I Know What Terror Is... I Am A Black American

I previously published this piece under the title: "On The Matter Of Living And Dying ...It Gets Personal". I am updating it in light of recent tragedies in our society. #Louisiana #Texas #Minnesota #AltonSterling #PhilandoCastile #MicahXaviorJohnson ...etc, etc...



I am a father of black children and grandchildren in this society. I have black brothers and sisters. An enduring fact of my life is that I find myself torn between the angst born of a concern for our safety, and the outrage I experience from witnessing the blatant wickedness of a system of institutionalized injustice. I watch and I listen to the expletives and the explanations that come in the course of the tragedies that this systemic injustice breeds, and I find myself struggling to maintain the moral and cultural equilibrium that I have come to idealize as a function of the hopes I have for a more humane world. The gut-wrenching tension between my hopes and my misgivings are at times very difficult to bear.

Danger is a fact of life. Unfortunate things happen, some of which we have little or no control over. There are bad people of every stripe whose lack of a moral compass wreak havoc in the lives of individuals and communities. In a civilized society we seek through the various agencies of the Law, to curb, if not eliminate, the chaos that bad people cause. The contradiction that plagues us has to do with the fact that some of those entrusted with the duty to maintain order are themselves the agents of chaos. There are poisoners among those who heal. There are arsonists among our firemen. There are murderers and robbers among our police. Some of our elected officials are the scum of the earth. There are perverts among our clergy. In a culture corrupted by these facts... Truth is fiction. This is the unfortunate reality that complicates our quest for civil society. The threats are many and overwhelming, but my main focus here is with the problems involving law-enforcement... Specifically the murderous inclination of some white officers toward black folk.

The murder of our people by officers who have little or no regard for Black Lives must end. The criminals posing in "blue" must come to realize that the filth they represent will no longer be tolerated among us. Their actions are foul... They stink to high heavens. We are well aware of the history that bred these brutes. We are talking about the history of the exploitation and dehumanization of people of color. I am talking about a holocaust that lasted over four hundred years. We are talking about the indelible stain of Slavery and its aftermath. We are talking about Jim Crow and the KKK. We are talking about the Confederacy and Segregation. We are talking about the ignorance that breeds a culture of hate which spawns discrimination and murder. We are talking about white cops finding chicken shit reasons to track and threaten us. We are talking about them shooting us and choking us and lynching us in their jails...and then employing the tactic of "testi-lying" to cover up their crimes. The summary execution of persons whose only crime is living while Black must end. America's aspiration to true greatness will remain unfulfilled while this tragic circumstance persists.

The time for soothing our sorrows with platitudes that were formulated and imposed by our oppressors is past. Our quickness to talk about "forgiveness" is not just theologically deficient, its is culturally and legally perverse. The "Amazing Grace" of God is only meaningful in the context of an active application for forgiveness. True change is a function of repentance. Racists must not have their wickedness quickly expunged by our propensity to reach for a religious balm, so that they can continue to facilitate our victimization. Empty religious supplications are no substitute for necessary justice. A god who watches us being oppressed and killed so that we can marvel at his amazing grace is a joker... and a cruel one at that. I prefer the God who "delivers us out of the house of bondage"... And I know that such a Being has no hands but mine. I prefer the God who demands that sinners repent as a prerequisite for saving their asses... I mean their sinful souls.

The time is now when we must get out of the pews and on to the streets. It is time to make laws that serve Justice. Regulations that permit the indiscriminate use of deadly force that we have witnessed all over the country historically, and that in recent times have elicited the  outcry: Black Lives Matter!', must be removed. Every cop must be required to wear body cameras. All jails must be monitored constantly. Talking back to a police officer is a civil and human right. The mantra of every cop must be to protect and serve, not to dehumanize and destroy. Communities, through their leaders, must become active in qualifying and hiring the men and women who police them. Weeding out those who have no business wearing the badge has always been a challenge... But it must become and remain a priority. It is time to bring the full force of the law to bear against the brute force of the unworthy in our police forces. It is time for us to get involved in our politics with a new vigor. We need to elect Judges and District Attorneys who will prioritize the pursuit of Justice over the financial and political support of police unions.

