| In honor and remembrance of those lost today |
I don't know what is wrong with this country. It's disheartening to see ourselves so hell-bent on our own destruction. With the recent shootings in Aurora and now at a Sikh temple in Wisconsin, I'm starting to wonder what we stand for as a country.
It's easy to talk in high terms about society and what we should and shouldn't do, promote, condone, or condemn. But let's take a much more personal view of this. I want everyone that is reading this to try to be introspective for just a second.
A. We, myself included, LOVE to post bullshit on Facebook that makes us seem deep or enlightened. We quote the Dalai Lama, random gurus, Lao Zi(Tze), Confucius, and every other philosopher that our freshmen seminar taught us about. We LOVE the idea of the universal idea of love. But have we thought about hate.
Why is it that we refuse, on both an individual level and as a society, to acknowledge that hate is also universal. One person's hate is no more hateful than any other persons. We like to qualify hate to our own interests, and it isn't just conservatives or evangelicals, but liberals as well. For example, this recent shooting at the Sikh temple. When it turns out to be a fanatic white guy with evangelical Christian beliefs, going to shoot some rag heads, singing "Onward Christian Soldiers", 90% of white Americans will give his Christian beliefs a pass. He will be classified as a deranged man who had violent and perverse tendencies, and at the end of the day, lost his shit. Though this will be classified, as it should, as an "domestic terrorist-like act", I questions this:
1. Will his family be subject to scrutiny in the way that Muslim "extremists" families are? Case in point Secretary Clinton's Assistant Chief of Staff Huma Abedin?
2. If he turns out to be a Christian extremist, will we start questioning the basis of Christianity as generally violent, just like so many commentators have said about Islam? Case in point "Do not think that I have come to bring peace to the earth; I have not come to bring peace but a sword." Matthew 10:34
3. Will his affiliation with other groups mean that those groups are guilty by association? Case in point, http://mediamatters.org/research/2010/11/12/fox-continues-its-guilt-by-association-smears-o/173261
We wish to qualify all of our hatred, as if hatred born from causes or belief that we believe in or are sympathetic to, are some how different that other hate. We believe that those people are somehow not representative of the flaws of that particular set of beliefs. THEY are just outliars, and WE do not believe in hate. Sorry, folks, hate is universal, and I wish we condemned hate in all of it's forms. Just as we embrace love in all of its forms.
B. Our collective vanity will doom us all. We, as a nation, focus on the wrong things. On Yahoo, the top story is the Olympics and Republicans calling Harry Reid a "dirty liar". Does that sell more than 7 people, including a cop, getting shot? Do we care more about what the Kardashian sisters are wearing as opposed to what the conditions are for our troops in Afghanistan? Why is it that we will not take sometime out of our day to learn about other cultures, to prevent the type of misunderstanding that lead to the Sikh temple shooting and NOT take that time posting pictures of food we're are about to eat or our pets? It is so very angering when you see people hating on a culture believing that it is another culture.
Bottom line is, what is happening to us?
When did we get so violent?
Why are we contently trying to portray a rosier image of society than what it really is?
When did we stop caring about other peoples plight and suffering?
I wish I could end this with a happy note about how we can change, and come together and fight hatred, but that would be a lie. I don't know what this will lead to nor do I believe that it will get better. Let's just not try to kid ourselves into thinking that going down this path, we will be ok.
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