My Life in Republicanville 4: I Need a New Bar

I have a lot of work to do today, so I'll keep this brief.

Friday night, after work, I stopped by my favorite bar in Republicanville to watch some playoff baseball.  Not long after I bellied up to the bar, a couple of post-college, late 20s white men walk in and sit next to me.  As he pulls out his chair, one man says, "Don't worry.  I'm not racist."  I gave a side eye  look and said, "That's good to know."  He then asked if I was "that guy who works in the library."  When I said no, he asked "are you sure?" and reached for his phone (to pull up the guy's picture on the university website--I think).  His friend said, "So all black guys look alike?"  I gave the friend a knowing nod, which prompted the first guy to insist that I really do look just like the library guy.  When he pulled up the library guy's picture, he looked nothing like me.  Our complexions are similar, but we are at least 50 pounds apart and our facial features are not similar.  I frowned and said, "Well, that didn't take long."

The two guys followed with a round of racist comments about my blackness, ending when one of them "won" 7-2.

When I returned to the bar yesterday, they were surprised I sat far away from them.  They yelled across the bar, "Is it because we're white? ... Do you not want to sit with us because we're racist?"

Just another day in Republicanville.  (In related news, I think I'm gonna have to get cable just to avoid having to be in racist surroundings anytime I want to see a game.  You can chalk that $60/month up as just one of "the many costs of racism.")

My Life in Republicanville - 3: Dick and Jane Threaten to Hold Me at Gunpoint

After my first apartment option fell through, I ended up renting a condo from extremely conservative white Christians.  (The following story is also part of my reflections on the George Zimmerman Acquittal for Murdering Trayvon Martin).  The husband and wife landlord team, whom I will call Dick and Jane, took me to their home so they could process my application and conduct my background check.  As Dick entered my information into the computer, Jane stood in the threshold of the entrance that connected the room we were in to the majority of the house.  Once my criminal background check came back clean, Dick turned and said, "Whew!  You're clean!  I was ready to say to Jane, 'Honey, get the gun.  This guy is wanted!'"

Keep in mind, Dick and Jane had already confirmed my university appointment!  They had seen my contract and spoken to the department secretary.  Nevertheless, they suspected that I was a criminal and were prepared to hold me at gun point!  Being a good ethnographer--and frankly, a well-raised black person--I noticed the NRA sticker on their truck in the driveway.  I also saw mail identifying Dick and Jane as "Texans for Fiscal Responsibility," which places them far on the right fringe--the Tea Party's Tea Party.  Point being, Dick's exclamation was no idle threat.  

Essentially, I am renting an apartment from George Zimmerman right now!  My landlords' racism, presumptions of me as dangerous and criminal, and willingness to use deadly force against me are all explicitly established.  Only my own personal George Zimmerman has a key to my front door!  

I would also like to point out that my situation has many more parallels to the Zimmerman incident.  The most important parallel is that by *inviting* me into their house, Dick and Jane put themselves in position to legally kill me under at least two Texas laws--Stand Your Ground and the Castle Doctrine.  If my criminal check had come back with any problems--perhaps a bench warrant for a traffic ticket or a random mistake--Dick and Jane could easily have claimed to have been frightened.  Their background check system does not indicate the offense that makes someone fail the check.  Dick and Jane would have assumed I was a potentially violent criminal.  Because I was already in their home, they could claim to fear for their lives and their children's lives (who were home as well).  They could have pulled the gun on me as a means of defending their home *OR* just their property.  They would have had legal protections if, after pulling the gun on me, I made any moves to resist being imprisoned and held at gunpoint by these strangers.  

Several times since the background check, I have thought about the fact that the smallest typo might have resulted in Dick and Jane legally murdering me last week.

The Ghettosburg Address*

Four hundred and one half dozen years ago, invaders brought forth on this continent a new nation, conceived through theft and slavery, and dedicated to the proposition that white men are superior. 

Since that time, we have been engaged in a one-sided civil war, testing whether that nation, or any other so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure.  The question before us being the oldest of humanity: can ill-gotten power sustain an oppressive regime or must that oppressor fall under the weight of contradictions generated at its birth and forever held in its bosom?  The entire continent is thus a battlefield of that war.  We are now all forced, by innumerable events—formal and informal; interpersonal and systemic—to recognize and officially acknowledge that this land is one on which only one ideal can live.  After centuries of denial, it is altogether fitting and proper—indeed imperative—that we should do this. 

But in a larger sense, we cannot dedicate, we cannot consecrate, we cannot hallow this ground because most of us have no legitimate authority here and precious few of its rightful inheritors survive to claim it.  The brave men and women, past and present, who struggle here, have consecrated it far above our power to add or detract.  The globe is forever changed by the events that occurred over here over these centuries, but it may someday recover the peace that was upset here. 

In a somber yet hopeful spirit, it is for us the living to reflect upon and then forever choose our position in this war—to side with white supremacy or the equality of peoples.  And then to fight will all vigor, recognizing, as our ancestors did, that this war cannot end but in the complete and final defeat of one or the other ideal.  We see now, as our ancestors did, that the realization of either ideal excludes the possibility of the other, both by definition and its necessarily complete consumption of the energies and institutions of any people.  We see now, as our ancestors did, that both ideals require more than articulation; that both require instantiation and that such instantiation is the eternal damnation of the other. 

Therefore, it is for us to be here dedicated to the great task inherited by each of us and remaining before us all—that from this reflection we take increased devotion to the war that defines this land—that we highly resolve that injustice shall not perpetually reign—that this nation shall finally give birth to freedom—and that no matter the costs—equality of all people, defined by oppressed peoples, ensuring justice for all people, shall soon be realized upon this earth. 

