A Way Forward

One of the things that is difficult about writing is that it is so personal.  An author pours part of himself/herself into every work.  This is especially true when dealing with the kind of stuff I often post.  I have tried to be open and vulnerable and honest in my writings.  This is a risk that I take because I am a teacher at heart.  I always assume that if I’m going through something, there is a good chance a bunch of other people are as well.  If I am driving along and realize that Two Notch Road is jacked up more than usual, I would want others to know so they don’t take that road.  That same consideration applies to my writing: if I can stop others from making my mistakes or help others to free themselves from something - it is my responsibility to raise awareness.  I mean, when I am ranting about LeBron James or my greatest injuries, I clearly am not offering life lessons.  But there is a type of post that anyone who remotely follows me at all will recognize.  This is going to be one of them.  It is highly personal.  If you wonder what is going on with me, then this will be a good resource.  If something stirs in you as you read, cool.  If not, cool.

I’ve been on a winding journey for a little while now.  In college, I studied to become a history teacher.  This is a job that I have never actually held.  I went into church ministry out of college and worked doing that off and on with several changes of roles for about fifteen years.  When Heather went to medical school, I switched to staying home with our kids.  I kept up with ministry for a few years, but eventually I ended up working for Kaplan Test Prep.  I’ve been doing that for almost eight years now.  I have enjoyed my time at KTP.  It has provided me great freedom in helping my family financially while staying at home and helping the kids.  I made some great friends and have been able to do what I love as I taught thousands of students.  I’m not leaving Kaplan, but there has been a change in me recently that needed to be dealt with.

In my last post, I talked some about my personal history and experiences with issues of race.  (I am sure that I will write more about this as we move along.)  For far too long, I was what I call a “casual racist” who would never identify as a racist, but who harbored many prejudiced and racist thoughts and beliefs.  It has taken a long time for that to be broken and torn out of me.  I have read books, heard sermons, talked to friends, prayed a lot.  Things in me shattered as I realized how much sin I harbored.  As I became more aware of the truth of life in America, the truth of what blacks go through on a daily basis, my heart was devastated.  I began to realize what the history that I had learned really showed.  The pain that so many have been forced to suffer through in the name of America’s advancement?  It is hard to even fathom. 

I am a big believer that God will put us in situations in order to prepare us for things later.  While Heather has been going through med training, we have lived in Tallahassee, Columbia, and Houston.  There is something unique about those cities, aside from being major cities in their respective states.  They all have a large percentage of minorities.  Tallahassee and Columbia are state capitals with large percentages of blacks.  My kids go to school in districts where white is the minority.  We live in neighborhoods that are predominantly black.  I grew up in South Florida, where Hispanics were a large portion of the population.  Houston was a wonderfully blended area.  Our city was in the most ethnically diverse county in America.  There my kids were constantly around Asians and Hispanics and blacks.  What this all has done is force me to observe and learn and open my mind and heart.  And I have changed so much.  There was a day, especially in college, when I would have described myself as an arrogant jerk.  I wasn’t nice to other people.  I thought more of myself due to my intelligence.  I judged people constantly.  I was easily devoured by rage and would have explosive episodes.  

On the other side of 45, I hardly recognize that other David.  Now, I aim to be calmer and more helpful.  I embrace those brought across my path.  I try to serve more than elevate myself.  I am quieter and more thoughtful.  I am more humble.  It has taken a lot to get to that point.  It hasn’t been easy; it has actually been quite painful.  But I wouldn’t change a thing.  I prefer this person.  Yes, it makes me more vulnerable and I feel a lot more, which isn’t always a great thing.  But I seemore.  I see those people who I wouldn’t have seen before.  I want to help people who need help.  I am not devoted to intellectual pursuits or pointless arguments.  God has been softening and preparing me for something.  For a long time, I had no idea what it was.  Finally, though, I understand.  

