America

Hatred-An American Pastime

/ cigarman501 / 4 Comments

“Memo to extreme partisans: If you can’t bring yourselves to love your enemies, can you at least learn to hate your friends?”
― Walter Kirn

To my right leaning friends who read…who read my blog, don’t shoot the messenger because I’m choosing to quote Hillary Rodham Clinton. It is a necessary quote to help make my point. Please read farther than the quote.

“Not every election will be so filled with venom, misinformation, resentments, and outside interference as this one was. Solutions are going to matter again in politics.”

― Hillary Rodham Clinton, What Happened

I am sorry Mrs. Clinton, I disagree. It is easier to fill an election with venom, misinformation, and resentments than to provide solutions. Solutions require thought and tend to be expensive. Outside interference comes free of charge.

Venomous hatred is America’s new spectator sport with misinformation and resentments leading the cheers. No that is not true. Hatred directed at the “other” side has been around for…ever? Hatred is more of a participatory sport than spectator. Misinformation and resentments are dressed like the Dallas Cowboy Cheerleaders with their high kicks aimed at the heads of their opponents.

Hatred is not new; it just happens at light speed with social media with cowards hiding behind their computer screen.

I can’t help but think of abolitionist Charles Sumner being beaten by pro-slavery Preston Brooks in the hallowed halls of the Senate in 1856. Sumner made the mistake of calling out Brooks’ cousin over the Kansas-Nebraska Act. Making it about family honor rather than a squabble over the expansion of slavery, Brooks confronted Sumner in the Senate chamber and almost beat him to death using a thick cane with a golden head.

Bleeding, Sumner managed to stagger up the aisle before collapsing and losing consciousness. Brooks continued to beat the motionless Sumner until his cane broke, at which point he continued to strike Sumner with the remaining piece. While many attempted to come to Sumner’s aid, they were held off at gunpoint.

Brooks was left with a broken cane and Southern sympathizers sent Brooks hundreds of new canes in endorsement of his assault. One was inscribed “Hit him again.” I would call this a breakdown in civil discourse. Sumner was never the same, both physically and emotionally and died of a heart attack in 1874.

I am not immune to feeling hatred. I did want Ted Cruz to throat punch The Donald after Trump insulted Cruz’s wife during a televised debate before the 2016 elections. Cruz being Cruz snuggled up close to The Orange Man instead.

Far beyond throat punching, if you paid attention in US History, one might remember the Hamilton-Burr duel in 1804 which saw Aaron Burr shooting Alexander Hamilton dead. We might end much useless debate today if we allowed our legislators to duel it out…or even “duke it out.” Judging from our love of firearms, many Americans would stand behind this.

Americans like to get a good hate on, we even drum up reasons to hate when none exists. A liberal publication, I know I’m taking a chance with my right leaning friends to quote two liberals, published the opinion of Tom Krattenmaker who described present day hatred as “so thick you can cut it with a knife and eat it with a fork. I’m afraid many of us are finding it a little too tasty.” He was discussing the recent breakdowns in civil discourse.

Hatred has been ingrained throughout the generations of American history and it is easy to point a finger and workup a good loathing for the other side. Hatred is in our genes, and we display our hatred in the strangest manners; Songs about small towns bring out the worst on both sides. Books might make our kids feel bad and should be kept out of their hands. Media darlings who dare to differ from our beliefs need to be boycotted.  Sports teams not singing our National Anthem need to move to China.

Strangest recently, a movie about doll characters dressed in pink…the movie portrayed Ken as not masculine enough according to certain pundits. Do you realize neither Barbi nor Ken dolls have genitalia? The stars? I saw a nude scene involving the female lead. Her female parts seem in good form…and then some.  Everyone is fair game, even people playing dolls.

Since becoming a nation, we have focused hatred on corrupt politicians for as long as corrupt politicians have been around…which is forever. Andrew Jackson ran as the “anti-corruption” candidate in 1824 (Take note Ted, he also fought a duel when someone insulted his wife). President Grant was up to his neck in graft and corruption…not him personally but people associated with him. The entire Election of 1876 was fraught with corruption. No, it ain’t new but closing our eyes to it seems the new norm.

