I’m so confused. I was around for the race riots in D.C. many years ago when my black Saturday afternoon football friends would alert us white boys to stay inside on a given night. We would knock on doors and gather the next day for another game. I seem to recall women emerging from centuries of subservience to gain their pride, identity, and, most importantly, voice. I was a part of the voice to end an unnecessary war and to make peace and equality a national priority. I was a teenager then. This is now.
As global warming gradually erases the glaciers and icy habitat for beloved furry creatures, the extremes of polarity have spread across this country like a viral video of kittens playing with a moose. Nobody will talk, nobody will listen. Short-armed politicians have as much trouble reaching across the aisle as short-armed Mike Napoli has reaching for a fastball on the outside corner. Whiff. And, just when I thought there had been joining, talking, and blending in this country, here we are…again…drifting further and further apart. Blacks are angry at cops and cops are acting like uniformed KKK Neanderthals. Women still don’t earn an equal wage. Crazy people are shooting at everyone and yet the freedom to carry guns…anywhere…concealed…is not only legal, but encouraged. OK Corral? Regal Cinemas? Can you tell the difference?
Hey…I have my own history. My father was absolutely a racist…and a cop. I grew older learning to, not embrace, but understand his view of the world while developing my own, much different view. His grandfather and great-grandfather both fought in the Civil War…for the North yet…the latter of whom died at Gettysburg. I had a great x-something grandfather who fought in the Revolutionary War and still had the time to leave his slaves to his wife and children. It is still so hard to believe that there was EVER such thing as slavery, that women EVER could not vote, or that I was born not that long after the Germans had carried out their reign of terror. JAPAN attacked US? WTF? Even so, I thought that we - the “leaders of the free world” - were beyond all that. I am not my ancestors, I am not even my father. I like to think I am capable of free thought, wise perspective, continued evolution.
Just as I think I/we had evolved, look at this mess we’re in. Should anyone decide to briefly look up from his cell phone, he’ll find us fighting in unnecessary wars, inequality of freedom and rights, growing racial tension, and a political “aisle” as broad as Donald Trump’s ego. Grown men and a few women allowed into a male club are more concerned with playing with their own…navels….and being elected for the sole purpose of working towards re-election. Is it too much to ask everyone to join us in our evolution? What gives?
Well, I think there are a number of variables working here. But maybe…just maybe…it is Obama’s fault after all! No, they couldn’t prove he wasn’t an American citizen. No, he’s not a Muslim terrorist. I know there are some who still aren’t sure, but they’re probably too busy questioning the myth of dinosaurs and the Holocaust. But…what they seem to be correct about and there is no proof otherwise is that…get read for this…Obama IS, in fact, a black man. Yep…pretty sure.
Imagine that! First, he had the nerve to not only run for president, but be elected. Twice! He brought with him a wife who is classier, more articulate, more likable than any previous first lady of my lifetime. He has two lovely daughters who share their parents’ quiet, graceful style and who have stayed away from this country’s starvation for sensational celebrity bullshit. But wait…there’s more. He also took an economy devastated by his rich, stupid predecessor and revived the robust, growth economy left by his stupid predecessor’s…predecessor. He has made great strides to remove us from stupid’s (x2) wars and is actually preferring diplomacy to boots on the ground. He’s funny. He sings. He dances. He’s unfazed by the blind arrogance of the short arms around him. And yet, unfortunately, he is still black and the better he is, the more hateful they become. We can’t have everything I guess.
When Obama was first elected, republicans (I still refuse to capitalize this word) swore…out loud…really they did…to defeat any initiative our black president might make. They promise to “get the economy moving again” while unemployment is way down, the deficit is way down, and even the rich still get richer. They have no original ideas, but they’re sure as hell not going to let Obama be recognized for the most civilized eight years in the last century.
The ugliest and most unfortunate outgrowth of this political racism is that it has stirred up so much other hate and prejudice elsewhere. With guns more deadly and available than ever, those who might have otherwise sat in their recliners surrounded by empty beer cans, are taking their seething rage to the streets. Some of them wear uniforms. Some of them have records. Some of them are f#*king nuts. Violence against women seems on the rise too. Michelle’s fault maybe? An order of protection has become nothing other than an engraved invitation for escalation and murder. What a mess. Just as transgender Olympic heroes and “real” wives of some backwards county become the darlings of Twitter twits, our country is floating backwards like a nation of blindfolded lemmings.
It’s just my theory that all of this…okay, much of it…can be traced back to Obama. At least he’s a male. But he doesn’t have that presidential, coiffed-hair, slick, WHITE look of a real president. He doesn’t have the grin of Alfred E. Newman. He doesn’t have road kill on his head. He’s not named Bush.
And so, the nation becomes divided more than other between the evolved and the not-evolved. Success and decency become the roots of either admiration or resentment. And, along with this divide, comes a continental drift carrying advocates for other important issues further apart.
Wouldn’t it be nice if the NRA and their republican puppets agree that we can still have the right to bear arms (I would prefer arming bears) and still filter out those who have not shown the capacity for good judgement?
Wouldn’t it be nice for us to tax the wealthy and still leave them a few dollars to use for…making more dollars? Perhaps we could compete with the rest of the world if we had the money for infrastructure, cyber sophistication, space weaponry, and still help those Americans who are less fortunate?
Wouldn’t it be nice for pro-life and pr0-choice folks to agree that abortion is simply an awful solution while working together to prevent unwanted pregnancy?
Wouldn’t it be nice for parents and school administrations to stop blaming teachers and begin to make “screen time” contingent upon hard work, good grades, and respect?
Wouldn’t it be nice if women made the same pay (can’t believe I’m still saying this) as men and that employers could pay a decent wage?
Wouldn’t it be nice. Communication. We therapists talk about it all the time. Relationships just deteriorate when there isn’t enough constructive communication. Responsibility. Progress breaks down when blaming overrides any sincere attempt to accept personal responsibility. Compromise. The more polarized people…factions…become, the less compromise, responsibility, and communication there will be.
And this is where we are today. Our country (much of it anyway) and the world celebrated gleefully when we elected our first black president. For seven years, he has done nothing but be everything we hoped he would be. He has the respect of every rational, hopeful, evolved American for not just what he has done, but for who he is. Damn him.