Heather is done with her training and now she has a position in town using her skills to change lives.  My kids are older.  Josiah is going to University of South Carolina.  The others are in 11th and 7th grade.  Two of them can drive.  They don’t need me like they used to.  They can (mostly) function without me.  So what am I going to do?  I want to write, and I have been exploring what that looks like.  But even in those endeavors, I don’t feel fulfilled if I’m not trying to teach or make a difference.  I thought that maybe Kaplan would be a long-term answer, but that really doesn’t seem the right thing.  I’ve considered being a media specialist or a guidance counselor or a college counselor.  Those all have their attractive qualities, but they also bring complications that I do not want to take on.

The recent racial unrest in our country again pulled at my heartstrings.  This is something that has been burning for several years now.  I believe that our country, and the Church, are guilty of harboring a horrible sin.  The sin of racism is too prevalent in our land, from the outspoken white supremacists to the casual racists.  Growing up and living in the South my whole life, I have been inundated with it.  This is a rift that strikes at the very foundations of both America and the Church.  Liberty, which is the founding principle of the USA, is shattered when it comes to black people.  Blacks do not enjoy the same freedoms as whites here.  My 18 year old son can walk around town, drive around town, shop, wear whatever he wants and not have to worry about a thing.  That is not true for the 18 year old black boy down the street.  If you do not realize that, then you are intentionally blinding yourself to reality.  We have seen enough examples of this, but those are just the ones that end tragically and that are caught on tape.  What about the countless daily ones that don’t get covered?  The blacks followed in the grocery store, the black family turned down for a home, the black workers forced to work in unsafe conditions, the black mom who has to feed her children subpar food, the black student who has no chance to go to college, the black man who will be pulled over and threatened in front of his children.  This is the reality of being black in America.  As far as the Church goes, it has staked its identity on the value of life.  Between abortion and euthanasia, the Church has spent a lot of capital on insisting that life is valuable.  I completely agree.  One of my favorite sayings is “you will never lock eyes with someone who doesn’t matter deeply to God.”  Human lives matter; human souls matter more.  It doesn’t matter what color that life is, the soul is the same.  Racism violates everything about that belief.  It states that some lives matter more, some souls matter more.  Sorry, that is not compatible with Christianity.  It is not compatible with the BIble.  It is not compatible with love.  It is not compatible with God.

This is what has been simmering inside of me, waiting for the right moment.  Lately, it has been boiling.  I have tried to figure out what I can do to make a difference.  How can I use my position in this world as a white male Christian to change this putrid cancer tearing both our country and Church apart?  I found a guiding verse in a book called Love Kindness by Barry Corey.  Micah 6:8 says, “He has told you, O man, what is good, and what does the Lord require of you but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God.”  Those three things will dictate how I spend the rest of my life.  

DO JUSTICE

I mentioned earlier how I have struggled at times with anger issues.  I was always taught that anger was wrong and should be dismissed altogether.  But through a lot of studying, I finally understood what “righteous anger” was all about.  You know, how Jesus went off in the Temple and then pastors tried to tell us He wasn’t angry.  Yes he was.  He was righteously angry.  Righteous anger, correct anger, is the feeling we get when we see injustice happening.  Jesus looked at the people who were being oppressed and wounded by the very people who were supposed to protect them and He was ANGRY.  He didn’t sin.  But he stood up against the injustice.  He also stood up against the injustice being visited on Samaritans and women and the disabled and lepers and tax collectors and so many others.  THAT is the feeling that I have when I watch another black man shot and killed by police, a child being shot by a rubber bullet, a peaceful crowd being gassed, and old man being shoved onto the pavement.  So my first step is to DO JUSTICE.  How?  I am going to go to Law School.  My goal is to go to the University of South Carolina, because we aren’t moving.  They offer a dual degree: Master of Social Work with a JD (law degree).  I hope to enroll in August 2021.  It will take a few years, but after that I will put that training to good use and fight injustice.  I don’t know what exactly that will look like yet.  I have been meeting with people about options, and I know that it will become clear as I move closer to that point.  It could be working at a college or school district, working with a nonprofit, working with a religious group.  I’m open to whatever it looks like.  I feel having the legitimacy of a law degree will provide me with more opportunities to bring about change than just being a regular dude with a sign.