Hatred isn’t limited to politics but could be a product of politics. Going back to colonial times we “hated” the “redskin”, drumming up support to take their land for better use. That was the basis for our hatred as the natives had the audacity to try and stand up to us.

“No dogs or Irishmen allowed” was our reaction to the Potato Famine. Newly freed slaves better not let the sundown catch you in this town. The Chinese, who were building the railroads for a “fish head and a bowl of rice a day,” had their pigtails cut off. Middle and Eastern immigrants were ridiculed during the Industrial Revolution and the Gilded Age. “Japs” “Krauts” and “Wops” were less than endearing terms used during the war years…and after…and before. Even the “Okies” were turned away at the California border as they migrated to get away from “The Dust Bowl.” We are good at using our hatred to eat our own.

A groundswell of anti-foreign hatred became evident with anti-Asian assaults provoked by blaming China for the Covid pandemic. It didn’t matter that many victims had lived their entire lives in the US.

There was also has the anti-Hispanic hatred element, seen in the call for the wall at our southern border and in the fear of an invasion of Latinos following the inauguration of President Joe Biden. That surge was realized but as soon as Title 42 was rescinded, illegal entries encountered at the border dropped by fifty to seventy percent.  Will that continue? Only time will tell.

The “crisis at the border” is not just a political concern but a humanitarian concern. Many on the right who believe in the “crisis at the border” also believe in “The Great Replacement Theory” and don’t seem to care about humanitarian concerns.

Lest I forget, there was a great deal of hatred on display during the January 6th protest, riot, insurrection…or the tour made by peace loving tourists.

It is not just the political right. No one my age should forget the liberal protests and riots of the late Sixties and early Seventies. War protests, civil rights protest, and the 1968 Democratic Convention all turned violent and were fueled by someone’s hatred.

Liberals expressed their hatred by taunting Viet Nam troops returning from the war and bombing or burning symbols of American Imperialism.

The ’67 Detroit riots lasted for five days and forty-three people were killed and over eleven hundred were injured. It also helped to trigger protests across the US that were a part of the “long, hot summer of 1967.”

The Holy Week Uprisings involving several US cities in April of 1968 after the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr.

The Occupy Movement a decade ago, the Portland Riots after the death of George Floyd and others were liberal protests and riots and led to loss of life and damage in cities other than Portland.

Much hate on both sides and these are just a few examples.

A Newsweek poll conducted by Pure Spectrum found that 23 percent of survey respondents said it was “definitely” or “probably” justifiable to engage in violent protest. Among those polled, self-identified liberals were the most likely to say violent protest was ever justified at 28 percent, followed by conservatives at 25 percent. Ideological moderates were the least likely to say violence against the government was ever justifiable at 17 percent. Thankfully, 77 percent disagree.

Yes, Americans welcome a good hate. I am reminded of my college’s football cheer, “Kill em, kill em, we don’t care. We’ve got a graveyard over there” while pointing at the cemetery next to the stadium. Good, clean American fun.

Don Miller writes both fiction and non-fiction. His latest book, a historical novel of the Depression, Thunder Along the Copperhead, among others may be found at https://www.amazon.com/stores/Don-Miller/author/B018IT38GM?ref=ap_rdr&store_ref=ap_rdr&isDramIntegrated=true&shoppingPortalEnabled=true

Black History…American History….

/ cigarman501 / 2 Comments

“Black history is indeed American history, but it is also world history.”
― Angela Y. Davis, Freedom Is a Constant Struggle

In the early days of the Obama years, I first got the dreaded “When are you going to teach white history?” question as soon as Black History Month began, and I discussed what I might be teaching.  We are in the second year of the second administration since and the same people are making the same asinine statements or asking the same asinine questions. 

