politics

Ambivalence

It’s always ambivalence.

That’s the general feeling I associate with America. Take “General Order Number 3”, the official document associated with Juneteenth which says in part: "The freedmen are advised to remain quietly at their present homes and work for wages. They are informed that they will not be allowed to collect at military posts and that they will not be supported in idleness either there or elsewhere."

There’s always that parting shot,

“…they will not be allowed to collect at military posts and that they will not be supported in idleness either there or elsewhere.”

It’s the loophole that Jim Crow and The Black Codes ride through.

And remember, The Emancipation Proclamation freed the enslaved of the Confederacy on January 1, 1863. Also keep in mind that there were Union states where black citizens remained enslaved until the passage of the 13th Amendment.

So, let’s recap: Two and a half years after The Emancipation Proclamation which preserved slavery in Union territory, the enslaved of Texas were informed that they had been freed, conditional on a broad interpretation of their “good behavior” (check out that other loophole in the 13th Amendment).

Hence the source of my ambivalence.

My daughter has a Juneteenth poster somewhere around here inscribed with the tag #freeish

Here’s to a day when we’re all free.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Order_No._3#Physical_document

It May Be Time to Shake Off the Dust

Laban said, “This heap is a witness between you and me today.” That is why it was called Galeed. 49 It was also called Mizpah,[c] because he said, “May the Lord keep watch between you and me when we are away from each other. – Genesis: 31:48-49

If anyone will not welcome you or listen to your words, leave that home or town and shake the dust off your feet. – Matthew 10:14

A bit of drama from the Michigan state senate gained the national spotlight recently. In a campaign mailing, Lana Theis, the state senator from Brighton, implied that state senator Mallory McMorrow, of Royal Oak, was involved in “sexually grooming” children for a supposed pedophile ring and that furthermore, Senator McMorrow is supporting something called the “raced based” education of our children.

The first accusation carries serious legal implications and should not be taken lightly. One would think that an accusation of this magnitude, with dire implications for our children’s safety, should be shared with local, federal, state authorities rather than be included in a fundraising email.

The second accusation, that of supporting “raced based education”, is overly broad and open to interpretation covering a potential spectrum between The Honorable Elijah Mohammed and The Reverend Martin Luther King Jr. The major focus of the life’s work of both men had to do with race, yet from entirely different angles of approach.

Senator McMorrow did not take these accusations lying down. She stood in the Michigan chamber and delivered a powerful speech refuting Senator Theis’s lies and innuendo. Furthermore, McMorrow boldly stood up for the rights of citizens who are marginalized by Theis’s stance. The speech only lasted five minutes but it resounded around the globe as a long overdue response to the increasingly fascist, authoritarian, and racist public stance of the Republican party. Senator McMorrow has been rightly celebrated for the principles, passion and integrity exemplified in her comments. But her speech is not what I’d like to focus on today. It’s what she said after the speech. When asked if she would continue to work with Senator Theis in the senate, McMorrow stated that she had no interest in working with her further.

This would seem to run counter to the orthodoxy of a lot of politicians, including our current president, and many in the media, who urge Americans to find compromise with those with whom we disagree.

I’m here to suggest that it may be time to “shake the dust off our feet”.

When I was a teenager, we used to close our Baptist Youth Fellowship meetings at my home church in St. Louis with words taken our Old Testament text: “May the Lord watch between me and thee, while we’re absent, one from another.” We discontinued the practice after someone reviewed the text leading up to that scripture and put it in proper context. In short, it’s the story of the dissolution of the relationship between Jacob, the Patriarch, and his cousin, Laban, for whom Jacob had worked for 20 years. Jacob felt that Laban had not dealt fairly with him. In fact, Jacob had been ordered by God to take his household, consisting of two of Laban’s daughters, and his share of Laban’s flock – that he’d worked for – and leave. Once he’d learned of Jacob’s surreptitious departure, Laban pursued him.

He eventually caught up with Jacob and after a lot of back and forth and rehashing of grievances, we come to what amounts to a covenant between the two men that signifies the dissolution of their relationship. However, I do not interpret this as an amicable parting. For in verse 52 and 53 Laban further states: 52 “This heap is a witness, and this pillar is a witness, that I will not go past this heap to your side to harm you and that you will not go past this heap and pillar to my side to harm me. 53 May the God of Abraham and the God of Nahor, the God of their father, judge between us.”

These men will not be visiting each other for the holidays. They have irreconcilable differences. Jacob has taken a stand for himself and for what is right. To continue to associate with Laban would be foolhardy. Likewise, rightly, or wrongly Laban feels that he is the aggrieved party. For him to continue to ally with Jacob is pointless.