LOVE KINDNESS

For all of the things that my dad did wrong, one thing he did well (when he wanted) was show kindness to strangers. I remember so clearly him chatting with every worker he passed in Publix.  He would chat up customers in the store.  He would joke with other diners in restaurants.  Sure, he could also be petty and cruel to those same people.  But I loved watching him as he would make friends anywhere.  It obviously made a huge impact on me, because I am the exact same way.  I have a friend at Kaplan who is named Ged.  One time we were working an event and I told him, “The manager at Hot Topic is named Jad.  I think of you every time I’m talking to him.”  His natural response was, “Why in the heck do you know the name of the manager at Hot Topic.”  I said, “We go in there a lot.  The other manager is Greg.  The manager over at Think Geek is Jeff.  His mother in law recently got in an accident and broke her pelvis, so she had to move in with them.  They only have one car.  It makes things tough.”  When I see someone in a Houston Astros clothing item, I say,“Hey, I’m proud of you for wearing that in public.  Has the ban on liking them been lifted?”  Then we talk about the 2017 World Series.  UCF hat?  Oh forget about it.  I’m such a dork with that person.  The other day I was picking up our dog from the vet and the person in front of me in line had the last name Staples.  We weren’t related, but it looked like we were by the time we left.  That is what I think of when I think of kindness.  It is treating people like they matter, because they do.  I’m not perfect at it.  There is one guy that works at our Publix that I try to avoid every time we are there.  I hope to get better.  In the book Love Kindness, the author talks about how kindness is something that is so foreign in our country and churches that it can be seen as offensive - fraternizing with the enemy.  What enemy?  They are people.  We are supposed to love our enemies.  Corey describes it as “hard in the center and soft on the edges.”  You know exactly what you stand for at your center, but you are approachable and willing to receive people who come to you.  You recognize how everybody hurts (cue REM song) and are vulnerable and transparent so they know it is ok.  That is my goal.  I want to be kind to others because, I am quite sure, that it is not something they have experienced often.  The things that go through my mind, the echoes of voices, they are never kind.  It took a long time before I realized God is kind.  That’s pretty sad.  It is about time for people to know what kindness looks like and feels like.  

WALK HUMBLY WITH YOUR GOD

For a long time, I saw my intelligence as something to hang my hat on.  It made me proud.  It made me mean.  But God has a funny way of humbling the proud.  I married someone who is smarter than me.  She has gotten farther and knows more things than I ever could.  Then I had three children who all are probably smarter than me.  Then I started working at a company where most of my coworkers are smarter than me.  It was uncomfortable at first, but now I am fine not thinking I’m the smartest in the room.  There is a lot of pressure when your entire worth hangs on if you can outsmart everyone.  I’m not dumb; it would be insulting to pretend that.  But I’m much more humble about my brain.  I remember when I worked at Apple Store, one of the younger girls there was asking some of our co-workers where they finished in their class.  I’m easily 15 years older than all of them.  They asked me and I said, “I graduated first.”  They were floored.  Then I said, “And now I’m working here and you’re my supervisor.  Trust me, it doesn’t matter at all.”  It’s true.  I am old enough now to know that I don’t know everything.  And that’s okay.  I don’t get into arguments any more with people, trying to prove I’m right.  It doesn’t help.  Especially with the arrival of social media, no one is going to change their mind thanks to my well crafted argument.  I fell into this trap a few years ago on Facebook and got into some squabbles about one of my newfound stances.  It predictably went awry.  You know.  Mean words, assumptions, me being called a Tool of Satan a few times, me shutting my Facebook down.  Good stuff.  That ended up being a good reminder of the whole “walk humbly” point.  I get angry about things I see and hear, but I don’t follow my old tactics any more.  What good is getting in a big fight going to do?  I lose that friendship and nothing changes.  Plus, there have been times in the past where I have stood somewhere and planted a flag and dared all comers.  And now I realize that place was on the wrong side of the fight.  That is a humbling realization.  

So there is my very lengthy story of where I am heading.  It is both exciting and terrifying.  

