In two seconds, a photon of light travels over 372,000 miles.
In two seconds, a heart at its resting rate will have beat 2-3 times.
In two seconds, the worlds fastest computer performs 67,720 trillion calculations.
In two seconds, an innocent Black boy died.
His name was Tamir Rice. He was all of twelve-years-old. He lived in Cleveland and was out playing in a park with his sister and friends on a cool November day in 2014, carrying around a fake pistol, in the way most kids do. Or did.
Growing up, I can remember boys playing "War" or "Cops and Robbers" or "Cowboys and Indians" - back before we knew better - running around yards, and parks, and neighborhoods, brandishing toy pistols or rifles, or even long tree branches, playing with reckless abandon.
Tamir was no doubt doing something similar. He was young, he was having fun... and then he was dead.
Someone called 9-1-1. They reported someone running around with a gun. They made offhand remarks that it might be a fake gun. That it might be a kid. So weak were these remarks, the police dispatcher saw no need to mention them in the radio call to officers.
What happened next is on video for all the world to see. You can look it up yourself, measure the time from the moment police arrived at the park to the time of Tamir's death.
Two seconds.
Many things happen quickly in the span of two seconds, if you're a ray of light, or a computer, or even a heart. What shouldn't happen in the span of two seconds is the death of an innocent child at the hands of a person sworn to protect him and all the all other citizens of Cleveland. Two seconds is not enough time to size up a situation. Two seconds is not enough time to make the crucial decision about what action to take. Two seconds is not enough time to prepare for what may come.
It is enough time to kill an innocent boy if you have it in your mind to do it.
The officer rolled up on the scene, threw open his door, and fired, all in a span of two seconds. No thought, no analysis, no attempt to warn the subject of his machinations to drop the weapon. Car, door, shots, death.
The only way it took so little time for these actions to be accomplished was if there had been forethought about them. The officer took the report of a person possibly brandishing a weapon - from which no shots had been fired - and used that as the fuel to play "hero" in his head. He would stop this shooter before anyone could be harmed. He would save lives.
Instead, he took one.
Thoughtlessly.
Callously.
Cruelly.
Tamir's sister was there. Distraught over his death, the police manhandled her rather than trying to identify why she was distressed. They did not perform even rudimentary first aid on Tamir. If there had been a chance to save him, they did not take it. There he lay, and died.
And now, as if the insult and injury of the senseless murder of a child was not enough, the officers involved will face no charges. Not even for their reckless behavior or failure to render aid. No charges. Because a system, built of interlocking parts that cover each others' backs, will not condemn its own. The police, the District Attorneys, the Judges, they are woven together into a system that grants White people absolution for their crimes and anyone else "justice" in the form of a callous disregard for their life.
A White man shoots up a movie theater, or a Planned Parenthood clinic, or a Black Baptist church, and they walk away, weapons surrendered, shackled, off to meet a justice system that is more than willing to play host to the idea they simply "weren't in their right mind." That same system takes a Black boy with a toy gun, a grown man with an unpurchased rifle in a store, a man trying to bring peace to his neighborhood, a woman pulled over for not signaling, and condemns them to quick or slow death, but death all the same.
If Black people are angry, if they are upset, if they rage at the system, it is because they are allowed. They watch daily as their kind are subject to the depredations of "justice," which so often result in the death of innocents and a lack of contrition by, or accountability for, those who dole out senseless death.
There is no reforming this system. It is diseased, so shot through with privilege and hypocrisy as to be worthless to any but the richest, Whitest citizens. It is a system built on the backs of slaves, powered by tax money of the poor and middle class, and twisted by those with power and wealth to suit their ends. It is filled with people who crave power, who see victory in court as a check-mark in the "win" column, and a handful of believers in true justice overwhelmed by a caseload they cannot keep up with, leading them to short-change defendants by encouraging them to plead guilty to crimes they did not commit, in the name of expediency.
When a system exists that allows the murder of a twelve-year-old boy in a park by law enforcement to go unchallenged, it is time for that system to be torn down.
Showing posts with label murder. Show all posts
Showing posts with label murder. Show all posts
Tuesday, December 29, 2015
Wednesday, July 22, 2015
Simply Murder
By now, you know here name: Sandra Bland.