Turning to our New Testament scripture, we find Jesus instructing the disciples as he sends them out to preach and heal in his name. He has been very specific in his instructions, as one would think he’d be. These are his representatives. What strikes me is that Jesus makes the disciples completely reliant on the people they will be ministering to. He instructs them to take no coin with them, to not even take any extra clothes. “… for the worker is worth his keep,” he says.

This is vital because I believe it leads to the admonition to “shake off the dust.” If the people you are ministering to and working with don’t recognize your worth – and by extension, the worth of the God in you – move on. They aren’t worth the time. In similar fashion, Jacob, God’s anointed, had labored faithfully in Laban’s household. His worth was not reciprocated in kind, so God instructed Jacob to move on. When Laban caught up with Jacob after seven days, he chastised Jacob in bad faith for “abandoning” him. When it was obviously Jacob who had been mistreated.

All of this presumes that what one is trying to accomplish aligns with the will and purpose of God. But beloved, God does not want us to waste our efforts in alliance with those who would abuse us. We are to use discernment in our alliances. And while we are not to think too highly of ourselves, this is his mission after all, we are not allowed to waste God’s time. In verse sixteen Christ admonishes his disciples to be “shrewd as snakes and innocent as doves.”

So, I think Senator McMorrow was in order when she declared that she no longer intended to work with Senator Theis. There is an oft quoted epigram of Maya Angelou that says, “When people show you who they are the first time believe them.” Consider that the line is part of a larger quote that reads in part, “Live your life in truth. Don’t pretend to be someone you’re not. You will survive anything if you live your life from the point of view of truth.” Or again, again, as the Savior said, “If anyone will not welcome you or listen to your words, leave that home or town and shake the dust off your feet.”

When you assume…

Some comments:

1. Black people have consistently been roughly 12% of the U.S. population for quite some time. I would like to see the scholarship around this. I’m sure some of it centers around “how *black* is defined.”

2. The amount of power granted “leaders” who gin up fear around Muslim & LGBTQ Americans, given their extraordinarily small numbers, is frightening. Fear and Loathing of the “other” has become a monstrous feature of the American operating system.

3. Y’all ain’t never gonna get rich. And rich people ain’t sharing.

4. We love guns. That’s 100 million guns folks. And note that roughly one-third of Americans own enough weapons to arm every man woman and child in this country.

https://acasignups.net/22/03/17/redblue-covid-divide-includes-pretty-eyebrow-raising-coincidental-data-point

You’re Welcome, Senator

So rather than, the “black women save America again” narrative, how about “black women again voted in their own best interests, like everyone else does? ”

And don’t forget that black people are often left with the choice of voting for the candidate that will do them the least amount of harm.

While generally being ignored at best.

And at worst, scapegoated.

This has nothing to do with “love of country.” Love America, hate it, or likely, feel generally ambivalent about it, for black residents, voting is about self preservation.

Beyond his conviction of the Birmingham bombers – which was significant (but also his job) – I know little about Doug Jones. I supported his candidacy because he was not Roy Moore.

I have it on good authority that, among white progressives, Jones is considered the real deal, the diametric opposite of Moore. I hope that Jones works to bring black constituents around to the same enthusiastic view.

I hope that Jones truly understands that there is rarely any enthusiasm behind a black person’s ballot. But there is usually much at risk. Little promise and much to lose. ‎And usually, just the act of voting comes with difficulty, in the face of interference and even intimidation.

Black voters don’t get much from our votes, generally. Yet we keep showing up.

It’s past time we received something for it.

Tuesday Is The New Thursday…

… at least this week it is. Shouldn’t come as any surprise after a weekend of flailing at work from the paying job. But at least it pays. The news doesn’t help. After day whatever of Judge Roy Moore and a year of the current presidency, time weighs heavier.

I keep waiting to get numbed by the news. For all of the backbiting and mudslinging, the mendacity and the hubris of very stupid people, to build a callous. Surprisingly, and perhaps thankfully, it doesn’t.

And I try to do my part. I need to contact my state representative about the incredibly reckless legislation currently being proffered to expand firearm use in Michigan. And I need to contact my House Rep over the new tax bill.

It lightens the load a bit.

Deadwood

So I’m watching HBO’s Deadwood again for the umpteenth time. I’m a sucker for good dialogue and Deadwood has some of the best. Not only good scripting but some of the cleverest, and unexpected, word usage I’ve ever experienced, utilized in a Western no less.

Ian McShane is a gift as Swearengen. Ruthless, profane, complicated, and the most self aware and  discerning of all the characters. He doesn’t commit sin. He inhabits it. But he doesn’t kid himself about it.