I am in the process of gathering information.  I’m having good conversations with people to keep educating myself.  I’m reading books and watching movies to learn more.  I’m taking stands where I can.  And I’m trying to be kinder to those around me.  And I’m aiming to remember that I don’t know everything.  After law school, maybe I will.  But not yet.  

Some good verses on how to be a good Christian and person

Micah 6:8

He has told you, O man, what is good, and what does the Lord require of you but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God.

Mark 12:30-31

And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.  The second in this: You shall love your neighbor as yourself.

James 1:27

Religion that is pure and undefined before God, the Father, is this: to visit orphans and widows in their affliction, and to keep oneself unstained from the world.

1 Peter 2:17

Honor everyone. Love the brotherhood.  Fear God.  Honor the emperor.

Focus on the Diagnosis

In college, I had horrendous wrist pain in my left arm.  I thought it was tendonitis, which was something that my doctor seconded.  It was terrible. I had trouble typing or carrying things.  Eventually, I was diagnosed with Keinbach’s Disease, which is where a wrist bone is cut off from blood supply and ultimately dies.  I had to have wrist surgery to have my radius bone shortened to take pressure off of it, thereby stopping the pain.  My wrist was permanently affected in strength and usefulness, but at least it didn’t hurt any more.

Early in our marriage, when we first were having kids, I developed some serious joint pain.  My wrists and hands were weak, and I once again had trouble holding things.  Remembering the problems I had before, I was understandably distressed. I was worried that maybe I had Keinbach’s again - not really understanding that can’t happen.  The pain was really debilitating. I thought it might be Carpal Tunnel, since I used my computer a lot for my job.  I switched to an ergonomic keyboard and mouse.  I had to get a different desk so my wrists were not tilted the wrong way.  I switched chairs to try to help.  The pain was still horrible.  Finally, at a doctor’s appointment my physician was asking me questions about the pain.  I always had joint pain and weird joints, so I wasn’t overly troubled by things hurting. It was the intensity of pain that drew my attention.  But there was a much bigger problem going on.  I had nodes in my elbows.  There was constant pain that moved all over my body.  My doctor ordered blood tests and I found out that I had an advanced case of Rheumatoid Arthritis.  The wrists were just a symptom of the overall disease.  It didn’t matter how many wrist braces I wore; nothing was going to get better until I started dealing with the RA.

I am reminded of this as our country faces yet another challenge in this crazy year 2020.  Except this is not a problem unique to this year.  I am talking about the issue of race in America.  While it has burst into our consciousness again thanks to the repulsive actions surrounding George Floyd, this issue has been woven into our history from the very beginning.  You could argue that the history of America is the history of one group climbing higher by pushing others lower. From soon after the first colonists arrived, people of color found themselves on the receiving end of the insatiable need of whites to dominate everything in their path.  Examining the history of this country - the true history - one should not come away with a favorable picture, something to be proud of.  The more history I learn, the more offended I become.  The more disheartened I am.  I am ashamed of what has happened in the name of establishing America.  While I appreciate living in the Land of Plenty and I have benefitted by being one of those who received that Plenty, I am continually horrified by what has happened to grant me that place and keep me there.

George Floyd’s murder was a despicable act.  It has been the spark for a much needed discussion of race in America.  Much of the anger has been directed towards the police officers involved.  Naturally, the focus also has been magnified to include all police officers. Inevitably, this has led to an overall debate about police brutality, inherent racism in the police force, and even police training.  There are definitely some topics that need to be discussed and changes that need to be made.  However, this singular focus creates potential disaster.  The issue is not police brutality.  Yes, that is a very important issue.  It is something that needs to be talked about in general and regarding race specifically.  But this is also a symptom of something much larger.  Zooming to focus only on the police issue is robbing treatment of the more important disease.  Just like my wrist pain, police treatment of blacks is a symptom of something more insidious, something we must fight.  THAT is the diagnosis.  THAT is where we should be focused.  