You know what happened to her: pulled over by a police officer, he proceeded to abuse his authority, and she wound up in jail.
Then she "hung herself."
---
As we reel off the litany of Black people who have lost their lives unfairly and unjustly - Trayvon Martin, Mike Brown, Renisha McBride, Tamir Rice, Tanisha Anderson, John Crawford, Eric Garner, Freddie Gray, and on and on - we should, to use Eric Garner's words, find it difficult to breathe. The constant stream of dead Black bodies being heaped at our feet cannot help but tighten the chest of any decent person. In most, if not all, cases these people were no threat to anyone, not armed, not doing anything that could be construed at the moment of their death as a threat to anyone. Some were murdered in the street, some shot in the back, some killed in their own homes, some in their cars, some running, some standing, some looking for help... and they are ALL DEAD.
DEAD. Killed in the main by law enforcement, with the occasional support of "law-abiding" citizens and racist malcontents, they have been set down in the ground and there have been outcries and protests and meetings and speeches and calls for justice...
...and still they die.
Every day.
Every day, we are greeted with the latest addition to the butcher's bill. Even since Sandra Bland's horrific arrest and subsequent death, there have been more. It is a ceaseless parade of Black people being cut down for no reason, no purpose, no need. These people are just trying to live their lives and being deprived of those lives by a callous, cruel, heartless system of endemic racism that they cannot fight. Punches are thrown, jabs are taken, blows are struck, but at the end of the day, Whiteness is still the law of the land and Blackness is marked for death.
America may remove the chains, it may fight a war, it may pass laws, but all that does nothing to stem the infernal spread of toxic bigotry that envelopes and swallows Black life at a breakneck pace. Black people, ancestors dragged from their African homes to provide free labor, continue to suffer the depredations of taskmasters who have never known the feel of the lash in their hand. Whiteness is a disease, a despicable malady, that creeps into the souls of many who suffer from it but do not realize they are infected. They see the creeping, inexorable snuffing out of Black life as something that they are not party to, for not once in generations did they or their family own slaves, as if that were the only yardstick by which to measure such galling hatred.
We, the White people, are beneficiaries of a system that was built by the sweat, toil, and blood of Black slaves to provide White people comfort, strength, and power. Whatever strides have been made, whatever battles fought, whatever ink dried, that system lives and we benefit from it still. It is not torn down, rings and all, but stands in silent reproach of those who seek to surmount it, to collapse it, to bring White masters down to the level of everyone else, to take their rightful place in American life as free and equal citizens. No sound is made as its tentacles creep out from hidden dens to strangle and snuff out Black hope. Even a Black President cannot beat it down from the seat at the heart of that power.
No matter the circumstances, the actual events, of Sandra Bland's death, we mark it murder, wicked and foul. She was Black, she was strong, she knew her rights, and it did her no good, for the White power would not recognize her simple humanity or rights. Automatically, without thought, she was reduced in the eyes of a law enforcement officer who saw her challenges as weapons as potent as knives and guns. He stepped out of the guise of peace keeper and into the well-worn suit of slave master, and proceeded to attack her as if she were no more than an animal.
Our nation may well burn, consumed in a fire set by our recalcitrant need to maintain a death grip on a past that has no purpose or place in the 21st Century. If we suffer such self-immolation, it will be well-deserved, for allowing ignorance and bigotry to flourish in a time of knowledge is a crime that only a society may be asked to pay for in its own blood. We may weep at the destruction, but as the flames lick us, we should remember well that our hands could have put out the fire, if only we had reached down to our Black brethren and brought them up to their rightful place as equals. There is yet time, but Sandra Bland is the first wisp of smoke, a signal of the fire that waits to rage among us.
You know what happened to her: pulled over by a police officer, he proceeded to abuse his authority, and she wound up in jail.
Then she "hung herself."
---
As we reel off the litany of Black people who have lost their lives unfairly and unjustly - Trayvon Martin, Mike Brown, Renisha McBride, Tamir Rice, Tanisha Anderson, John Crawford, Eric Garner, Freddie Gray, and on and on - we should, to use Eric Garner's words, find it difficult to breathe. The constant stream of dead Black bodies being heaped at our feet cannot help but tighten the chest of any decent person. In most, if not all, cases these people were no threat to anyone, not armed, not doing anything that could be construed at the moment of their death as a threat to anyone. Some were murdered in the street, some shot in the back, some killed in their own homes, some in their cars, some running, some standing, some looking for help... and they are ALL DEAD.