I will be disgusted because many asinine statements will come from former students, teaching peers, and friends I want to respect but find that I can’t.  We can agree to disagree but not on racism, covert or overt. White is the default, a preselected option. When it is not, we can move on from Black History Month.

I question the motives of folk who comment negatively about Black History Month and wonder if the ghost of George Wallace or Strom Thurmond haunts them. I have seen social memes and comments that have included “When is White America going to have a Month?” “Black History Month is Racist!” “Why do we have to have a Black History Month?”

An answer to the last question, in a perfect world, YOU WOULDN’T have Black History Month. Nor would you have Women’s History Month, in March, a Native American Heritage Month, in November, a Hispanic Heritage Month beginning in the middle September or any of the others that you can take the time to look up. Unfortunately, we are not, nor have we been, living in a perfect world. To quote a former student, “We celebrate white history in all months that don’t begin with F.” I agree with my student and believe any child should be made to feel included.

Examples of it not being a perfect world include protest, verbal and physical, over CRT, kneeling football players, Black Lives Matter, Antifa, and The 1619 Project, a book I am presently reading. Parents are outraged over naked mice in Maus and language that they themselves use when yelling down school board members. Examples of an imperfect world date to when “We hold these to be self-evident, all men are created equal” was written. Our Declaration of Independence and Constitution were both an ideal and a lie and evidence of an imperfect world when they were first penned.

As a retired, high school history teacher I know history books are written from a decidedly European-American point of view…well…at least where I taught, a deeply red, conservative state. A state that almost required D. W. Griffith’s “Birth of a Nation” as required viewing, along with Margaret Mitchell’s “Gone With The Wind” and Walter Raleigh’s “Ivanhoe” as required reading. I find little has changed in the time since I retired as it relates to most non-European-American history.

During a year, Asian-Americans are mentioned a few times.  Transcontinental Railroad, the Chinese Exclusion Act and Gentleman’s Agreement, the Japanese involvement in World War Two and China goes communist, Korea and Vietnam.

Hispanic contributions, a bit more. Spanish colonization, the Mexican-American War, Imperialism, Pancho Villa, and then a jump to NAFTA and the question “Why are they taking our jobs?” Wait, we fixed that one, didn’t we? Since I’ve retired, I’m sure illegal immigration is a topic. Notice, these are all mostly decidedly negative when viewed from a white European point of view and not a celebration at all.

Native Americans are prominent but disappear after Wounded Knee unless you happen to bring them back up in the Sixties with the many social movements. Again, until recently, Custer’s Last Stand was viewed as a glorious massacre, brave men falling to war painted heathens. Damn Redskins stepping on our Manifest Destiny and the only good Indian…! I digress.  The Washington Football Team, formally Redskins and now Commanders, cured all those ills. (Said with sarcasm)

I rarely taught Black history exclusively during Black History Month. I was wrong. I deluded myself into thinking that I taught EVERYONE’S HISTORY ALL YEAR LONG and didn’t need to focus on a Black History Month. It wasn’t until late in my career that I began to assess what I had taught. I’m not happy.

Denmark Vesey, Nat Turner, Harriett Tubman, Fredrick Douglass, W.E.B Dubois versus Booker T. Washington, Rosa Parks, Dr. Martin Luther King and maybe Malcomb X. There were others but most were only related to certain peculiar aspects of African American lives and American history. A decidedly important aspect but besides George Washington Carver and Langston Hughes, there was nothing about other contributions.

Why didn’t I teach other aspects of Black culture and history? Because I hadn’t been taught Black culture and history. During my college days, Black culture and history were after thoughts…not even after thoughts. I grew up in a segregated society that had just begun to transition as I entered college. I did run across an African Studies course as I finished my specialist’s degree thirty years later, but I did not enroll.

Black History Month should be viewed as an opportunity to spotlight contributions by African Americans. It should focus on the less obvious, not just slavery, Jim Crow, and Civil Rights.