I’m not saying to ignore the police situation.  But what I am offering up is that it becomes a too easy distraction.  When police are involved in the discussion, there will always be people who refuse to discuss any further.  The police are a vital element of our society.  There must be a line drawn for “law and order” and a group of people willing to stand there defending that line.  And, like many people retort whenever this discussion arises (as it does far too often), not all cops are bad.  I have dear friends who are police officers and who are married to police officers.  They are good people who are doing the right things.  And most of us can say the same thing.  During the recents protests and inexcusable riots, I have been concerned for these officers as well as the citizens exercising their right to protest.  You can see the problem in this issue, right? We keep swirling around and around, accomplishing nothing.  Meanwhile, the root issue, the disease, goes unhandled.

We MUST do better.  Yes, I want police officers to be held accountable for their actions.  Yes, I want police to be more careful in their dealings with blacks and all people.  Over 7,000 people were killed by officers from 2010-2019.  A disproportionate number of those were black (over 33% despite being 12% of the US population.)  But I don’t want this to become a fight between whose lives matter more - black lives or blue lives.  Even if we completely solve every single institutional issue in the police system, we still will have problems due to the racism that is so deeply scarred into the country.  

This discussion is not a comfortable one.  No one said it should be.  The other day my wife and I were having an argument with one of our children.  Another child was very distressed by this.  He wanted it to just go away.  I tried to explain to him that making the argument disappear was more unhealthy than to actually have it.  People need to be able to talk through things, to express their feelings and opinions, their hurts and disappointments.  The argument ultimately led to a greater understanding in our family, which was a good thing.  We had a goal, though.  We aimed for reconciliation and were able to achieve that.  In America, we need to have a similar approach.  We need to have a goal of reconciling the races.  We need to do whatever we can to heal this shattered land.  There are going to be very painful and awkward conversations.  Seismic shifts in our country need to happen.  Those kind of things never happen easily.  But it is more unhealthy to avoid these discussions than to face the pain.  

Even if it makes you feel uncomfortable, even if you feel angry or offended, there is a fact that needs to be embraced early on in the process.  Black people in this country are not seen as equals.  They never have been.  They are not given equal opportunities.  They are not living on equal footing.  The concept of White Privilege may be troubling to think about, but it is real.  My son can leave our house, drive around, wear whatever he wants.  He will not be harassed or suspected of anything.  He can shop and not be hassled.  My wife and I can go car shopping or look into buying a house with all options presented before us.  The black family down the street from us do not experience life the same way.  Nothing I did led and nothing they did led us to these diverse experiences.  That is the difference between being white and black in this country.  Now, there is a large group of people in this land who take this even further and hate blacks.  White supremacists, outright racists.  The fact that this subsection even still exists is nauseating.  Yet they are here and they have more of a platform than ever.  Dealing with that group is going to require much different tactics.  Beyond them, though, there is the much larger slice of the population who harbor racist thoughts - maybe subconsciously, maybe overtly.  These people harbor thoughts that affect how they see and treat blacks (and all minorities, but we will keep the focus on black/white issues today).  They could believe that blacks are inherently lazier and more violent than whites.  They could believe blacks aren’t smart enough to be quarterbacks, supervisors, head coaches.  They may cross the street to avoid blacks.  They might assume that blacks in the store are using welfare to pay.  They could think that blacks are more likely to use drugs, to get pregnant out of wedlock, to abandon their families.  They might refer to young black men as thugs and young black women as sluts. If they see a black person driving a nice car or wearing jewelry, the thought could pop up about how those things were paid for - or if they even were.  They might swear that blacks want everything handed to them.  Or they may drift closer to the white supremacists, touting the belief that blacks are the descendants of Ham and cursed forever.  Conversely, they may flee those extremes and settle for a more low-key, subtle racism.  “You ever notice how black people…”

