’t stop anyone from getting guns, why are they worried about them? Why don’t they just let the rest of us pass laws restricting guns and they can ignore them like they say they will. Let’s at least give it a try.

But let’s follow their logic a little further. If laws don’t stop criminals or crime, why do we need any? Criminals break the law by definition. So, of course, criminals will continue to break the law if you add more to them. But the reason we have laws is to indicate what is allowed and considered right and what is wrong. And we back up our laws with punishment for those who break them. Laws reduce certain acts by making them criminal. Maybe not eliminate them, but certainly reduces them. I take this to be self-evident. If you want to live in a lawless society and see how that works out, go right ahead.

But on a more important note, why do you think criminals have such easy access to guns? The answer is simply because there are so many damn guns around. The U.S. has half the private guns in the world, one for every single person (including children) in this country. Of course it’s easy for criminals to get them. And it’s the fault of all the people over all the years who have argued that we all need the right to own guns. It’s those people who want to make sure the good guys have guns who have created a system whereby it’s easy for bad guys to obtain guns. The blame lies with their culture.

But maybe it is too late. The criminals are armed and the only way to stop them is to make sure the good guys have guns too. But I really wonder about how many good guys are really good. The truth is, it’s those good guys who accidentally shoot themselves while cleaning their weapons. It’s the good guys who leave the weapon unsecure so a child finds it and hurts themselves or others. It’s the people we thought were good guys who get angry and use the weapon against their wife or partner. It’s especially the good ones who get sad at all the badness in the world and put their gun to their own head to end the pain. And even the best among us will eventually pass away and leave their stockpiles of deadly weapons to the next generation who may not be nearly as worthy. Statistically speaking, good law-abiding citizens are far more likely to hurt themselves or innocent people with their guns than they are to stop a bad guy, and eventually their weapons will find their way into the wrong hands.

But they still want their guns. Their right to have a toy, to make themselves feel safer in spite of the evidence that proves it isn’t so, is far more important to them than the lives of the innocent people who will die in a system that grants them their right. It’s incredibly selfish. It should not be the basis for how a rational society decides what is best for the population as a whole.

I do agree that it’s too late. It will take generations to get rid of the ridiculous amount of guns in the country. But I’ll still argue for a sane course of action and an end goal that makes sense. It’s not laws or regulation that will make this country safer, but a change in the mindset that weapons are the basis for peace, that everyone needs the power to kill quickly and efficiently in order to survive. There are too many models out there that prove it isn’t so. In the meantime, it would be good to know what incremental steps we can take to make things better. To start us on a path towards a society where more guns are not the solution to a problem of too many guns. The truth is, it’s really hard to know what to do. But that’s their fault as well.

The reason we don’t have much solid academic study of the problems of gun violence is that gun proponents have fought tooth and nail to prevent it. The NRA has used all its power, every politician on its payroll, to stop the government from researching how guns impact public safety. To me, the only reason they would do that is because they know all too well what the answer will be. Those who fear to face the truth are the ones who already know what it is.

And that’s the truth of it. We all really do know that guns are bad. They’re designed to kill. Their purpose is evil. While it may be necessary to have such evil weapons in the world, we should never forget that it’s an evil necessity. We should take no pride in facing that necessity. We should look to eliminate it or reduce it at every turn. If we have any morality in us, we should all strive for a world without guns. The argument that it isn’t possible is proven wrong by many of the most developed and civilized countries in the world – it would be nice if the U.S. could be part of that group.

Where lies our nobility?

“I don't think people are inherently racist in this country. In fact, I think that we have a pretty noble tradition of the opposite.” Jeb Bush, Sep. 25, 2015

When I first read the above quote from Jeb I thought it was the same level of ignorance that made him say his brother kept us safe (except for that whole 9/11 thing, right?). That he simply didn’t think it through or possibly was so eager to stick to his positive ‘Rise Up’ message that he couldn’t acknowledge the obvious: our history is hardly noble. It is one of slavery and discrimination. Of subjugation and displacement. White people in this country came to power through disenfranchising, marginalizing, ignoring, or outright killing every other race that crossed their path. The more I thought about it, the more I wondered what ‘noble tradition’ he could be referring to, the more I realized he truly believed what he said. And I think I can understand why.

