“Catch a Wave” by Fred Smith
Dear God, I’ve been intimidated by a bad argument for a long time. Frankly, I’m intimidated by a lot of arguments. There are a lot of times when someone will say something that I find shockingly offensive or inappropriate, but I don’t have a well thought out response to it so I remain silent. Or maybe I don’t want to be confrontational and hurt their feelings–although they didn’t seem to pay much attention to my feelings when they said it in the first place.
In Fred’s blog post that I linked to above, he mentions hearing someone make an argument that is being made in many places around our country and world right now. Social media, frankly, only seems to have made it worse. The quote Fred heard was, “Your community will soon experience the full force of a tsunami of brown, young, unemployed, fertile, sometimes violent, non-English speaking immigrants from the South. It is going to affect every institution and, as it has everywhere else, the economic resources of your city and region.”
I am so tired of this. I’m so tired of the bigotry and hate it implies. I’m tired of the lack of empathy it suggests. I’m tired of the insecurity and fear it develops.
I have a confession. If I ever read a news story about a drug bust or a domestic violence issue, or if I ever read about a shooting somewhere, I one of the first things I look for is to see if I can make out the race of the offender. Were they white? Black? Hispanic? Middle-Eastern? Asian? If they are a minority, will this make people jump on board and accuse all minorities of the same behavior? If they are white, will it make racists stop and think twice about only looking at the crimes of minorities?
With the recent passing of Barbara Bush, there was a hateful woman who had a lot of bad things to say about her. She spouted off on Twitter, her post went viral and she got a lot of push-back. The news picked it up, and then Barbara Bush defenders started accusing “liberals” of being tolerant of this hateful speech. It grew into a national news story. One woman who happens to be a tenured professor at a university was given a platform, and with that she was handed by the right the mantle to carry for all “liberals.” But the truth is she was just one woman with one opinion. She didn’t speak for “liberals” anymore than I speak for moderate conservatives or Christians. At the end of the day, there is no reason I should have ever even known about her or her opinion.
I was riding my bike the other day when I passed by a playground in my town. I saw an Hispanic man, probably in his early 50s, taking pictures of a child who was probably young enough to be his grandchild. There was a young woman there as well. I assumed she was the little girl’s mother. But as I saw this man I thought about the stereotype of the Hispanic man who is unfaithful, drinks too much, and abandons his family. I hoped that racist people might pass by and see that this man represents most of the Hispanic people I know. The problem is, we are still so segregated in our society, most white people don’t personally know Hispanic people so the only thing they know of them is what they see on the news or in the paper–and these people have no business representing an entire race of people.
About 10 years ago, I remember there was a church in Florida that decided it was going to burn a bunch of Qurans. I think it went viral on YouTube. Then the media picked it up and it caused an international incident so serious that the Secretary of Defense at the time called the pastor to implore him to not do it. The disgusting thing about the story, however, was that the church in question consisted of about 25 members. So a fringe, cultish group of people were all of a sudden representing United States Christians to the Muslim world.
But back to Fred’s piece. What I like so much about it is that their group of leaders looked for and embraced the strength all immigrants bring to our American fabric. The chose to respect those who were coming to us and find a way to help them to be successful Americans. They didn’t plan social programs. They embraced and helped them live out the dream that drove them to come to this country in the first place.
Father, all of this is to say that I need to be more willing to take on that argument in real time, jump into the water that I might not have totally explored yet, and spread your love. Sometimes, the attitude in our country makes it feel like it’s midnight in America, but I hope that we can take even that sentiment and turn it into an opportunity to shine our own lights in the dark of night.
In Jesus’ name I pray,
Amen
Emails to God 