Obama and Othering

The many Obamas.

There is a high level of anger and frustration in the United States these days and many reasons to feel so. Employment still remains a high concern for many citizens and opportunities continue to disappear. The hope of many cities to return to glory days isn't little more that a wishful dream. With the continual departure of jobs to cheaper factories and cheaper labor costs, once jobs disappear it is unlikely they will return. When economic times get tough, the once stable and manageable relationships among citizens become a little bit less so.

One of the "Faces" of the Tea Party.

It almost seems like an afterthought, but there has been tremendous change during the last couple years: the election of Obama as president, a very large domestic policy shift with equally divisive laws enacted, and an undercurrent that things are changing. The ability of someone like Glenn Beck to become an overnight leader highlights the feeling that many Americans have about the changes taking place. The Tea Party Movement has become a force to be reckoned with, both for those on the left and right of politics. What we know about this movement is that it is composed of predominantly white, male, married, over 45, and Republican folks. What has emerged as an "angry" group of citizens wanting to reclaim and take back their  country highlights the sense of normalcy and identity for citizens who long for yesteryear. However, these fond memories are amnesic because we've been growing further and further apart for quite a while. MSNBC has done a really interesting photoblog of some of the faces of the Tea Party.

Some of the most striking examples of this distance and identification of the "other" has been growing considerably just in the last few years, especially as Obama emerged as a candidate and then when he was elected to office. Just today, there are stories about Obama being portrayed a a terrorist, gangster, Mexican bandit, and as a gay man. It has only recently been taken down. It had the title, "Vote DemocRAT." Nice. Billboards, the American way to advertise, have highlighted the feelings across the country by those who see Obama as something quite distinct from themselves. You know, black. 

So I'm left to wonder: what would make everything all right for those who oppose everything going on today with regards to Democratic control, legislation, and the highest office held by none other than Barack Obama? 

We've been here before

We're always dealing with new issues and new ideas. Aren't we?

Maybe it's because I'm reading many articles, books, pamphlets, and speeches from 70 years ago for my research. Maybe it's because I'm coming across stories about anti-Catholic sentiment in New York in the 18th century. Or maybe it has something to do with the fact that very little--if anything--we think and do (aside from the discovery of graphene and those kinds of things) is new and original. I know this may come as a surprise and a blow to your ego, but we're not quite as creative as we might think we are. I guess I've always appreciated reading and learning about history because there is so much that has happened years, decades, and centuries ago that we wrestle with today as if they are totally new issues. I'm not diminishing the importance of contextualization or time and space. What I do want to say is that we've got a great deal to learn from the stories of others, especially those who have come before us.

Historical events and happenings aren't quite as static as we might think. The stories (or more often story) we learn about is limited. It's partial. There is always more. There are many more actors. The United States in the 1770s didn't consist of only a handful of pretty smart guys. That holds true for any other time as well. It's just that we don't learn about all of those folks at the same time. History is done, something simply to be documented. It's alive. This is another reason history is so fascinating to me: it's continually unfolding. Some of the work I'm doing these days is digging deeper into a part of American history that has been uniformly categorized. People, in that time, acted this way. However, I'm finding out something so different that it's almost difficulty to situate it then, in that period. But that's where it belongs. It's part of the larger narrative. But getting to that larger narrative is so vitally important.

Just as we need to recognize the fears that have shaped American society for so long, we must put that knowledge--those stories--into conversation with what's going on in our world today. It's this ongoing, unfolding conversation and engagement with different times and people that we acknowledge our little spot in this amazing thing called human history.

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Making the Call to Cull

By Some Miracle

It's easy to think we're all individuals doing our own things and making our own decisions. It's as if the interconnectedness we have one with one doesn't truly exist. This video for Philip Selway's new song (of Radiohead fame) makes me think of the impact(s) that our decisions have on others, either knowingly or not.

King’s ‘Dream’ was a radical economic equality message

King’s ‘Dream’ was a radical economic equality message

It's a little after the fact, but I came across this blog post by Roland Martin and was reminded of how frustrated I get when we turn MLK into something he wasn't. In the secular sainthood we've given him, we've done a tremendous job of disarming the most challenging aspects of what he championed. It is easy to make him a leader of African-Americans seeking justice from white America, but it's sure uncomfortable to think of his challenging of the U.S. economic system and militarism.

How Can a Democracy Solve Tough Problems?

How Can a Democracy Solve Tough Problems?

Joe Klein, writing for Time, has an interesting article about how democracy can/should solve difficult problems. While he suggests using a model as championed by James Fishkin (among others), the central question about how should a democracy deal with difficult questions get to the heart of rethinking both democracy and governance.

I think one of the important take-aways from this article is that communities actually turn to citizens rather than limit themselves to expert panel and consultants about what should be done.

Is American Higher Education Like GM?

The Economist has an interesting article out, Declining by degree: Will America’s universities go the way of its car companies? The warn of the possibility that higher education in the United States is going the way of the auto industry: down and out. 

What do you think?