Are We Teaching Hate?

My daughter Jenny has a blog, the Jenny Life. It is good. She is creating a phenomenal history for her children as most of the articles include pictures and a description of activities the family has participated in. I cannot imagine the value to those kids in 20 or 25 years. From time to time she posts an article that gets me thinking, probably far more or deeper than I should. A recent article is titled the exact title of this blog, Are We Teaching Hate? The gist of Jenny's blog is she was concerned that a book that her daughter brought home about MLK might awaken in her mind the fact that Blacks look different than White, Latinos or Asians. There were pictures from the civil rights era showing dogs attacking civil rights marchers, water cannons being turned on protesters and other pictures showing the tenor of the times. I believe Jenny believes that her children don't see Black, Brown, or Yellow. I do not know if and/or when children notice we are different one from another. I never had the opportunity. I grew up in a small town in northern Michigan, we had no TV, at least not until I was twelve years old. News of the world was simply not known to me. So I was naive.

As I moved on I learned. I spent the better part of Friday evenings at college talking with a black librarian named Mr. Scott who took the time to talk about the similarities in our families, black and white not the differences. He told me of the social culture of blacks and that in many ways it was learned just as white people learn their social culture.

I took part in college wide discussions and programs on civil rights and the right of equality. Nigger was a word I thought of from time to time, but it did not come out of my mouth. It is kind of like we learn all those words we associate with prejudice, stereotypes and hate, Kike, Mick, Wop, Dago, Spic, Chink, Zipperhead, Slant eyed, Jap, and on. Dustin Hoffman in a 1974 film titled :Lenny" played Lenny Bruce, the idol of none other than Richard Pryor. In one scene Lenny is playing in a smoke filled club and starts saying, "Are there any Kikes in here, any Niggers, how about some Wops or Mick. Any Spic's." He zeroes in on a black man and his date sitting at a table, and he says again, "How about some Niggers, you a Nigger there?" The Black man is infuriated, humiliated and about ready to pounce when all of a sudden Lenny says, "I wish we would use these words and make them part of our everyday vocabulary so they become acceptable. Perhaps then a black child might not run home from school crying because she was called one of those terrible names."

Point made, point taken.

We all have prejudices. We all have stereotypes. They are taught us by being around our parents, our community, our teachers, and those we grow up with. Do we teach hate, We can.. We can teach it in our homes, we can teach it in our schools, we can teach it in our churches, and we display it in our actions. I think prejudices, stereotypes and differences between people need to be discussed and talked about. I think we need to emphasize that we are truly equal, I can use any other human blood in my body for a transfusion. Race plays no part in that. We can fall in love with people from different races. We owe it to ourselves to understand our prejudices and stereotypes so that when we come up against one we can make a choice. For if we make a decision about a person based on race, color, creed, religion, etc., without thought we fall victim to our prejudices and stereotypes and deny ourselves the opportunity to have a wonderful human experience.

Values are learned close to home and at a young age. Our values change over the years as we grow and mature, but our beginnings are right in front of us.

They finally got to me

I try not to take too much extreme rhetoric to heart. I feel the size of the electorate and the views of our populace tend to moderate extremism. That said, some extreme talk really infuriates me. Two colleagues sent me a copy of a letter this week purported to be written by a Fourth Grade teacher in Missouri. I could barely read the letter without seeing red.

The letter is highly critical of President Obama, which I do not ordinarily mind. However this one derided Obama for bowing to the King of Saudi Arabia, for reaching out to Muslims, for allegedly saying that Americans provided aid to the world and doesn't Europe know how much we help rebuild them after WWII. A letter veiled in so called patriotism was nothing more than an extreme hate letter written by a teacher of our young minds, God help us.

Obviously this woman thinks that because we rebuilt the economies of France, Germany, Italy, but she left out Japan after WWII we should be viewed as some great savior country. The fact is we would not have had the tremendous economic expansion if we had not created overseas markets to take out goods. The real mistake we made was greed. Instead of listening to the people who had fashioned quality standards that made our military superior in WWII we took the attitude of get it out ASAP and damn the consequences so all kinds of quality procedures that had been built into the military procurement methods were abandoned. We produced goods, but even in our own country the quality image of our manufactures became a joke.

In the meantime countries who had long histories of craftsmanship and quality, plus Japan who learned from the Americans who had helped establish the quality procedures during the war listened and learned and eventually took markets away from us. We founded the electronics industry, it went offshore. We founded mass production of automobiles, we allowed offshore competition to make huge inroads into our auto industry until it is on the verge of collapse today. Our position was here, these are goods made by the great and wonderful U.S. Take them, pay us, and bow to our superiority. It didn't take long until they shoved our superiority up our ass.

This woman goes on to criticize Obama for bowing to a Saudi King. It could've been a head nod. Regardless, it seems to me that we need to reach out to someone in the Mideast. I've nodded my head in recognition of someone, even a slight bow is a sign of respect not subordination.

This woman then goes on to say how dare President Obama reach out to Muslims, doesn't he know that this country is founded on the Judeo-Christian ethic. There's an idea. First this country was founded on the principles of independence, independence to choose and act in a manner that we choose. People who came to this country also came to escape religious persecution, which means you have to freedom to practice any religion you choose. Now as to the idea that we were founded on the Judeo-Christian ethic, there a good idea. In the middle ages some of the worst atrocities and most cruel actions were initiated by good Christians trying to liberate Jeruselam. Our J-C Ethic allowed people to go to church on Sunday and bid at auction on slaves on Monday without batting an eye. Our J-C Ethic permited the wholesale slaughter of Native Americans and subjugated them so thoroughly they have not recovered to this day. Some hate crimes are committed by overzealous self-rightous defenders of the faith.

I do not agree with everything that President Obama is advocating. However, I do think it is time we reach out to our enemies. I think it is time to end the boycott of Cuba. I think it is time we actively pursue partnerships with our South American brothers. The economy is now global, our dependence on that global economy is very deep. We need to quit pursuing this holier than thou attitude and pursue friendship and building relationships with others in the world. There is that old saying, "Pride goeth before the Fall." That saying doesn't mean that pride disappears before the fall, it means that first come pride, then comes disaster. We can take pride in materials, pride in our materialism and stick it where the sun don't shine for all I care. I take pride in members of my family, my daughters, but I certainly don't think the sun rises and sets with them. This teacher in Missouri, if she really is a teacher should be fired before she inflicts any more self-rightous propaganda on her students.