"Everything that we see is a shadow cast by that which we do not see." ~ Martin Luther King Jr.
For the last few days, the MSM has been all over the Reverend Jeremiah Wright story. They've exclaimed how radical he is, his long relationship with Barack Obama, and Barack's subsequent Guilt by Association. They dredge up old fears and smears of Barack & Michelle's alleged and demonstrably false "patriotism problems" and decry how terrible was the rhetoric in those 15-20 second sound bites, how angry, divisive and sharp the contrast with a candidate soaring on a platform of hope and inclusion. On the left, ignoring for a second the glee exuding from the most fervent and fevered of Clinton supporters, we hear concern that its fodder for the right wing echo chamber, a clarion call for the 527's come the general, and that it raises serious questions about Barack Obama's judgement, something that has been considered a strength and a recurring theme of the Obama campaign.
And it's all bullshit. We're all just seeing our shadows.
To me, the underlying theme of all of the coverage, of the incessant clamoring of the punditry and the inane questioning of insipid anchors like Anderson Cooper, is the paradigmatic blindness of American culture, and the ultimate failing of today's drive-by media to fulfill it's obligation as servant of the public interest. The fiery rhetoric of Reverend Jeremiah Wright, and more importantly the faux outrage in reaction, is a direct result of the inability of Americans to empathize with or even recognize perspective, and it is the calling of progressives and liberals, and more importantly progressive leaders like Barack Obama, to recreate in this country a new culture of understanding, tolerance, and inclusion; We must teach Americans to see one another again.
In science fiction movies and shows on the TV, the "aliens" are almost always humanoid. It's not just because it's cheaper to put an actor in a rubber mask. It's because it's just about nearly impossible to imagine how a truly alien life form would evolve, how it would move, see, think, communicate, or even what it would look like. The variables are too great, not only in the infinite possiblilities of evolutionary process, but in the environments in which alien life, especially intelligent alien life, might evolve. So, they all look human. It's similiar in how we as humans look at each other. It is very difficult to see things from other perspectives, especially if they're "alien" to what we've known all our lives. I cannot imagine what it is to be a black man in America, or anywhere else in the world, without input and perspective from someone who has. Language is the bridge between each of our very isolated islands of existence. Yet, so is being willing to listen to what the other is saying.
When you are right you cannot be too radical; when you are wrong, you cannot be too conservative. ~ Martin Luther King Jr.
Some look at what Rev. Wright said in those clips with revulsion and horror. They cannot imagine, or refuse to, feeling that way about the country that has given them so much. So immediately those words are written off as radical, as something outside what is acceptable in American society, without considering for a second whether that kind of angry rhetoric just might be justified. The horrors African-Americans have endured in the short history of this country doesn't exactly inspire pride. Growing up while much of the worst of that was still going on has got to instill a little bit of anger and bitterness in those who lived it. Even today, in our supposedly progressive society, the racial disparities in our justice system (especially sentencing), and in poverty don't speak in any way to the fabled greatness of America. When I see some pasty-white over-privileged twit on the TV bemoaning the rhetoric of Rev. Wright as hateful and racist, you have to ask, what did Reverend Wright say that was untrue? Forgetting the language and the tone of what he said, which I agree may be considered divisive and counterproductive to reconciliation, everything he said is something every American should confront and come to grips with. Pretending there isn't a rift in this nation between black and white, rich and poor, gay and straight, conservative and liberal, pretending that the concept of America is and should be the same for each individual, is destructive in its own right, and doesn't solve anything.
This blind side in American perspective has shaped our foreign policy, our financial markets, and our media. This nation was given an opportunity to change all of that after the horrors of 9/11, and as we all know, that opportunity was squandered and twisted and perverted by the greed of the corporate kings and nobles that have been not-so-secretly running our country for the last 30 years. It's the same mantra, the same ROE's, the same politics as usual. Stress our differences, divide the public, depress and marginalize the opposition. Divide and conquer. Keep the vassals pacified in their comfortable little cocoons while you steal their democracy right out from under them.
Barack Obama is different. He recognizes and sees the differences among us. He sees the great rifts between the multi-faceted aspects of American society, but instead of a rhetoric and policies to make those divisions wider, he's finding the language to build bridges. He stresses and finds the things that make us all the same, instead of emphasizing what's not, but he does it without pretending those differences don't exist. I talked earlier how different an alien intelligence would be from our own. If there ever comes a day when first contact is made between two intelligent species, it won't be our differences that we explore in that meeting. It will be what makes us the same. It will be the language of mathematics and physics that will be the foundation of a bridge between two vastly different cultures. It is those kinds of bridges that Barack Obama wishes to build in our society, our politics, and our foreign policy.
Barack Obama's close relationship with Reverend Wright isn't proof that he somehow agrees with the rhetoric of his pastor, but that he's able to reconcile his very different life experience and beliefs with those of a different generation. It shows that "audacity of hope" he learned from his spiritual mentor isn't just a slogan, but a bridge between that which divides us. When we fear people like Jeremiah Wright because his views of America are so different from our own, we're really just fearing the aspects of our society that we can't see. Or that we refuse to. We're jumping at our own shadow, and what I believe Barack Obama brings is a little daylight to shine on those fears, and forces America to confront them.
Yet, not a confrontation wrought with fear, but one filled by hope.
Peace.