Jeb grew up a rich white kid in the south. He learned his history the way many of us did in school – through a prism that included the truth but really distorted the facts into a world-view that fed into our own beliefs and desires. You see, everyone wants to be great. We want to be a part of something great and to know our ancestors, whether genetic or cultural, were great. We look at history not to see what happened, but to reassure ourselves that our greatness is deserved. We idealize our past so we can assure ourselves of our future. It’s why Donald wants to make American great again – because so many people think that it was.

In school I was taught that the United States was the greatest country in the world. We were the first true democracy. We expanded across a (nearly) empty land and rose through hard work and industrialization to dominate the world economy. We ended slavery, saved Europe in World War I and saved the world in World War 2. And it was white men like me who did it. How proud was I to be the inheritor of all that greatness.

To be fair, I was taught that we decimated the native Americans when we arrived. We treated them poorly, infected them with disease, robbed them of their lands, rounded them up to reservations, and promptly ignored their existence. But that was the past.

We also had slavery – or, more accurately, those Southerners had slavery. I had the privilege of living in a section of the North that could easily toss off any association with the institution. More importantly, we ended slavery. We, as a nation, fought and sacrificed to free the slaves. Sure, it was ourselves we were fighting. We had lived with slavery for centuries. Grown rich and powerful on the backs of slaves. But the point was we ended the practice because we were good white men.

And even if some prejudice remained, it was in the past, before the Civil Rights Act. Once again, we ended segregation and Jim Crow laws. Good for us.

The facts were there. Our terrible history of discrimination. Against blacks, Asians, women, the Irish, Catholics, etc., etc. Our terrible acts of corporate greed – slave labor followed by child labor. Our terrible treatment of the rest of the world, from supporting dictators to ignoring human rights abuses. Yes, we did lots of terrible things. But look how much we accomplished.

The overall narrative always reinforced that the bad things were done in the past, and that we had changed and improved since then. We took the good things and built on them. There is some truth to this – I believe we have improved as a people and a society. But it also feeds into the self-congratulatory concept that we come from good people. People who ended the bad things. We take pride in our history of achievements but leave our guilt over the costs of our success behind, much like a Vegas buffet.  All prime rib, all the time. No broccoli for us.

So in Jeb’s mind, in the minds of most white people in this country, we are good folk. We come from good folk who were noble and righteous. We desperately want to believe that and it’s so easy to do. Just listen to what you’ve been told since childhood.

It takes much more self-awareness and strength of character to accept the grayness that stains our souls. Our country was built on the bodies of the disadvantaged. Since our very start, we have raped the land, killed those who were here before us, dragged our labor here in chains, repressed the voices and rights of those who looked different or were born the wrong gender. Our true greatness lies not in what we accomplished in the past but how much we have grown and changed from those times. We are not perfect but we are better. That is something rare and worth celebrating.

But we do not have a noble history as a nation. None do. Any current claim of nobility rests not only on our actions today but in honestly admitting the mistakes of our past. Our willingness to sweep the dark spots of our history under the rug is an inherently racist action. It hurts those who have already been hurt, it denies their truth and perpetuates a system that exists to placate those who have the power and gained it so dishonestly. The fact that so many of us choose to willfully ignore our past, that we seek praise for ceasing to perpetrate evil, that we blithely dismiss anyone who dares to suggest we are not the rightful heirs of manifest destiny  – that’s what reveals who we really are. It’s not the second line of the quote that is the big lie. It’s the first.

Race of Racism in America

Life is a race. A multi-generational race. Where you start depends on where your parents were in the race; the obstacles in your path depend upon how you grow up, the education your receive, the support you have behind you. And the color of your skin.

