Ok—I am
going to say it! I am so tired of the Obama bashing and bashing by pundits and left right bashing each other.Even friends and families cannot have in depth real thoughtful inquiring discussions.
Was I mistaken in hearing
that people elected Obama to be king?-- to fix everything? And to do so in his
first term? Then… why, I keep asking, have the left, the right, and even the
middle, failed to act as a wise and enlightened citizenry? Why do we choose to be so polarized that we can no longer calmly and respectfully engage in dialogue with each other?
I listened to
Obama’s inaugural speech yesterday. I never thought I would hear a president--in an inaugural speech-- so eloquently cite the history of and struggle for equal rights – and call for the nation—as in WE (all of us!) to work together to solve the problems before us.... to extend EQUAL rights
to women ( as in having control over their
lives and bodies) and to our gay brothers and sisters. Never would I have imagined a
President signing a Don’t Ask Don’t Tell Repeal Act, bringing to an end a
discriminatory policy that " stood in stark contrast to our shared values
of unity and equality."
“For we are
not a nation that says, ‘don’t ask, don’t tell.’ We are a nation that says, ‘Out
of many, we are one.’ We are a nation that welcomes the service of every
patriot. We are a nation that believes that all men and women are created
equal. Those are the ideals that generations have fought for. Those are
the ideals that we uphold today. And now, it is my honor to sign this
bill into law.”
--
President Barack Obama, December 22, 2010.
Never would
I have thought that I would witness a president reference Selma, Seneca Falls
and Stonewall in making a case for equality in an Inaugural speech!
“We the
people declare today that the most evident of truth that all of us are created
equal -- is the star that guides us still; just as it guided our forebears
through Seneca Falls and Selma and Stonewall; just as it guided all those men
and women, sung and unsung, who left footprints along this great mall, to hear
a preacher say that we cannot walk alone; to hear a King proclaim that our
individual freedom is inextricably bound to the freedom of every soul on Earth.”-
President Barack Obama, January 21, 2013.
Now how do
we stop poverty or the scourge of AIDS? How to we stop investment corporations from
raising rents on housing and small business? How do we stop feuds between
families or neighbors, and end the battles between gangs. Let’s not forget to
mention the fighting over blood diamonds, and natural resources or over borders. How about proliferation
of chemicals and pesticides. Then there is the war on workers and the war against
a woman’s right to choose. How do we stop Global Warming? Religious wars, ethnic feuds, sexism, racism,
homophobia, ethnocentrism , human speciesism and so on.
And what about all our pollution on land, sea and in the air including our space junk orbiting around this precious planet and plastic garbage creating islands in our oceans.
Life is complicated and messy and so are all people
who populate this world.
Obama’s challenges in a war culture? I suggest reading ‘A decade
of war is now ending’ by Jonathan Bernstein (Washington Post, January 21, 2013)
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/plum-line/wp/2013/01/21/a-decade-of-war-is-now-ending/
And, one
more thing. I look to the movements in our more recent history-- as in the ending of Slavery (do see
the Film Lincoln) to the amazing determination of the Suffragettes and the
struggle for Civil Rights, or the fall of Apartheid, and the peaceful toppling of the one-party brutal communist regime by Solidarność, the Polish Trade Union Movement of
men and women-- and the disability rights movement. In every case there was the stepping up together to stand together for a
common and just cause-- of people
working together for something better
and a higher purpose where all will benefit.
I like to refer to the article written by Jeff Conklin, Ph.D., Wicked problems
and Social Complexity.Conklin writes, “The
Holy Grail of effective collaboration – is in creating shared understanding about
the problem, and shared commitment to the possible solutions. Shared
understanding does not mean we necessarily agree on the problem, although that
is a good thing when it happens. Shared understanding means that the
stakeholders understand each other’s positions well enough to have intelligent
dialogue about the different interpretations of the problem, and to exercise
collective intelligence about how to solve it. Because of social complexity,
solving a wicked problem is fundamentally a social process.”
So how do we
get there without bashing each other? We can’t blame any president for the unabashed
incivility and the disempowering plethora of tropes and meaningless rhetoric that
tears down and that is winding its way through our Main Streets, up to the Halls of Congress and found on countless social media sites and on emotionally charged talk radio programs. Knee jerk emotionalism,
fear based conspiracy theories, setting up home arsenals and harboring the ills
of the past is not a panacea either. Climate Change will – as we are seeing-- probably WILL
whip our behinds first!
President Obama in his Inauguration Speech at the very least raised the
bar of integrity and the call to take action to care about each other--- for all of us --.
How we get there is not just up to him. Maybe it is time to get out of our own way, set aside our prejudices,
fears and self-constructed entitlements, self interests,
and act to unselfishly to think
of and help others.
John Lennon - "You may say I'm a dreamer, but I'm not the only one. I hope someday you'll join us. And the world will live as
one."
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