DEAD. Killed in the main by law enforcement, with the occasional support of "law-abiding" citizens and racist malcontents, they have been set down in the ground and there have been outcries and protests and meetings and speeches and calls for justice...
...and still they die.
Every day.
Every day, we are greeted with the latest addition to the butcher's bill. Even since Sandra Bland's horrific arrest and subsequent death, there have been more. It is a ceaseless parade of Black people being cut down for no reason, no purpose, no need. These people are just trying to live their lives and being deprived of those lives by a callous, cruel, heartless system of endemic racism that they cannot fight. Punches are thrown, jabs are taken, blows are struck, but at the end of the day, Whiteness is still the law of the land and Blackness is marked for death.
America may remove the chains, it may fight a war, it may pass laws, but all that does nothing to stem the infernal spread of toxic bigotry that envelopes and swallows Black life at a breakneck pace. Black people, ancestors dragged from their African homes to provide free labor, continue to suffer the depredations of taskmasters who have never known the feel of the lash in their hand. Whiteness is a disease, a despicable malady, that creeps into the souls of many who suffer from it but do not realize they are infected. They see the creeping, inexorable snuffing out of Black life as something that they are not party to, for not once in generations did they or their family own slaves, as if that were the only yardstick by which to measure such galling hatred.
We, the White people, are beneficiaries of a system that was built by the sweat, toil, and blood of Black slaves to provide White people comfort, strength, and power. Whatever strides have been made, whatever battles fought, whatever ink dried, that system lives and we benefit from it still. It is not torn down, rings and all, but stands in silent reproach of those who seek to surmount it, to collapse it, to bring White masters down to the level of everyone else, to take their rightful place in American life as free and equal citizens. No sound is made as its tentacles creep out from hidden dens to strangle and snuff out Black hope. Even a Black President cannot beat it down from the seat at the heart of that power.
No matter the circumstances, the actual events, of Sandra Bland's death, we mark it murder, wicked and foul. She was Black, she was strong, she knew her rights, and it did her no good, for the White power would not recognize her simple humanity or rights. Automatically, without thought, she was reduced in the eyes of a law enforcement officer who saw her challenges as weapons as potent as knives and guns. He stepped out of the guise of peace keeper and into the well-worn suit of slave master, and proceeded to attack her as if she were no more than an animal.
Our nation may well burn, consumed in a fire set by our recalcitrant need to maintain a death grip on a past that has no purpose or place in the 21st Century. If we suffer such self-immolation, it will be well-deserved, for allowing ignorance and bigotry to flourish in a time of knowledge is a crime that only a society may be asked to pay for in its own blood. We may weep at the destruction, but as the flames lick us, we should remember well that our hands could have put out the fire, if only we had reached down to our Black brethren and brought them up to their rightful place as equals. There is yet time, but Sandra Bland is the first wisp of smoke, a signal of the fire that waits to rage among us.
Wednesday, April 8, 2015
His Name Was Walter Scott
He was a 50-year-old Black man.
He was pulled over for having a broken tail light on his car.
An officer confronted him. He broke and ran.
And received 8 bullets in the back for it.
From a White police officer.
The whole thing was caught on video.
I won't link to the video. You can find it easily enough. It's sickening. It's repulsive. It's irritating. It's mystifying. It's enraging.
I wrote a lament for Eric Garner (Sons And Daughters Of Rodney King) after there was a video of him being choked to death by a police officer, even though he was doing nothing that could be considered harmful or dangerous. That hearkened back to Rodney King, for like King, Garner's attacker was let off the hook. A Staten Island District Attorney did a slapdash job of presenting a case and a grand jury refused to convict. The only person charged with anything was the man who took the video.
The death of Walter Scott, more brutal and violent than that of Eric Garner, might have been just another source of outrage, protest, condemnation for the Black community and, ultimately, ambivalence by the White community, but the officer involved was arrested and charged with murder. His after action report read like so much bad fiction compared to the reality of the unblinking camera eye. That he felt no compunction to honesty, spinning tissues of obfuscation into the whole cloth of "fearing for his life," points to how "acceptable" we, as a society, have allowed this to become.