In America, the white man (and it was only men who were allowed to run) started with an open path. He ran hard and fast. The black man was in chains – he couldn’t run at all. At some point the white man stopped and turned around. He realized it wasn’t a race at all and called for the black man to be cut free. The black man began to run and the white man continued on his way, comfortable with his large lead.

The black man found many hurdles in his path. Voting obstructions, Jim Crow laws, lynchings. Not surprisingly, he couldn’t catch up. Eventually the white man paused once again. He looked far behind him and dictated the hurdles be removed. He continued on his way.

Some of the hurdles were gone, but the path of the black man was still a rough road. Racism hadn’t been removed by decree. The white man was far out front and still running hard. The black man couldn’t catch up.

Today the white man is still out front. Some look back and don’t see the hurdles. They know the history, they hear stories of the rough ground, are shown the statistics that prove the black man faces more challenges. But their lane has some bumps too. They didn’t personally create any obstacles for anyone. They weren’t around for the days of high hurdles. They decreed it was to be a fair race, so it must be true. A very small percentage of black men have even caught up – doesn’t that prove it? Never mind they never stopped to let all the black men catch up. Never mind the contest was unfair for so long. It’s fair now – what else can we do? We’ve got a race to run. The white man wants to win.

The hurdles aren’t gone. They never will be. The evidence they exist is all around us, but not everyone experiences them. When you’re in the lead it’s hard to see what’s happening behind you. But it’s impossible to deny that the white man had a head start. No way to argue that generation after generation began out in front and did very little to help the black man catch up. How long does the race have to be before we can ignore the start? How much harder does the black man have to run to pull even? How can anyone claim themselves a deserving winner in such an unfair competition?

Everyone runs a different race and some will always have more obstacles than others. There will always be some unfairness in the race. We could argue about who has the hardest course, which hurdles are higher and how many still exist. Or we could spend our time clearing the path. We could work together to remove as many obstacles as possible and let everyone run on the same ground. We could help everyone get to the same starting line. Then we can all race as hard as we want and feel good about our accomplishments. Or maybe we could get on the same team and find a way for everyone to win. Either way, this race needs a start-over.

[I wrote my post before reading this article, but I knew it was out there. It lays out the case in a more concrete manner: The Case for Reparations in The Atlantic]

An Open Letter to #AllLivesMatter

All Lives DO Matter

I believe when most people say that #AllLivesMatter they are expressing a good thought. They truly believe that all lives do matter and as a society we should be outraged and saddened when someone, anyone, is killed. It’s true. It’s right. It also misses the point.

Because there’s something more in #AllLivesMatter. It’s not just an idea unto itself but a response to #BlackLivesMatter. In order to be understood, it needs to be placed in context and that requires a little more understanding and awareness of what the #BlackLivesMatter movement represents beyond a hashtag slogan.

First, when people use the expression #BlackLivesMatter, what they’re saying is that Black lives matter too. Because here’s the thing: society very clearly says that white lives matter. When a white police officer is killed in the line of duty everyone says it’s a tragedy. The system (the criminal justice system and society in general) swings into action and no expense is spared to find the killer and bring them to justice. People who kill cops, people who kill white people in general, are the subject of large police manhunts, prosecuted vigilantly by the largely white district attorneys, and punished harshly by the court system. That’s as it should be. It’s already happening and we don’t need any large social movement to make it happen or to improve the system in that regard. You don’t need to say #AllLivesMatter when talking about white police officers because everyone already agrees with that.

On the other hand, when a black person is killed, especially at the hands of a white police officer, the system often treats it as if it doesn’t really matter. It doesn’t get wide coverage in the media. It doesn’t create any outrage or upset in the majority population. The assumption is that the black person deserved it. The system doesn’t investigate it as thoroughly – the police officer isn’t treated as a suspect, they don’t have to give a statement right away, the people who do the investigation are the officer’s coworkers, often their friends, the district attorney who decides if any crime has been committed is a regular partner of the police and is hardly impartial. So while it may be true that the police officer was justified, the system is not a fair and impartial determiner of that fact. That’s what people are complaining about.

