In Search of a Voice for Ferguson's America (Revised 12/2/14)

I watch Ferguson, Missouri, from the safety of my suburban home as my television displays a bizarre juxtaposition of incongruent images--a torched police cruiser, tear gas and smoke bombs, a mock display of uplifted hands, and a bright red illuminated banner crossing a major thoroughfare and proclaiming the traditional greetings of the Thanksgiving and Christmas seasons. I am ill at ease.

My discontent is palpable but I don't know how to express it or what to call it. I think it is because the truth is so elusive, that the moment is populated by separate realities, many of them unspoken but defining nonetheless. There are many truths here, and not just because people have different experiences. It is because truth is layered, measured, clipped, and disproportionately applied. And so we flounder around in search of explanations. Their banality become most evident when CNN holds a microphone to someone's face and invites a sound bite. God save us from sound bites.

Some think it is all summed up by watching the looters acting like they're running an early Black Friday sale at the local liquor store. It is so infuriating you want to throw a shoe. And sitting in the cheap seats, like my living room, it is tempting to point out how this is the real problem--people don't get it, human greed takes over, and obedience to the rule of law is the issue that needs to be confronted. But it's not that easy.

Then one can turn to the rational examination of facts. Just read the Grand Jury transcript and everything will become clear. The cop was being attacked by a 300 pound thug with stolen cigars, reminded him of Hulk Hogan, had a demonic look in his eye. Convinced his life was in danger, he pulled a gun for the first time as a police officer on duty. He fired off a multitude of shots in defense of his own life, and a teenage kid lay dead on the street. His blood was inside the police car and on the gun, he wasn't shot in the back, and the disparate recollections of many witnesses finally got sorted, adjusted, and crafted into a reasonably believable narrative. It's sad, unfortunate, even tragic, but there is the answer. No, it's not that easy.

How about the threat of anarchy? Who got the bright idea that the way to protest police brutality was to burn down the neighborhood beauty products store, to loot the automotive parts outlet, or to essentially raze by bats or matches an entire block of commerce in your own town? There's no rhyme or reason; there is only the crazed mob mentality that simmers beneath the surface, nesting within the constellation of injustice, unfairness, and inequality that is the lived-out experience of so many people of color and poverty. It takes just a particular moment, a convergence of circumstances, to ignite and then explode. It may not be the best of reasons. But it is a reason; some might say an excuse. That explains it--the presence of anarchy, or the fear of it. Alas, not that easy.

It has been a lot of years since Martin Luther King climbed to the mountaintop--about 46 of them. The nation of equals he marched for, prayed for, got arrested for, and ultimately died for, has come a long way since 1968. We have an African American President and Attorney-General, previously a Secretary of State. Life has improved for people of color. Few could deny that.

But King's dream is far from fulfillment, even if it has been adopted by many Americans of many ethnic and cultural backgrounds. Nonetheless, the events in Ferguson have reminded us of how urgently this nation needs a prophetic voice that can transform this mess of pottage into poetry.

We watched Missouri's governor bumbling his way around on national television, dashing hopes that he could bring sensitive leadership to the defining moment of his political career. We listened to a prosecutor reading a sanitized bill of particulars without seemingly having a clue about how his matter-of-fact prosecutorial tone would only deepen the pain of a community that needed assurance that he had not just a head but also a heart. We observed an array of officials speaking within their limited scope of authority, but few seemed able to understand where their brick fit in the cathedral under construction.

In the days that followed the non-indictment of a police officer and the subsequent torching of a community people took sides. But it was too late for that--the issues had already left Ferguson. Officer Wilson is no longer a cop, but he will find riches by telling his story to the media. Michael Brown will be grieved by his family forever, but he will soon slip from the collective memory of the nation. The question is what will be done with the remnants? What will happen to the ashes in the street, the shards of glass, the bullets collected from the crime scene, the police cruiser laying on its side, gutted and burned and remembered now as an iconic photo in the news magazines. What will happen to it all? Can redemption ever come from this?

A voice. I think that's what I need, what I think we all need. I don't know where it comes from, although I'm betting against cable TV. I doubt it's to be found among the bevy of minions acting as our Congress these days. They can't agree on the type of paper towel dispenser to be used in the Congressional bathrooms. My disposition would lean toward the churches, but they seem so busy deliberating on whether gays and lesbians are persons of worth along with a variety of other preoccupations.