These police officers, they are not the Sergeant Joe Fridays of "Dragnet" or the Lennie Briscoes of "Law & Order"; those are fabrications that Hollywood purveys in an effort to secure ratings. These are White men, mainly, who have deep seated veins of casual bigotry running through the valleys of their minds. They see the Black person as automatically the villain, the criminal, the threat. This default value denies the flight and energizes the fight, and the moral circuit breaker that should snap before they brandish a weapon is fused shut, leading to hails of lead and bleeding bodies in the street, often unarmed.
If the circle of White-Officer-on-Black-Person violence and murder is to end, this may be the first crack that breaks the linkage. It may be. Innocent until proven guilty, there is still a trial to be navigated, a jury to be seated, and an array of law enforcement and justice officials to be overcome, all of whom are naturally predisposed to believe the officer if infallible and honest. It makes the landings at the Normandy beaches seem a Sunday stroll through the park.
As Eric Garner taught us, not even the clearest evidence of impropriety can guarantee charges, let alone a guilty verdict. George Zimmerman, not even a police officer, was let off even though there was no solid evidence Trayvon Martin ever posed a threat. For the Justice system to earn it's name back in this case, it will have to set aside all the prejudices and predispositions as to the stalwart trustworthiness of a police officer, and judge his actions as a man, a man emboldened by the shield on his chest to follow a course of action that no one should ever follow. The death of Walter Scott must become a watershed moment, like Selma, if we are ever to disentangle ourselves from the skein of bigotry and racism still clinging tightly to the fabric of America.
He was pulled over for having a broken tail light on his car.
An officer confronted him. He broke and ran.
And received 8 bullets in the back for it.
From a White police officer.
The whole thing was caught on video.
I won't link to the video. You can find it easily enough. It's sickening. It's repulsive. It's irritating. It's mystifying. It's enraging.
I wrote a lament for Eric Garner (Sons And Daughters Of Rodney King) after there was a video of him being choked to death by a police officer, even though he was doing nothing that could be considered harmful or dangerous. That hearkened back to Rodney King, for like King, Garner's attacker was let off the hook. A Staten Island District Attorney did a slapdash job of presenting a case and a grand jury refused to convict. The only person charged with anything was the man who took the video.
The death of Walter Scott, more brutal and violent than that of Eric Garner, might have been just another source of outrage, protest, condemnation for the Black community and, ultimately, ambivalence by the White community, but the officer involved was arrested and charged with murder. His after action report read like so much bad fiction compared to the reality of the unblinking camera eye. That he felt no compunction to honesty, spinning tissues of obfuscation into the whole cloth of "fearing for his life," points to how "acceptable" we, as a society, have allowed this to become.
These police officers, they are not the Sergeant Joe Fridays of "Dragnet" or the Lennie Briscoes of "Law & Order"; those are fabrications that Hollywood purveys in an effort to secure ratings. These are White men, mainly, who have deep seated veins of casual bigotry running through the valleys of their minds. They see the Black person as automatically the villain, the criminal, the threat. This default value denies the flight and energizes the fight, and the moral circuit breaker that should snap before they brandish a weapon is fused shut, leading to hails of lead and bleeding bodies in the street, often unarmed.
If the circle of White-Officer-on-Black-Person violence and murder is to end, this may be the first crack that breaks the linkage. It may be. Innocent until proven guilty, there is still a trial to be navigated, a jury to be seated, and an array of law enforcement and justice officials to be overcome, all of whom are naturally predisposed to believe the officer if infallible and honest. It makes the landings at the Normandy beaches seem a Sunday stroll through the park.
As Eric Garner taught us, not even the clearest evidence of impropriety can guarantee charges, let alone a guilty verdict. George Zimmerman, not even a police officer, was let off even though there was no solid evidence Trayvon Martin ever posed a threat. For the Justice system to earn it's name back in this case, it will have to set aside all the prejudices and predispositions as to the stalwart trustworthiness of a police officer, and judge his actions as a man, a man emboldened by the shield on his chest to follow a course of action that no one should ever follow. The death of Walter Scott must become a watershed moment, like Selma, if we are ever to disentangle ourselves from the skein of bigotry and racism still clinging tightly to the fabric of America.