Musicians, artists, writers, poets, inventors, explorers, scientists, businesspeople, soldiers, etc. should be spotlighted. It should be an opportunity for us all to learn. As I have learned, Black History is American History and a rich, patriotic history at that.

Three years before my second retirement were teaching “cultural” geography. I loved it. One, I had no end of school testing pressure and could go off on any tangent I desired to go off on. I could be creative and allow creativity from my students. It became about cultural diversity, really teaching everyone’s history and culture, all year long. I would like to think my best efforts as a teacher came during those three years.

A paragraph I wrote in one of my many musings sums up my feelings, “Today I look toward diversity as a smorgasbord of delights. I believe we should just focus on how diversely different people party. How can you be distrustful of people who produce such wonderful food? Or music, or art, or etc….. My life without Latin, Soul, Asian, and Cajun foods would not be life-ending, but life would not be as joyous, especially without a Belgian, Mexican, Jamaican, or German beer, a Mojito, or some Tennessee whiskey to go with it and a Cuban cigar for afterward. We should play some Blues, Reggae, Blue Grass, or a little Zydeco to help the atmosphere along. It is just as easy to focus on the positives about diversity as it is the negatives and again with knowledge comes understanding.”

I am a social liberal swimming in a red sea of conservatism and make no excuses for my beliefs. I don’t believe books should be banned or that CRT is being forced down our children’s throats by liberal teachers who hate America.

I believe that the rights that someone else is given do not take my rights away from me including the right to celebrate Black History Month…or Cinco De Mayo or St. Patrick’s Day for that matter. In fact, I have joined in and by doing so believe I am not only a better American but a better human.

I know my quote by Angela Y. Davis will rankle some folk. Yes, she is a Communist and yes, she was arrested for the crime of murder…and acquitted by an all-white jury I might add. She is also a lesbian and a liberal university professor. Many will discount anything I said because I used her quote. In this case it is about the message not the messenger. Black history is world history.

Don Miller’s Author’s Page may be found at https://www.amazon.com/Don-Miller/e/B018IT38GM?fbclid=IwAR0mzivK_bmnTjG4D9RL1KGMQ4TurZ8y7hrFca8ExoRa_XmkEUStmSylMCc

Tin Soldier

/ cigarman501 / 4 Comments

The grilled chicken thighs and fingerling potato salad are just memories now…even the leftovers.  Later in the day ribs and chicken wings were served at the Bennett Fourth of July fest along with Carol Ann’s killer potato salad.  I’m sure there will be lingering side effects to an evening of eating and drinking what I normally don’t eat or drink.  Still, I almost feel sacrilegious not having pulled pork as a side with the ribs.  Anti-American?  No, just trying to cheat the Grim Reaper a few seconds longer.

Despite the enjoyment of seeing friends, some for the first time since the last Fourth, I would prefer a small gathering with my bride and two blind puppy dogs to be my only concession to the celebration of the Fourth of July.  Very sedate until the crazies above us begin to set off M-80s and Cherry Bombs.  Not very patriotic by some people’s standards.  Typical…or rather than typical, maybe it is simply the new normal for me.  I celebrated my own birthday in the same way.

I’m truly not feeling it.  Not feeling it but certainly thinking about it…it being my patriotism.

I am patriotic and wish my country a happy birthday.  I simply don’t believe everything wrapped in a red, white and blue flag is patriotism.  I’m not blindly patriotic…odd perspective for a guy who grew up during the period of “American Exceptionalism” and the indoctrination I now associate with the Cold War Sixties.  “My Country Right or Wrong”, “The only good Commie is a dead Commie”,  “I’d rather be dead than Red.”  I remember my eighth-grade civics class being equal parts academic and propagandistic …maybe more propaganda than substance as I sit pondering.

I watched a recent news program, not fake news if we can still believe the black and white photographs the program featured.  I had certainly seen them before.  Black and white photographs high lighting certain moments in time…in history…my history.  Some were colorized photos but there was something stark and depressing about the ones in black and white.  The photos triggered memories of the old black and white film clips I saw featured during the CBS Evening News with Walter Cronkite.  “And that’s the way it is…” or was.