In the final analysis we all want change. But the Change we need will only come when we end the complacency that results in our non-participation in the political life of our communities and our nation. Our tears will make no difference until they are matched by the profuse sweat that comes from the hard work of acting together to build the kind of society where Peace and Justice are shared values. This requires real activism. It requires that we translate our civic concerns to political decisions at the ballot box. As long as those who victimize us can bet on our continued complacency, as long as we retreat from our duties as activist citizens, as long as we think that our vote and our presence wont make a difference... Until these things change among us .. Our tears will be in vain.

We are talking about matters of life and death. In these matters we do not have the luxury of being indifferent ... I am an African American, I know what terror is. Every time we step out of our dwellings into the spaces where we seek to live out our lives... It becomes personal.

Of Paradise Despised... Poetry For A Day Such As This

Shanty towns ...of heated browns
Blighted spirits weighted down
On bended knees ...to hierarchies
Of powers in conflict that compete for the loyalties of those oppressed
By the hardened heart of wickedness
And their own sense of void...

Wanton wasted brokenness
That looks at life through blood-tainted eyes...
Rancid stench of wickedness...
Dark arresting passions of a sinful nakedness
Raging red... Till death and Hell
Confirm the dreadfull truths ...Of Paradise despised
And lives that bought into a lie...

*** *** *** ***             *** *** *** ***

And when we sorrow for the lives of our sons
Who engage in the violence of their mutual despair
Will our tears yet quench the barren-ness
Of this heated state in which we live...?

And can we stop this crimson rain
This predestined clash of conflicting loyalties
If we replace the shanty towns
With fertile places unconfined...?

*** *** *** ***          *** *** *** ***

And on this rise
From which we survey the woe-begotten aftermath
Of a Megiddo inspired conflagration
We retire to wipe our tears
And find a place to build a house of hope
Through which flows the eternal spring
Of that Love that softens hearts ...Restoring hope
And heals the broken-ness
Of every passionate soul

(From my book...Of Paradise Despised... And lives that bought into a lie)

We Have Seen The Enemy...

The possibilities for the corruption of our communal experiences are ever present. They are as close as every insecurity we harbor about our chances of “making it “ in the world in which we live. They are as real as every prejudice we cultivate about those we have not taken the time and effort to get to know and understand. They are as alive as every hateful impulse cultivated by those who have allowed fear to overshadow the possibilities of our shared humanity. They are as present as every effort we have refused or ignored to take toward our own development and prosperity. As far as the existence of the threats that keep us awake at night are concerned… we have seen the enemy, and it is in many instances… us.

It has become a function of convenient habit, both for individuals and groups, to point the finger at others in our pursuit of the villains responsible for the corruption of our ever shrinking world. The truth, however, may be more clear if we take a moment to examine the influences that are playing a role in our own cultural formation. Chief among these are the blatant violations of our common humanity that we see daily in a culture of injustice that exploits the superficial differences of our human experience. No matter where we come from, or what color our skins are, or what our gender orientation is; we all hurt when we are shot, or burned, or bombed. We all grieve for loved ones caught in the violence we witness all around us almost daily.

Almost reflexively, we point our fingers at others as the main cause of our grief. It is always easier to identify the causes of the dysfunctions we face and the grief that comes with those dysfunctions in the intentions and behaviors of other individuals, or groups, or nations. The time has come when we must face the uncomfortable truth that there is as much of us in them as there are ...them. In our daily experiences we are not just victims... we are also guilty in so many ways of being perpetrators of the culture of injustice that haunts and corrupts our lives as individuals and as communities. The truth of this is most evident in our closest relationships, in our business practices, in the culture of graft and self-aggrandizement that we indulge in at each others expense. Ultimately our world will get better we we become better as individuals.

Our lives and our mutual prosperity matter, and we must evidence that as a constant function of our every behavior. That is as true for every individual as it must be for every group. While we must be vigilant in securing our humanity against the assaults of others, we have as equal a responsibility to develop our own human potentials by every just means available to us. Beyond this, we must guard against our cultural propensity to inflict the harm on others that we do not want to be the victims of ourselves. The Golden Rule must become and remain the standard that we aspire to in our efforts to create peaceful and prosperous communities.

As members of societies evolving toward a greater operation of Justice, we have a sacred duty to be part of the articulation and institution of laws that embody the universal scope of the ancient code that expresses and protects our claims to a common humanity. There can be no justification, religious or otherwise, for our denial of equal treatment to those we perceive to be different. To do so is antithetical to the nurturing of the greater civility that a truly moral community aspires to.