And make no doubt, the system is flawed and it takes herculean efforts to prove that white police are in the wrong and that black people have been victimized. There are many cases where the truth is in question and normally nothing comes of it. But it does happen. It happened in South Carolina. It happened in Cincinnati. It happened New York. So we know that sometimes police officers are not justified in their killing of unarmed black men. But what about here, and here, and here, and there’s a list of more here. That’s just this past year. And just the deaths. It goes to reason that there are many more cases where bad cops injured, unjustly detained, or simply harassed Black people without killing them so it was never noticed by the media.

And if you wonder why so many Black suspects resist arrest or try to flee, it’s because they know the system is rigged against them. White people can simply take a ride down to the station and get it sorted out. That doesn’t work so well for minorities. They might not make it to the station, like Freddie Gray. Once in custody they’re still not safe, like Tyree Woodson. And then they face our criminal justice system, has a clear statistical bias against them.

This isn’t to say that all police shootings are wrong or that all police are racist and corrupt. There are lots of fine people working in law enforcement and most are simply trying to do their job to the best of their abilities. But some police officers are bad. Just like some kindergarten teachers are bad. Some cooks are bad, some carpenters, some auto dealers, some doctors and even some politicians are bad. It would be perverse and irrational to assume all police officers are good and decent and perfectly scrupulous and fair when doing their job. No large group of people is perfect. History has many documented cases of bad, racist law enforcement, like the Rampart Scandal and the Chicago Corruption and many, many more. So let’s admit that there are bad cops and instead of arguing about exactly how many we should be trying to find ways to weed out and eliminate as many as we can.

The evidence is very clear that policing in this country is not the same for White people when compared to Black people. If you’re white, you may not have experienced it, but that doesn’t mean it isn’t true. You can’t look at the statistics, read case after case of racist policing, hear story after story of the daily lives of Black people (including those in law enforcement) and still say our system is fair and equal. The system is broken.

That’s what #BlackLivesMatter is protesting. No one is saying that white lives don’t matter. They’re saying we need to recognize the bias in the system - not just pass it off as a few random, racist people - and make a change. All those fine law enforcement officers who are trying to do the right thing would be better served if the right thing were made a little clearer and the bad apples were removed. The movement is not trying to divide – the divisions already exist. They’re saying that Black lives matter too.

What #BlackLivesMatters wants are a series of policy changes and criminal system reforms that have been suggested before by academics and experts - but without anyone listening because there was no public outcry (at least among the majority). They want less militarization of the police, more community involvement, and more accountability. They want what most of us want: fair and equal treatment with systems in place to better train police and someone outside to oversee their activities. You can read more about it here: Campaign Zero. Don’t read into it what you think it means. Don’t respond to some random quote that was passed around on Facebook. Don’t get offended and reply before thinking. Actually listen their position and understand what #BlackLivesMatter means.

How should you respond to #BlackLivesMatter? That’s up to you. If you have issues with any of the points of Campaign Zero, go ahead and argue them. Tell us about the specific problems with having police wear body cameras or why for-profit policing is actually a good idea. Explain how having an independent body reviewing police actions is bad even though our country is built on the idea of checks and balances in government. Try to defend the fact that many minority neighborhoods are policed by mostly white forces and how that’s a good thing. At least that would be a productive discussion.

But if you say #AllLivesMatter, you’re saying the system is just fine as it is and we don’t need to address any issues regarding race in America. You’re discounting the lives and experiences of millions of minorities. You’re trying to silence the disadvantaged who are crying out for justice. I don’t think that’s what most people want to be saying, but it is. If you really believe that all lives matter, then you should realize Black lives matter too.