Saturday, March 10, 2012
Shot In The Dark
His name was Trayvon Martin... was, because the 17-year-old black boy is dead of a gunshot wound.
It was not a drive-by shooting.
It was not a drug deal gone bad.
It was not a "gang-banger" scuffle.
He was shot and killed on his way back to his father's home, in a gated, predominantly-white community in Sanford, Florida, carrying a bag of candy and an iced tea. No weapon. No drugs. No nothing. Just candy and a drink.
He was shot by a member of the neighborhood watch, one 26-year-old white man, George Zimmerman, after Zimmerman had reported a "suspicious person" to the police and was told not to intervene.
Mr. Zimmerman claims "self-defense."
Mr. Zimmerman has been released from police custody. He has not been charged.
It does not take the tremendous powers of deductive reasoning of a Sherlock Holmes to uncover the fundamental truth behind this incident: it need never have happened.
As days come and go, more facts will come to light, perhaps more concrete data will be made available for public consumption, but on the face of it, it does not take much logic to put the simplest parts of this narrative together into a coherent picture. A white man, seeing a young black man, "determined" him to be "suspicious," and took matters into his own hands after being told not to by the authorities.
Mr. Zimmerman was carrying a licensed weapon. He was in a car. He was a white man in a predominantly-white neighborhood. In every respect, in every fashion, he had every advantage on his side.
Trayvon Martin had a drink and some candy.
Hardly a fair fight.
Mr. Zimmerman could have obeyed the police admonition to not get involved. He chose not to. He could have simply driven up to the boy and asked him where he was going, and left it at that. He chose not to. He could have refrained from handling his weapon. He chose not to. He could have stayed in his car until the police arrived. He chose not to.
What choice did Trayvon Martin have? Here was some white guy in a car, following him. All he was doing was walking back to his father's house; what was this guy's problem? Can't somebody walk back to their house?
If you are black, the answer to that question is: no.
On any city street, in just about any part of the nation, if you are a black person, there is an assumption by others, mainly white, that you are up to no good. Your mere presence "suggests" it... well, that, and the color of your skin. Is it any wonder that the majority of those in American prisons are young, black men? What chance does a black man have, when he has a strike against him that he does not deserve?
Apparently, there was a confrontation. The details are sketchy. Several people called police to report hearing the fight... and then the gunshot. Who started it and why is still unclear, but no doubt the white man with the gun -- in contravention of civil authority -- decided to confront the "suspicious" black boy. And the result of that was clear: Trayvon Martin died.
For now, Mr. Zimmerman goes free, but that freedom from restraint by the law does not leave him free from guilt, because this young black man's blood is on his hands. And this stain, this blot, will not be so easily washed away, because there must be a reckoning for this. Justice may be blind, but it is not deaf, and it will not suffer the anguished and outraged cries of a black community hounded and harassed still by those who choose to see them only as a blight on society, nor will it be allowed to ignore the millions of voices of decent Americans of all stripes, raised in anger, at this senseless and brutal killing.
We demand justice for Trayvon Martin and we demand it now!
It was not a drive-by shooting.
It was not a drug deal gone bad.
It was not a "gang-banger" scuffle.
He was shot and killed on his way back to his father's home, in a gated, predominantly-white community in Sanford, Florida, carrying a bag of candy and an iced tea. No weapon. No drugs. No nothing. Just candy and a drink.
He was shot by a member of the neighborhood watch, one 26-year-old white man, George Zimmerman, after Zimmerman had reported a "suspicious person" to the police and was told not to intervene.
Mr. Zimmerman claims "self-defense."
Mr. Zimmerman has been released from police custody. He has not been charged.
It does not take the tremendous powers of deductive reasoning of a Sherlock Holmes to uncover the fundamental truth behind this incident: it need never have happened.
As days come and go, more facts will come to light, perhaps more concrete data will be made available for public consumption, but on the face of it, it does not take much logic to put the simplest parts of this narrative together into a coherent picture. A white man, seeing a young black man, "determined" him to be "suspicious," and took matters into his own hands after being told not to by the authorities.
Mr. Zimmerman was carrying a licensed weapon. He was in a car. He was a white man in a predominantly-white neighborhood. In every respect, in every fashion, he had every advantage on his side.
Trayvon Martin had a drink and some candy.
Hardly a fair fight.