We have no magic wand with which to wave away the sources of our grief. If we did we might find to our own dismay that we ourselves might disappear after that fateful wave. Beyond the rule of more just laws, our world becomes a better place one life at a time. It begins with the courage, with the determination, with our efforts to be better persons for our own benefit... and for the good of each other.

The Nail On Which The Robe Of Justice Hangs

In the absence of a codified and enforced system of values that seeks to guarantee the basic rights of individuals and groups to shared space, and to fair access to the resources in that space, conflict thrives. Whenever the most basic of our human aspirations, the need and the right to survive, is threatened by a disregard for the most fundamental code... to be treated as fellow human beings... we have the most fundamental reason for, and a cause of the violence that is all too often a parent of the insecurity that then arms us for more violence. In the presence and operation of a system of behavior that violates the humanity of others, the us against them mentality thrives.

The code: Do unto others as you would have them do to you... must have universal application in order to be valid. It must not, and cannot make exceptions for skin color, class, national origin, religious belief, gender, physical disability or ability, sexual orientation, or idiosyncrasies of any kind or cause. The prejudices implicit in these various convenient classifications have been prime factors in the victimization of individuals and groups throughout history.

In their efforts to justify the claims that serve their unjust perceptions and behaviors, groups have articulated and appealed to less civilizing, and blatantly inferior statutes. But despite every attempt to sanitize these corruptions of civility, we know beyond the shadow of a doubt that there is no law more complete in its distribution of justice than that which is outlined in the code above... there is a reason we agree that it is the golden rule. In fact this code has been the foundation of every viable system of justice predating the earliest recorded civilizations... prior to Hammurabi, and before Moses. The obvious moral validity of this rule stands out through the present day. It is the nail on which the protective coat called Justice hangs... and must hang.

The engendering and proliferation of the us against them mentality is in its very essence a dynamic that results when a group or individual perceives others as threats to their occupation of communal space, and to their access to the resources in that space. The culture that proceeds from this kind of mentality corrupts the very perception of what community should be, and consequently every single relationship in every unit that makes up community. This expression of a corrupted humanity is the dynamic at work in societies that foster racism, sexism and genderism, and every form of economic and social inequality.

The conflicts that inevitably result from the violations of one's humanity by another have tragic consequences. Us against them as an operating principle in any society leads to violence. It does so because the logical outcome of such a perception of life is a conclusion that declares: Us or them! The angst that this corruption of the possibilities of our human experience stirs is aptly expressed in a speech that then Emperor Haile Selassie of Ethiopia delivered before the United Nations on October 6, 1963:

"... until the philosophy which holds one race superior and another inferior is finally and permanently discredited and abandoned: That until there are no longer first class and second class citizens of any nation; That until the color of a man's skin is of no more significance than the color of his eyes; That until the basic human rights are equally guaranteed to all without regard to race; That until that day, the dream of lasting peace and world citizenship and the rule of international morality will remain but a fleeting illusion, to be pursued but never attained; ... "

The assertions of the late Emperor of Ethiopia are as true then as they are now. They are as applicable to the world in which we now live, a world beset by the threat of terrorism in its every nook and cranny, as they were then to nations facing the existential threat of fascism.

 

Our Shared Values and Objectives

An impressive fact of our common experience is that advances in technology are always combining to have the effect of shrinking our world. There was a time when it took months to physically make contact between various land masses and countries. The journey that once took months now takes a few hours. Email has replaced snail mail and the Pony Express. Wire transfers have made the old methods of moving currency redundant. Telephone has progressed to video phone. In fact we have come so far technologically, that the possibility of actualizing the “beam me up Scotty” phenomenon no longer seems far-fetched.  

We have shrunk both time and space, thus making our world smaller, more accessible, and more connect-able. All these facts have combined to create a reality in which we are now able to affect each other in ways not previously possible. A smaller world brings us closer together. As we become closer, our shared values and our common goals and objectives become more obvious… and so do the things that create conflict between us. 

One outstanding reality of an ever shrinking world is the need for us to learn to share the spaces we occupy, and the resources in those spaces, in ways that do not create and elevate conflict as an inevitability in our communal experience. The creation of conflict is antithetical to the most basic of human instincts… the instinct to survive. This instinct is at the very core, and is an essential part of the foundation, of every wholesome value system we have developed. Ideas about unity in diversity speak to the very essence of the values at the heart of our "village" experience. We have come to know the cliche that it takes a village to raise a child. We must also now acknowledge the reality that we need that same coordinated effort to sustain our corporate possibilities. United, we grow and prosper; divided, we become unviable.