John Kennedy standing in front of a map trying to explain where Vietnam was, later his son saluting as his father’s body rolled past.  LBJ looking haggard stating he would not run again.  A photograph of a naked Vietnamese child, Phan Thi Kim Phuc, running from a napalm attack.  Major General Nguyễn Ngọc Loan executing a Viet Cong prisoner after Tet, bodies laying a ditch outside Mai Lai.  Much different photographs from the ones I saw from World War Two.  Different and as I look back, projecting the loss of a certain innocence I wish I could find again.

Growing up I always believed we were the stalwart protectors of what was right and just.  A courageous country wearing white hats or knights in shiny armor.  We were the virtuous and righteous battling the minions of the devil.  Shining a light on the cockroaches of evil and sending them scurrying from sight. Vietnam and Watergate took my innocence and not in a good way.  Bobbi Jo Bedell did that but I doubt either innocence will be returned to me.

Black and white pictures of Richard Nixon, arms raised with fingers veed in victory…later a finger pointed at the camera, “I am not a crook.”  A color shot in front of Marine One, Nixon’s arms raised with fingers veed despite his disgrace.  Like an alcoholic wanting to recover, I hoped we had reached rock bottom.

I feel I’ve witnessed our decline firsthand.  Like my vision, it has taken place in small increments.  My failing eyesight was gradual until sharp lines became fuzzy and my arms became too short to bring the written word in to focus.  I’m not sure if we can make lenses strong enough to correct the vision of our nation.

Declines of civilizations are usually slow and all civilizations decline.  It is inevitable. Some disappear totally. Most don’t disappear due to a cataclysmic event, but rather, they die rotting from the inside.

A rotting social, economic, political system mated with an ineffective and excessive military brought the Roman and French Empires to an end.  It was gradually at first before running downhill like a runaway freight.  They collapsed under their own excesses and attempting to maintain the status quo.

I’ve been witnessed our rot for fifty years and I wonder if we have reached the point of no return.  I certainly believe our white hats are stained and our armor dented and rusty.  We are more concerned about filling our pockets than being the “shining light upon the hill.”

Some reading this will say “We’re still the best country in the world.”  Maybe, but what are we doing to keep ourselves on our lofty pedestal?  Is it a pedestal that exists only in our minds?

We deny science and accept myth.  We politicize religion and use it as a weapon against our fellow man.  We choose partisan politics over the good of the many and create a bogey man and call it socialism.  We create social outcasts with our hatred and more and more enemies with our bombs.  Our greed is more important than the planet we live on.  As a country, we are living on other people’s money and giving it to people who don’t need it…or deserve it.

My biggest worry is our hatred and greed which seems to drive everything else.  I’m reminded of the old Billy Jack movie from the early Sixties.  Not the movie exactly, the theme, “One Tin Soldier Rides Away” by Caste.

As a battle rages over a perceived treasure, the valley people kill the mountain people, who would have given them their treasure had they just asked.

“Now they stood before the treasure

On the mountain dark and red

Turned the stone and looked beneath it

Peace on earth was all it said.”

 

Others will read this and suggest that maybe I should relocate to another country since I hate America so much.  I don’t hate America, I hate what America has become…if it was ever anything else.  To quote James Baldwin,

“I love America more than any other country in this world,

and, exactly for this reason,

I insist on the right to criticize her perpetually.”

Usually, essays have a closing statement which draws everything together and ties a bright red bow around it.  I can’t do that because the story is still being written and the end hasn’t been reached.  What that ending is, is up to us.  We must find common ground or “There won’t be any trumpets blowing Come the judgment day.”

 

Featured Image:  By The Late Mitchell Warren (Author of “The End of the Magical Kingdom” series) http://subversify.com/2010/10/15/who-is-the-one-tin-soldier/

Video:

Don Miller’s author’s page can be found at http://subversify.com/2010/10/15/who-is-the-one-tin-soldier/