Mr. Zimmerman could have obeyed the police admonition to not get involved. He chose not to. He could have simply driven up to the boy and asked him where he was going, and left it at that. He chose not to. He could have refrained from handling his weapon. He chose not to. He could have stayed in his car until the police arrived. He chose not to.
What choice did Trayvon Martin have? Here was some white guy in a car, following him. All he was doing was walking back to his father's house; what was this guy's problem? Can't somebody walk back to their house?
If you are black, the answer to that question is: no.
On any city street, in just about any part of the nation, if you are a black person, there is an assumption by others, mainly white, that you are up to no good. Your mere presence "suggests" it... well, that, and the color of your skin. Is it any wonder that the majority of those in American prisons are young, black men? What chance does a black man have, when he has a strike against him that he does not deserve?
Apparently, there was a confrontation. The details are sketchy. Several people called police to report hearing the fight... and then the gunshot. Who started it and why is still unclear, but no doubt the white man with the gun -- in contravention of civil authority -- decided to confront the "suspicious" black boy. And the result of that was clear: Trayvon Martin died.
For now, Mr. Zimmerman goes free, but that freedom from restraint by the law does not leave him free from guilt, because this young black man's blood is on his hands. And this stain, this blot, will not be so easily washed away, because there must be a reckoning for this. Justice may be blind, but it is not deaf, and it will not suffer the anguished and outraged cries of a black community hounded and harassed still by those who choose to see them only as a blight on society, nor will it be allowed to ignore the millions of voices of decent Americans of all stripes, raised in anger, at this senseless and brutal killing.
We demand justice for Trayvon Martin and we demand it now!
Tuesday, February 15, 2011
Whose Life Are You Trying To Save?
To say abortion is a contentious issue is to make a pronounced understatement. To say that some people believe with all their heart that a fetus is a fully-formed and functional person from the moment of conception is a given. To say that it is a medical procedure is often glossed over. To say that both sides of the "debate" often cannot see the other's side clearly goes without saying.
What does it say, however, that a state that leans heavily in the direction of conservatism, is willing to codify the killing of an abortion doctor as being perfectly legal?
What does it say, however, that a state that leans heavily in the direction of conservatism, is willing to codify the killing of an abortion doctor as being perfectly legal?
Wednesday, December 8, 2010
Imagine
He would have been seventy this year, no doubt still spry and feisty, still concerned with the ills of the world, doing what he could to change them. Sadly, today, December 8th, we celebrate the 30th anniversary of his death. I speak of none other than John Lennon, a pioneer in music and another proponent of social conscience, felled this day by an assassin's bullet.
There is not much I can say that has not already been said of him and about him. I can only say that his fire still glows within many of us, as we look around at a world still plagued by poverty, disease, cruelty, war, and injustice. He accepted that some would think him a radical, a hippie, a freak, a rabble-rouser, and he was fine with that, choosing to turn his energies to making the world aware of the things that should concern us all, and caring little what anyone thought. It was his vision and his determination, that showed many of us the way, teaching us that you did not have to be a rich and successful music maker to do your part for social change, you only had to care about something, anything, but most of all, you had to care about people.
It is always easier, after the fact, to criticize, critique, and condemn, and many still see the things he did as somehow self-serving, but no man, no person, can be considered perfect, and we all must live with our foibles. His foibles just happened to be on display for the world to see. If he did not always put things tactfully, if he rubbed us the wrong way, if we thought what he said occasionally bordered on the egotistical, at least he got us to listen, and perhaps hear something that would make us think. He never seemed to tire of putting issues before us, dragging them from the dark places where we would prefer they stayed hidden. Unorthodox, maybe, but his words and his music set a tone, which said, in essence, "Look, this thing isn't going to fix itself -- we need to do something about it."
We will never know how much more he would have accomplished, and we can feel only sorrow at the loss of his talent, his passion, and his love. Let us not remember him this day in sorrow; let us, instead, remember the beautiful gifts he left us, the legacy that remains even to this day, and the nourishment he gave our souls. Bless you, John Lennon, wherever you may be, and thank you.
