Protests in America

This is who we are

Not a land of violence and hate

I don’t think any of us can tiptoe around the topic of the protests, what they are doing to disrupt America, and what they mean. So here are a few of my scattered thoughts.

This past week has been a dramatic and intense learning lesson for Jacob. Perhaps because he’s scared (he wouldn’t admit that but then, we all are), perhaps because he never imagined anything like this, he wants to talk about it, explore it. Last night, Fort Worth saw a peaceful protest on the Seventh Street bridge into downtown go violent, and police used tear gas for the first time in this city in decades. Christian and Jacob drove down there on the road safely under the bridge, but Jacob later came and showed me pictures they had taken—what I could principally see was clouds of tear gas floating in the air.

Tonight, Jacob and a buddy wanted to go to Old Neighborhood Grill, just down the street, for burgers. They left a few minutes after seven, with our warnings to be home by eight ringing in their ears. But the grill closed at seven, so that people would be sure to get home. These are the stories those kids will tell their grandkids, but what will their interpretation be? They have no precedent in their memory: I on the other hand remember the night Martin Luther King, Jr., was shot and the riots that followed, and the beating of Rodney King and the burning of Watts. My memory is too full of these things, and I am afraid to hope that this time will be different. Yet it seems different to me, the violence longer lasting and more widespread.

We talked about it last night, and when I said I thought the looting went beyond simple acquisitiveness by poor blacks and was an attempt to create social discord by organized groups, Jacob said tentatively, “I agree with Juju.” Perhaps he’ll see that it is a racial issue, one that’s been simmering too long, but it is also a civil issue, a statement on democracy.

The sitting president spoke briefly on TV tonight. If you know me, you know it’s hard for me to listen to him with an open mind and unbiased ear, but I tried. I really did. I agree with the need to restore order and protect individuals and small businesses, with the lip-service he paid to the genuine protestors and the slight sympathy he showed for George Floyd’s family—he got the name wrong and called him Floyd George. Ah, well.

But when he talks about activating military troops, my hackles go up. And when he blames it all an antifa, I can barely keep from shouting. It’s clearly accepted that outside organized groups are causing much of the continuing disruption, but he has no proof that it’s antifa, a generic name for anti-fascists. He announced he was declaring that a terrorist group—but antifa is the name for a general resistance, not an organized group, so good luck with that. And local leaders, with their feet on the ground and not hiding in a bunker, indicate that much of the trouble comes from white supremacists and from several highly organized groups within that movement. We may never know the truth, but my hunch is that there is some antifa action and a whole lot more neo-Nazi, and at the base, now overshadowed, are the peaceful protestors who simply want to march and chant for  equal justice for all—long overdue in this country.

Will this end racism in this country? Probably not, but perhaps, finally, it is the wake-up call we needed. There is a long road ahead, and true equality won’t happen in my lifetime, but perhaps in Jacob’s.

Is this the end of the trump presidency, as many have suggested. I can only hope. But if it is, it’s a terrible price to pay to free us from an incompetent man who would be a dictator, who fosters hate and incites violence, and to whom 100,000 deaths from COVID-19 apparently mean nothing.

America tonight is in shambles—a pandemic, millions out of work, the economy on the brink of faltering, and riots from coast to coast. No, I don’t believe trump’s prediction that we are on the road to greatness. If we are to move ahead, it will be a long and difficult journey. But I believe, with new leadership, we can do it. I am hopeful.

Eating Humble Pie

We all know the internet is full of faulty information, but I hate being part of that. Having realized that some of my comments were based on incomplete knowledge, I want to set the record straight. So here I go, eating a couple of slices of humble pie.

Until this past week, I had never heard the term “antifa.” In fact, I had to look it up. Even then, I didn’t realize it was an actual movement, loosely organized, apparently without national structure or political connections, but still a movement. Members of Antifa don’t start the fight, but they believe violence must be met with violence, and when white supremacists are violent, Antifa is ready to fight back. Because they are so loosely organized and because communism has so many meanings (an actual party, a belief system of a group, a personal belief, an affiliation with a country, often a willingness to overthrow the current government), I think it is erroneous to call these people “Commies,” but they aren’t peace-loving followers of Gandhi and Martin Luther King, Jr. either. According to reports, statistically they represent much less of a threat than the Neo-Nazis who are better organized, often with ties to a major political party.

I don’t like their methods, and I still think it’s unfair to tar all counter-protestors when so many are passive, many of them with religious motivation, with the communist or anarchist label, but thanks to Steve Munday for educating me so I can be a bit more honest and on target.

If you read my blog, you know I have been opposed to the destruction of Confederate monuments. I have bemoaned the frenzy with which we are trying to destroy or rewrite history, and I have been harsh about the fact that these monuments offend some. That, to my mind, is the past. But friend and fellow author Cindy Bonner suggested that the monuments should be removed to battlefields and cemeteries, where they are more appropriate than in our city parks and streets. I would be all for that, if they are carefully dismantled and transported, under the supervision of some government authority. I believe that was done in New Orleans and perhaps elsewhere. The wanton destruction by a mob is still, to my mind, vandalism and against the law.

I am still opposed to the frenzy that saw Six Flags take down all its flags and replace them with one American flag. That, indeed, is to ignore history, and I hope that in this burst of political correctness we don’t start renaming parks and streets. I think we will regret that in a few years.

All this for some reason reminds me that we consistently choose the military over the intellectual, and maybe we are reaping the fruits of that now. I am reminded of Adlai Stevenson, Jr., once governor of Illinois, UN ambassador, and a failed presidential candidate, unfortunately best known for the hole in the sole of his shoe while he sat on a platform during a political rally. A man of rare intellect, he was soundly defeated by General Dwight D. Eisenhower. Ike holds a special place in the hearts of Americans who remember that far back, but I grew up in a Stevenson household, and I’ve always been aware of the tension between soldier and thinker.

We see that today—violence vs. peaceful protest. Which do you choose?