In the long run we rationalize and define our behaviors, both individual and corporate, in accordance with our perceptions of how we should be, and what we must do to thrive in our social environment. The shared values and objectives we have articulated in our communal experience are expressions of such perceptions. The ultimate formulation of these values is codified in the commandment: Do unto others as you would have them do to you. It is our obedience to this code that allows for the possibility of peaceful and functional community. It is our violation of it that creates violence, and the subsequent destruction of community. 

Implicit in this code is a CommonSense born of our common experience. Except for those who suffer the dysfunction of enjoying not only their own pain, but that which they inflict on others; we can agree that it is in the interest of each to look out for the best interest of the other. It seems therefore that our coexistence, as individuals and as communities, must be a function of morally informed shared values, and social objectives that are undergirded by the best interests of everyone. When we discover the wisdom of the golden rule we will avoid the pitfalls of trying to impose our convenient dogmas on each other. This imposition now seems to be a threat to our ability to live together. It won't matter what our fundamentalist beliefs are if we are all dead.

There is no heaven for intolerant haters. If a person says they love God, while he or she hates ... That person is a liar.

Uncovering Pandora's Jar

There was a time when the earth was a vast, largely unexplored, seriously misunderstood place.The world was, for many, a frightening multiverse of reality, unreality, and spectacular fantasies. These perceptions inspired notions of security and insecurity based on fanciful myths about our connectedness, or lack thereof, with each other and the various phenomena around us.

In an unexplored world, the fear of the unknown drove a sense of danger that tended to cripple the possibilities for growth and needed change. Oceans were seen as the home of terrifying monsters. Heaven was above and beyond the vast blue yonder. Hell was below the ground underneath us. There was up and down, and most people were safely unaware of the dynamic outer-ness of our experience in time and space. Our fate was in the hands of the gods who ruled over us like impetuous bastards, more preoccupied with their own vanities than with the needs of their unfortunate subjects. For many in such a world, fear, inspired by a sense of ever-present danger, reigned supreme.

An uncontainable inquisitiveness coupled with an unsuppressable adventurous nature have combined to empower our desire and determination to face down the gods. In this quest we have come to realize that the only real limits to our ability to master and enhance our world are those we place on ourselves through fear and a lack of industry. So much has changed in our world, but the sense of danger that we have come to know so well still lurks.

Danger is real. It wears human and animal faces, and it takes the form of every element in and around us. It lives and moves with us in every facet of life. It is, as we are. In the presence of danger our world either shrinks...or it becomes larger. Facing a perceived threat, we may limit ourselves to the narrowed path forward created by it, or we can look beyond the presumed source of that threat to a more expansive view of our world and the variety of options available to address it. And yes… there are options available to us beyond those reflexively proposed by parasites who have an interest in cultivating the fears of others toward their own ends.

Beyond the “acts of God” over which we have little or no control, and beyond the convenient formulations of vultures who thrive on the tragedies that consume the lives and prospects of multitudes, we have a responsibility to critically examine the causes and sources of many of the threats we all face. This responsibility is all the more critical at a time when terrorism is alive and well among us.

Our ability to overcome the sense of danger that freezes us in our path and severely limits our perceptions and our choices, requires us to avail ourselves of substantial moments of truthfulness. The development of this ability is a function of our openness to the fact that we share some responsibility for the awe-full nature of every threat we confront, or that confronts us. All threats have a subjective component. We are either complicit in their creation, culturally invested in their propagation, or we allow ourselves to be objectified by them out of fear.

In a world where we are intellectually and spiritually drenched in the us against them mentality, we have for the most part ignored the reality of the us in them that more truthfully describes the developments around us that occupy our collective attention. It is this critical omission that results in our stumbling from one unfortunate political and cultural circumstance to the next. When faced with the results of our inability or unwillingness to honestly analyze the factors that make up the critical dilemmas confronting us, we resort to the easy answers that ignore our part in their creation. We want remedies for what ails our world, but in the absence of factual diagnoses of the problems as they are, we are left in a quagmire of superficial, and at times dangerous interventions that either lead nowhere, or that make matters worse. In a time when we must move with caution in our every activity, it behoves us to apply the golden rule in all our interactions... Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.