There is not much I can say that has not already been said of him and about him. I can only say that his fire still glows within many of us, as we look around at a world still plagued by poverty, disease, cruelty, war, and injustice. He accepted that some would think him a radical, a hippie, a freak, a rabble-rouser, and he was fine with that, choosing to turn his energies to making the world aware of the things that should concern us all, and caring little what anyone thought. It was his vision and his determination, that showed many of us the way, teaching us that you did not have to be a rich and successful music maker to do your part for social change, you only had to care about something, anything, but most of all, you had to care about people.
It is always easier, after the fact, to criticize, critique, and condemn, and many still see the things he did as somehow self-serving, but no man, no person, can be considered perfect, and we all must live with our foibles. His foibles just happened to be on display for the world to see. If he did not always put things tactfully, if he rubbed us the wrong way, if we thought what he said occasionally bordered on the egotistical, at least he got us to listen, and perhaps hear something that would make us think. He never seemed to tire of putting issues before us, dragging them from the dark places where we would prefer they stayed hidden. Unorthodox, maybe, but his words and his music set a tone, which said, in essence, "Look, this thing isn't going to fix itself -- we need to do something about it."
We will never know how much more he would have accomplished, and we can feel only sorrow at the loss of his talent, his passion, and his love. Let us not remember him this day in sorrow; let us, instead, remember the beautiful gifts he left us, the legacy that remains even to this day, and the nourishment he gave our souls. Bless you, John Lennon, wherever you may be, and thank you.
Monday, June 1, 2009
Four Words
You shall not kill.
Now, you may take those words at face value, and if you do, their intent is pretty obvious. Killing, it would seem, is wrong.
Mind you, there is not a lot of specificity there. Kill what, precisely? Other people? Animals? Microbes?
Without context, as powerful as the words are, we are left to wonder about their true intent. When placed in the context from which they sprang, the Ten Commandments, there is much better clarity. The Ten Commandments were a series of rules to live by, the codifying of life in terms all could understand and recognize. They told you what to do and what not to do to be seen as good in the eyes of the Old Testament God.
And these 4 words makes sense, even out of that context.
Whatever your belief system, there seems to be a fundamental right to be alive. You are here, brought into this world, raised, part of human society, and it seems perfectly natural for you to stay that way. More to the point, given that we are all human in this society, it seems reasonable to assume that if you have the right to be alive, so do your fellow humans. Taken further, it is an unforgivable breach for one human being to deprive another human being of their life, an asset that cannot be restored, once taken.
What seems obvious, right, and logical to one person, or even group of people, does not always translate. Throughout time, it has always been easier to simply deprive others of their life in order to get what you want. Someone has land you want: you kill them. Someone is in love with a woman you desire: you kill them. Your country is in a shambles and those people are to blame: let us kill them. They do not look like we do: kill them. They do not believe what we do.
Kill them.
Miraculously, human society still exists, despite the ever-increasing conflicts we pursue, on the ever-increasing scales we pursue them. And where large portions of human society have not managed to wipe other large portions out, there are the small, daily skirmishes, chalked up to daily survival, or worse, the defense of a "way of life."
You shall not kill.
For all the power of those 4 words, they are easily enough ignored when desired. Even the most devout can find a justification for murdering someone, if they try hard enough. Perhaps it is easy to do, because they know they can ask for absolution, a kind of "get out of jail free card" for the soul. Perhaps they are convinced that it is the hand of God that made them do it, and that places them beyond the grip of mortal, human justice. Perhaps they need no more justification than "I can do it, so I will." They do not fear degradation, retribution, or the judgment of other humans, cocooned in a shell of their belief, as unbreakable as their personal faith.
So, it is easy enough for them to justify their actions to themselves, if no one else. Yet we know, there are those who believe as they do, who see these actions, not as deplorable or reprehensible, but as justified, on some loose moral ground. They are driven by a desire to see everyone believe as they do. They are frustrated that their will is not enforced. They see it as their "right" to make the world in their own image. Reason, appeals to sanity, logic... these do not sway them. Their belief is their sword and their shield, and backed by nothing more, they would trample others who stand in their way, all the while hiding behind the protections granted them by their country.
Death begets death. They who live by the sword, die by the sword.
And those who would take up arms to enforce their point of view, or revel in a blow struck for their beliefs, can rest peacefully in their bed, because nowhere will others who oppose them plan the same fate for them. They will not have to worry about being brutally murdered to prove a point.
Violence is the last refuge of the incompetent.
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