Is there someone out there without preset agendas, with an ability to listen as well as talk? Is there someone who can clear their throat and speak with conviction and yet with humility about life in these United States of America? Is there someone who can convey a message that resonates with the proud moments of our past while pointing to a future of promise. We need words that sound strangely familiar and yet altogether new. Perhaps something like this:

"Listen, my friends, I have a dream about a journey and I must share it with you because I want to invite you to come with me. In this dream we are all together, climbing a mountain, seeking its summit. In this amazing dream we all understand that each and every one of us is of inestimable worth. There are no exceptions, no human quality that separates a human being from our essential worth. Some think it is a silly pipe dream, that it is too hard, too idealistic. Perhaps. I don't know if I will get to that mountaintop or if any of you will. But this dream is about a journey that is worthy of the human family, The mere effort to fulfill it will make us better, more hopeful, more loving. Surely I am not the only one who has this dream? Will  you join with me and risk some scoffing ridicule that we have embarked on a fool's errand? I don't care. I yearn for that mountaintop. I can't quite see it from here. It is, I am sure, out there somewhere, just out of view, just beyond the horizon. It will be a long journey, I am sure. But, oh my, how important that journey will be, how joyous. Do not look back. Do not let voices of skepticism and dissent turn us away. Take my hand, and the hand of another. Come, let us journey together. Let us live the dream once again."

We need a voice like that--clear, visionary, compelling, gentle, prayerful, and trustworthy. Many of us yearn for such a voice. The message from Ferguson's America is that the need for such a voice is no longer just a wistful hope. It is now an urgent necessity.

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 (This post was published in the early morning on November 26, 2014. During the course of the days that followed some stylistic edits and a few content revisions were made, especially in the last few paragraphs. These changes did not affect the thesis of the original, but hopefully allowed the English language to express those ideas more effectively. It is doubtful that further revisions will be made, however much they may be needed. In any case, the most current version will always be the one published on the GRANTaMUSEd blog. http://www.grantamused.blogspot.com/) 

Obama's Grandmother and Mine

Big Heart
Originally uploaded by Golden Emporium

When I was a young boy growing up in Toronto my grandmother took me to Detroit to see my Aunt Margaret. She lived in a high rise apartment building downtown, one I had not previously visited. While the adults were chatting I began to explore and soon my wanderings took me into the outer hallway. As I walked down the long corridor I looked up and came face to face with a black man--a custodian in the building as it turned out. I gasped and a sudden wave of fear washed over me. I turned and bolted down the hall and into the safety of my aunt's apartment.

There was nothing overt in my upbringing to give me a reason to be fearful of other races. I was never taught to feel negatively toward people of color. The racism I experienced in my family was subtle and cultural. For example, my grandmother would lead us through the playful musical ditty, Eanie Meanie Miney Moe/Catch a Nigger by the Toe/If He Hollers Let Him Go/Eanie Meanie Miney Moe. It never occurred to us that the song was racially charged, nor did it seem wrong when my grandmother referred to a Brazil nut as a "nigger toe."

Later in life, as education and experience began to sensitize me to cultural racism, I was appalled to think that racial references like that were to be found in the heart of my own family. It is because of that family memory that Barack Obama's remarkable speech on racism resonated within me with such power. In responding to the understandable firestorm over the incendiary remarks of his former pastor, Rev. Jeremiah Wright, Obama chose to do more than political damage control. In refusing to fully repudiate the man he described as "like family," Obama found the perfect point of reference in his own grandmother:

I can no more disown him than I can disown the black community. I can no more disown him than I can my white grandmother – a woman who helped raise me, a woman who sacrificed again and again for me, a woman who loves me as much as she loves anything in this world, but a woman who once confessed her fear of black men who passed by her on the street, and who on more than one occasion has uttered racial or ethnic stereotypes that made me cringe.

These people are a part of me. And they are a part of America, this country that I love.

Obama's courageous address is an illustration of why we need to take a chance on this guy. He reportedly labored into the night drafting this speech because he felt it needed to be said. He took a politically risky course because the issues are so important to the nation. Instead of scrambling to minimize political vulnerability Barack Obama chose to lead.

As a man with a black Kenyan father and a white Kansas mother, Obama's cultural roots are a bit more diverse than mine. But we both had a culturally challenged grandmother who loved us and who we continue to love, imperfections aside. Our shared memories become tools for the racial healing so urgently needed in our society. In his speech, Obama has framed the issues eloquently and passionately. He deserves our support.

My grandmother, may she rest in peace, was a Canadian with English and Pennsylvania Dutch bloodlines. I am sure she would be distressed to think her insensitivities would be recalled in this way. What I would explain to her is that personal memories and stories are the slices of life that link us together as human beings. Properly used in the cause of justice the stories become not an embarrassment but a blessing.

Note: The photo at the beginning of this blog is not of my grandmother or Barack Obama's. It was chosen because she looks like a grandmother we could all love.