Muhammad Ali

Once when asked the meaning of his name, he replied... " I am Muhammad Ali, ...  – it means beloved of God, and I insist people use it when people speak to me.” 

These are the words of a man who knew himself in terms of what Life was calling him to be. This was a man who had a deep understanding of what his life should mean in a world that sought to mould him and his character in accordance with its own corrupted myopia. Muhammad Ali was the measure of what a man needed to be in his time.

Born into a world where Injustice created chaos through its double-edged fangs of bigotry and an unjust war, he became a chiseled warrior against every attempt to co-opt him and his many skills for what he rightly saw as a twin evil. His name was meaningful to him, and he would insist with his every breath that he be known as the beloved of God... As a man of Peace... As an angel of light ... As a warrior against every vile instinct that would rise to confront him. His was the indomitable spirit of the cause of Peace.

Muhammad Ali was characteristically uncompromising in his stand against the twin injustices that still persist as corrupting influences in our society and in our world even now. He did not bite his tongue when confronted with the blatant contradictions in a hypocritical society that lies about its real intentions abroad while oppressing those on whose brutalized backs it sought, and still seeks to build wealth for a privileged few at home. He stood against influences that we must to this day be vigilant and uncompromising against. Listen as our champion speaks to us in his own words:

“Why should they ask me to put on a uniform and go 10,000 miles from home and drop bombs and bullets on Brown people in Vietnam while so-called Negro people in Louisville are treated like dogs and denied simple human rights? No I’m not going 10,000 miles from home to help murder and burn another poor nation simply to continue the domination of white slave masters of the darker people the world over. This is the day when such evils must come to an end. I have been warned that to take such a stand would cost me millions of dollars. But I have said it once and I will say it again. The real enemy of my people is here. I will not disgrace my religion, my people or myself by becoming a tool to enslave those who are fighting for their own justice, freedom and equality.… If I thought the war was going to bring freedom and equality to 22 million of my people they wouldn’t have to draft me, I’d join tomorrow. I have nothing to lose by standing up for my beliefs. So I’ll go to jail, so what? We’ve been in jail for 400 years.”

In these words we have the immortalization of a champion of Justice. Muhammad Ali was a true champion. He trained for, and rose to every adversary with the dynamic resilience of an indomitable spirit. Yes, he was the greatest boxing champion of all time, but not just that. He spoke of himself in terms of a certain greatness… A greatness that far transcended his prowess in the squared circle that was the boxing ring. The man had a sense of himself that made him a superior pugilist not just compared to the great boxers of his time, George Foreman and Joe Frazier, but in the greater circle which is Life.

Ralph Waldo Emerson was deeply and meaningfully articulate when he said: “The essence of greatness is the perception that virtue is enough.” Ali was in this very sense a virtuous man. It was his perception that it is enough to be on the side of right that made him exceptional. When asked what lessons today’s athletes can learn from Ali’s life, his friend and confidant Jim Brown responded: “Money is not God, and human dignity is very important...". Yes, in our time, and in our society, we must continue to declare against the idea that money is God… That white is right… That bigotry is insurmountable… That one’s life should be defined by the status quo. Muhammad Ali’s life is a testament to the truth that one moral man in the midst of a multitude of compliant “tools” in an unjust system, is a majority in the sight of a just God.

Muhammad Ali will continue to live in our hearts, in our minds, and through our will to do what is right... no matter what the consequences. We will name ourselves and our children after him... And deservedly so. We will laugh at the expanse of his wit. We will celebrate the vastness of his humanity. We will affirm in our own experiences, the depth of his wisdom and the power of his courage.  We will clothe ourselves in his charismatic virtuousness.

On the third day of June 2016, the physical presence that we knew as the man Muhammad Ali expired. His now frail body could no more contain and express his essence. What we have however in the absence of his body, is the eternal legacy of a life that transcends every physical limit, and a spirit that emboldens us to rise up against every imposed social boundary, and expose their inherent contradictions. His love was unlimited in its expression and in its appeal. His embrace of the human family was universal. With open arms, and strengthened by all he had to face in this life, he invites us to be family… To be one… To be courageously just.

He showed us the path of Love through his wonderful example. We will always love him. His name is Muhammad Ali. It means Beloved of God. And we shall forever call him that whenever we speak of him. And we shall continue to speak of him until ...and beyond that day when the evils of our time are beaten into submission… “Whooped!” , that is.

In the meantime… “Float like a butterfly, sting like a bee…”