I grew up in the South - if you consider Florida the South.  I do.  I was exposed to racism throughout my formative years.  I went to a Christian school where there were a grand total of three black students in my class throughout elementary: Tanisha, Tamara Kay, and Richard.  Once in middle school, I only had Phaedra and/or Ellis in most of my advanced classes.  There was a similar case in high school where I usually would only have some combination of Tasha, Sam, and Ellis in my higher level classes.  That was it.  The way things were districted, blacks were directed into other schools.  So in my school, it wasn’t unusual to see blacks treated differently.  Administrators were more likely to punish black students than whites, and the punishments were usually greater.  Subtle comments would be made by teachers or students. My eighth grade math teacher once told us to write something on our hands.  Then she said, “Well, Phaedra you may need to use white out.”  Everyone had one of those “did that really just happen” moments.  She didn’t say it to Ellis, though, which I pointed out to him.  He said, “She knew better.”  That and the fact she didn’t like Ellis.  Phaedra was one of the sweetest, quietest people ever.  Ellis wasn’t.  He was one of my best friends all through middle and high school, but everyone knew not to mess with Flip.  He stood up for himself and his friends.  My mom was born in Florida, just like me and my kids.  Her parents were from Canada and Pennsylvania, though.  My dad was from Vermont.  People assume racism is worse in the South, but from personal experience I can tell you that isn’t true.  Racist beliefs and comments were just as prevalent in my house as in any other Southern home.  It isn’t based on geography; it is based on the heart.  I learned just about every racist term there is from my father.  When we said he was a bigot, he would respond, “I’m not a bigot; I hate everyone the same.”  Or he would launch into the “it isn’t a stereotype if it is true.”  His comments were so audacious that they were easier to identify and avoid.  My mom’s and her family’s statements were tougher because they came from people who would not be labelled “racist.”  There were many times my mom would have to fix things around the house in a less than professional way.  Like holding the falling tile up in the bathroom by putting contact paper on it.  Or duct taping the drainpipe together.  She would call it “N*****-rigging” it.  I remember in college telling her that was a completely inappropriate term, which she seemed shocked to hear.  So she switched to “jerry-rigging” or “MickeyMousing.”  When I talked to her about dating a black girl, she cautioned me that my father would go nuts.  I already knew that, but I still argued that it wasn’t wrong.  “I don’t personally think it is wrong, but if you married one I would be scared for your children.”  Of course, I had a friend at church in high school who explained how dating blacks was wrong because “cats and dogs don’t get together.”  I was floored because he was one of my best friends and not someone who I would say was racist.  “We aren’t different species!  The correct analogy would be black dogs and white dogs.”  There was a lingo that was used in the world I lived which just became common to me.  Rap and hip-hop music were identified as “jiggaboo” music.  People down the street in “brown town” were called monkeys.  Black babies were called “niglets.” Rants were launched about drooping waistbands, durags, gold teeth and grills, backwards caps.  This isn’t to condemn my family or community.  My mother was one of the most godly women I ever knew.  I loved her deeply and valued what she taught and how she lived her life. However, even in that wonderful lady rested a river of evil thoughts towards a group of people. I want to show that even among “good people” there is a tendency to embrace these beliefs.  That is how deep this cancerous mindset is rooted.

The temptation among Americans is to try to compartmentalize racism to the Civil War or the South.  We desperately want to pretend that it is something of the past, something limited to one region.  But that is NOT TRUE.  We have to accept this to start to understand what we are dealing with.  Racism has been ingrained in every step from the beginning of this nation.  The earliest colonists stole from, murdered, banished the native people already residing in this land.  Slave ships rolled up off the coast in 1619.  The very documents this nation was founded on classified blacks as 3/5 of a person.  The country grew into a world power because it was the only empire-building nation that did not have to pay for labor costs due to slavery (and indentured servitude and mistreating immigrants).  The Civil War was fought over slavery.  (Let’s just concede that point. It isn’t worth fighting on that one thing; there are more than enough other examples.)  For those of you who feel the 1st and 2nd Amendments are endangered by other groups in this country, the 13th, 14th, and 15th amendments were passed to “solve the problem” of racial divide.  But it took one hundred years before the Civil Rights Acts of the 1960 actually gave teeth to these amendments.  Think about that: there were amendments outlawing mistreatment of blacks and other minorities for one hundred years.  Yet there still was the poll tax and the literacy tax and gerrymandering and stripping of voting rights for felons and voter intimidation and moving polling places.  And the sad thing is, those things still exist!  We have been involved in two elections so far since we moved back to South Carolina and both of them moved and shuttered polling places within a week of the election.  Rigging election districts is an even bigger practice now than ever, ensuring a concrete divide between parties.  ELEVEN states still have various bans on ex-felons voting - only half of them in the South.  This is not over.  It isn’t even close.  It isn’t relegated to the South, either.  If you want to have your eyes opened about America’s history with racism, I am going to list some places to go.  Be prepared, because after you look at these things you will never see this country the same again.  And that is a good thing.  Until we fully acknowledge the wickedness that courses through our veins, we will always be guilty of the sin of racism.