Besides McShane, Brad Dourif’s Doc Cochran is my next favorite character. Like Swearengen, Cochran is self aware, but he has limits on how far he’ll go. He’s a conscience of sorts to Swearengen. And while he isn’t particularly kind, he is the most humane character on the show.

Humanity seems to be in short supply these days. Self awareness has evaporated into the ether.  Our leaders would rather cling to some modern form of Manifest Destiny rather than admit that they don’t have a clue as to what they’re doing. That they’ve steered into a dead end. And that it’s time to admit that we’ve made a grave electoral error.

I’m not particularly hopeful that this ship will right itself any time soon, if ever. No one seems to be willing to take any real risk in the effort.

Meanwhile I’m content to watch McShane and Dourif ply their trade. Nobody in Deadwood ever kids themselves.

Wallowing In The Quagmire of Ignorance

“Personal attacks have no place in civil discourse” or so I was taught in high school by Mr. McCollister. He labeled it “Wallowing in the quagmire of ignorance.”

According to my grandfather, somewhere in scripture it says “… if you fall, don’t wallow.” His rejoinder was, “but sometimes wallowing just feels good.” I’ve found the highest expression of this philosophy in the blues.

I have yet to find the scripture he quoted but I did find this:

“Simpletons! How long will you wallow in ignorance? Cynics! How long will you feed your cynicism? Idiots! How long will you refuse to learn?” – Proverbs 1:22 (Message translation)

A less than ringing endorsement of our current level of public discourse. But there it is. Our most striking example being the very public twitter feud between our current sitting president and Senator Bob Corker. President Trump consistently degrades Corker with the appellation “liddle” and Corker famously compared Trumps Whitehouse to “an adult daycare center.”

If we’re honest about it, most of us don’t mind when someone we don’t like is personally attacked. We enjoy seeing our “enemies” brought low. TV talkshow hosts Stephen Colbert and Seth Meyers (to name only a couple) do it regularly and they do it well. They make fun of Trump’s tan, Kelly Ann Conway’s hair, Sebastian Gorka’s beard. The humor is  pointed and it’s usually quite clever and it seeks to bring low those who would set themselves over us. It makes powerful people look ridiculous.

But I’m beginning to wonder if we’ve wallowed long enough. Mr. Mac used to caution that slinging barbs at one another makes us “feel good” but does little to enlighten or illuminate discussion and it closes off dialogue.

Not that people like Trump, Conway, or Gorka would be likely to listen. And talk shows are not the proscribed venues for “civic discourse”.

But the rest of us need start listening to each other if we’re going to get anywhere.

Because even though I hate to admit it, as much as I love Colbert’s monologue and as much as I agree with Corker’s assessment, I have neighbors that believe that Donald Trump is telling the God’s truth.

Progress In The Party of Lincoln

My grandfather voted Republican for a good portion of his life. Largely, because Lincoln freed the slaves, or at least that’s how it was told to me. I imagine it had a lot to do with his experience with southern Democrats for most of his life.  They were pro slavery, pro Jim Crow, and anti practically anything that had to do with full citizenship for black people.

So I imagine the choice was pretty easy for quite a while.

Conventional wisdom has it that the Civil Rights movement changed all that. Essentially the progressive planks of the Democratic platform – and LBJ’s signing of the Civil Rights Act – sent southern Democrats, the “Dixiecrats”, into the welcoming arms of the Grand Old Party. Which says a couple of things to me. One: Race (at least in this case) trumps party affiliation. Two: In politics, winning trumps everything.

Either way, it took a lot of coaxing and cajoling to get my grandfather to change his party affiliation, even after his party changed their racial affiliation. Loyalty trumped everything for that old man.

I wonder how my grandfather would feel  about Herman Cain. A friend commented to me once that she could not see how a black person could support the Republican party. I flinched a little, recalling my grandfather’s history, and kept my own council.

I’ve always tried to give people the benefit of the doubt, at least upon first glance. This is something my mother taught me. Something she learned from my grandfather. But I don’t think the old man would be too impressed with Cain after hearing him speak for a while. I think he’d see the hypocrisy of a man claiming to be a victim of the Race card while dealing it or in a black man promising to exclude members of a minority group from his (hypothetical) cabinet because of the behavior of a few within that group. I think he’d be struck by the irony of a true carpetbagger as standard bearer for the very people who historically exploited fears for the majority with the image after Reconstruction [exhibit A: BIRTH OF A NATION]. I think my grandfather would be put off the claim, put forth by Cain, that black people who don’t support the GOP “can’t think for themselves.”

I don’t know my grandfather’s voting record after breaking his solid streak with the GOP. I do know that he voted, rain or shine, whenever the polls were opened. I wish he could see what’s become of his once beloved, GOP. I wonder if he’d count it as progress.