• Tears We Cannot Stop: A Sermon to White America by Michael Eric Dyson.  This book will devastate you.  After I read it, it took me weeks to be able to think clearly.  I could argue I’ve never come back, for which I am glad.
• 1491: New Revelations of the Americas Before Columbus by Charles Mann.  It is easy to justify slaughtering an indigenous people if you see them as unintelligent savages.  But that was a construct of the colonizers/explorers/invaders.  You’ll be shocked at what America looked like before the white man arrived.
• New York Time 1619 Project  This investigative project looks at the history of slavery in America on the 400th“anniversary” of its arrival on our shores.  It is brilliantly executed and horrifying.
• The Underground Railroad by Colton Whitehead.  You know those books that are so well written that you keep reading even when you are so disgusted by what is happening that you want to be sick?  This is that book.
• Tulsa Massacre of 1921  I am also including a link to the Wikipedia page on this event, which also tells more on the attacking aircraft during the massacre.  There also are links on the right side of the page with several other events along this line.
• Minneapolis (White) Race Riots   This was an interesting post by Nora McInerny about 1930s era Minneapolis and the way whites drove blacks out.
• Ex-Felon Voting Rights - If you aren’t sure how this applies, I am including several different sources discussing this issue.  Some of them surround Florida’s Amendment 4 in 2018.  The Amendment was passed by nearly a 2 to 1 margin, yet it still has not been put into practice - as evidenced by it is still being debated and hashed out.  Voter disenfranchisement is a racially motivated technique that has been in place since the Civil War.  It has taken many different forms and this is just another one.  It was a Jim Crow era law where states would create a law against loitering, for example, and make that a felony level crime.  That would mean any unemployed black man who was arrested for standing around, since they couldn’t get a job and had nowhere to go, could be banned from voting for life.  The number of people affected by this issue is staggering, and it could ultimately change the 2020 election.
• The Original 33 in Georgia. These were the first 33 blacks serving in the Georgia state legislature.  They were thrown out, after being elected, then brought back in, then permanently ejected.  One-quarter of them were beaten or killed.  The final one left in 1907, after which no blacks served in the legislature for 55 years.  Again, wikipedia to add more info.
• Blacks in Public Office This is almost a microcosm of racial mindsets in this country.  During Reconstruction, blacks ascended to public office.  They were elected to national and state- level positions and filled many governments roles. By 1913, those numbers had plummeted.  The backlash against the South after the Civil War was strong, but in time the segregationists reclaimed political strength and reinstituted their policies.  Woodrow Wilson, elected in 1912, is more known for his involvement in World War I and failed League of Nations.  He had been president of Princeton and Governor of New Jersey.  He has this image of an intellectual, a devout Presbyterian.  Yet, he was the picture of a good man doing nothing and letting evil to arise.  He didn’t personally segregate government offices, but he let each office decide if they wanted to segregate.  He didn’t allow the federal government to help blacks who were assailed as they migrated north to fill industrial jobs.  He spoke out against lynching, but did nothing to outlaw it.  (The repercussions echo even today.)  He allowed Reconstruction to die and whites to reclaim the governments in the South.  

This list is hardly comprehensive, but it is a place to start.  We have to do something.  Anyone who knows me, knows that I am a Christian and that my faith is what guides and defines me.  However, I will be the first to say that the Church(capital C means Church Universal - all Christians; little c means individual church) is failing HORRIBLY in this battle.  The Church should be at the very forefront, demanding social change.  It should be leading the charge, embracing all colors.  Go and read 1 John and see what God teaches about LOVE.  It is what defines being a Christian.  Not judgment, criticism, hate, conservatism.  What part of love is shooting a black man because he was looking at a house?  What part of love is defending a police officer for choking out a suspect?  What part of love is trying to find a justification for why someone was killed?  Go read the story of the Good Samaritan in Luke 10.  I know a lot of you have heard of this story or read it.  But it is a great story for today’s situation.  Here’s my version of the story.  A dude gets jacked up by villains.  He is laying there in a big mess.  A pastor walks by and ignores him.  Actually, he crosses over to the other side to avoid him.  Then another minister walks by and does the same thing.  Then a Samaritan comes up.  Now, the Samaritans were hated by the Jewish people.  It wasn’t over something as minor as skin color.  Long ago, some of the Samaritans had collaborated with the Syrians when they occupied Israel.  Even though they were of the same bloodlines, the people of Samaria were labelled unclean by Jews.  This got so ugly that the Jews destroyed the Samaritan temple and the Samaritans defiled the Jewish temple by leaving bones in it.  It was ugly.  This Samaritan dude comes up and helps the injured Jewish man.  (The big twist in today’s setting is that the beat up man would have been white and the helper would have been black.)  Now, the Samaritan didn’t ask the beat up guy if he deserved the beating.  He didn’t say that he needed to review the video to make sure he didn’t do something first before the bandits jumped him.  I mean, maybe the victim had mouthed off.  Maybe he went through the wrong neighborhood.  Maybe he had a criminal history.  Maybe he didn’t do what the bandits asked him to do right away.  The Samaritan didn’t ask questions; he just helped.  Of course, this isn’t a real story.  Yeah, that’s right.  Jesus made it up.  So it wasn’t just some fluke example of someone doing something nice that made it onto YouTube.  “Samaritan finds Jewish mugging victim. You’ll never guess what happens next!”  It was something that Jesus - the person that Christians value the most - made up as an example of how we should act to each other.  We should take care of even our worst enemies.  How much mores should this apply to people who merely have a different amount of pigment?  

Now the religious leaders of that time got irate at the story.  That kind of angry response from religious people has been a theme throughout history, actually.  Just a cursory glance at US History will demonstrate that those who embrace Christianity have usually been the worst at racial understanding.  And, unfortunately, that is still the situation today.  Christianity has become so tangled up in politics that churchgoers find themselves forming logical contortions to defend their support of Donald Trump in the face of overtly racist behavior and statements.  “He is holding up a Bible in front of a church! What a righteous man!”  Don’t be fooled!  That photo-op is not indicative of what that man believes.  The tear-gassing of peaceful protesters so he could take that picture is where he stands.  His flirting and defending of white-supremacists is where he stands.  He calls whites demanding the right to shop and not wear masks and racists violently protesting in Virginia “fine Americans.”  He calls blacks protesting “thugs.”  The 70+ year old man shoved by the cops intentionally fell.  (Reminds me of the police case down in Riviera Beach when I was a kid when the wife claimed her husband fell onto the knife…. over 20 times.)  He is master at muddying the waters.  His behavior is not unlike how focusing on the police minimizes and damages the racism issue.  He says protestors aren’t patriotic.  They are dishonoring the country and the flag.  He says to get those sons of bitches off of the football field.  Let me be perfectly clear: patriotism is not blindly agreeing with everything a country does.  A person does not betray his or her country by protesting inappropriate, illegal, and inexcusable actions that country is doing. I am not dishonoring my father’s military service by calling people to change the way that minorities are treated.  A true patriot demand that the country lives up to the sacrifices made over the decades by its soldiers and citizens.  America is NOT proving it deserves that blood that was shed.  This country that promises freedom, liberty, and happiness to its citizens need to adjust its mindset and behavior to heal this rift, to make things right, to reconcile the races.  I believe this is the most important issue in the nation right now.  I believe it is the most important issue that faces the Church right now.  It is a crack in the foundation of both that is threatening to rip both apart.  The diagnosis has been handed down; we need to work on treatment.  Now.