*aka "The Sanford, FL Address" following George Zimmerman's acquittal for murdering Trayvon Martin

** Lincoln's speech is here.  

*** This is a first draft, written to process this highly emotional, serious, and political moment.  Comments and edits are welcome.  

My Life in Republicanville - 2

This exchange occurred two days ago.  A really nice white 20 yr old man was making small talk as he helped me back to my car...

White Kid: Have you played Spartacus?

Me: No. I'm not into video games. 

WK: It's super cool. You can buy slaves and fight with them!

Me: 😒. [Sad, blank face]

WK: You can buy up to 8 slaves and fight them. 

Me: 😑. [blank stare]  .. So you can fight with a bunch of people. 

WK: Yeah!

I'm pretty sure he never caught the irony/insult. 

My Life in Republicanville

I recently moved deep deep deeeeeep into the heart of Texas. I've been here less than two days, and craziness has broken out already.  To keep my sanity, I'm blogging the stories for your entertainment.  

This conversation was with a business associate around 10:00 this morning.  The associate, "Lisa," is a middle aged Christian white woman.  

Lisa: I assume u have to know history for ur job. 

Me: some

L: but u have to be careful with that. Think of how they're changing history in our public schools. It's not what our founding fathers wanted. 

Me: 😑

L: I guess it depends on your perspective.  

Me: yeah.  ... You should think of Abigail Adams, who famously said to John, "don't forget the ladies!"

L: I didn't know that, but I really don't know much history at all. 

Me: 😑😒

Blindness and Walking By Faith: Lessons from John 9:1-7

Today, T.D. Jakes preached a message from God to me.  It was about the blind man Jesus healed by making clay from spit and telling him to wash in the pool Siloam after the disciples asked whose sin caused his blindness:

John 9:1-9 (NASB) 

As He passed by, He saw a man blind from birth. And His disciples asked Him, "Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he would be born blind?"  

Jesus answered, "It was neither that this man sinned, nor his parents; but it was so that the works of God might be displayed in him.  We must work the works of Him who sent Me as long as it is day; night is coming when no one can work. While I am in the world, I am the Light of the world." 

When He had said this, He spat on the ground, and made clay of the spittle, and applied the clay to his eyes, and said to him, "Go, wash in the pool of Siloam"(which is translated, Sent). 

So he went away and washed, and came back seeing.

As usual, the Bishop made many excellent points.  I am only recording a few that speak to me in my moment...

1. Blindness was this man's particular weakness, allowed by God, that facilitated God's glory.  My strengths and weaknesses are increasingly public and difficult for me to handle.  But they facilitate God's glory--and my humility.   There is no fault; nothing wrong with me and no punishment I am suffering.  It is just my particular set of weaknesses that facilitate my utility.

2. The disciples viewed the man as a public display of the costs of sin.  For them, the man existed as a site for casting derision--derision that extended even to his family.  This despite the disciples deserving the same consequence (i.e. if blindness always results from sin--parental or otherwise--we should all be blind).  I should be careful that I can survive the measures/condemnations I use against others.

3. Jesus covered the man's eyes with clay, then told him to go to Siloam.  This is a picture of faith (and I would argue recreation).  The man is already blind, but now Jesus has heaped more "blinders/barriers" on him.  From the looks of it, his situation is made even more difficult after a genuine encounter with God.  The man must now publicly grope his way, doubly blind, through the city to where he was "Sent/Siloam."  I, too, must publicly grope my way through this particular phase of my life--one I have long feared and feel like my life has not prepared me for much at all.  ... but there is a promise....

4. The man washed in Siloam, where he was sent, and God gave him sight.  If I grope my way, understanding this a process of practicing and developing faith, I will also be healed--of fear, troubling circumstance, ignorance.  And, like the formerly blind man, I will come to know God better.

5. The process that dramatizes my weakness and results in healing glorifies God.

Sociologizing Sin (cont)

I really appreciate the response many of you have had on the blog and in person to my new blog. I hope you keep reading and reacting. For today's entry, I want to respond to a comment "Anonymous" wrote in response to "Sociologizing Sin." I am including the full comment below and my response after it. Sorry to disappoint those of you who like fights. My response is mostly clarification and extension. --Glenn "The Professor"


Anonymous said...

Interesting. I wonder what parts of this might be different today, so I wouldn't spend a ton of time debating the topic. However, the line that strikes me is:

"And even if I could find a way to have no structural or relational exploitative power over any single other person on the globe, I would not do it. Sin has its enjoyable season."

Meaning, you've chosen the former of your 'logical conclusions'. I know you, and I know that you know that there is absolutely a way to remove yourself from the model as it is today; the questions is your motive. The alcoholic who receives the eye-opening grace of salvation but still esteems the bottle as his highest priority might rationalize his continued trips to the bar by saying "if I don't reach out to these other sinners at the bar, who will?". If he esteems Christ as superior, he understands the need to avoid sin and seek the sovereign plan of God through divine intervention.

So, if you hold your place in life and the degree you earned and the job you have and your hobbies and interests and man-made plans for changing the world as your highest priority, then I agree; you will perpetuate that which you hate and may take one of the two logical roads you mentioned. Option 3, then, would be to follow your convictions towards Christ-like change and to live more relaxed in the sovereignty of God, but not licentiously.


"The Professor" responds...
Thanks again for your comments, Anonymous. I want to be clear. When I said I would not stop exploiting people if I could, I was not minimizing the seriousness of oppression or encouraging licentiousness. I am including myself among those who would support the restoration of exploitative systems when the pain of justice touched my own life.

One of the books I mentioned in my profile is Paulo Friere's Pedagogy of the Oppressed. It is one of the 3 best books I have read in graduate school; I cannot recommend it highly enough. In the book, Friere says that oppressors (i.e. any person or class of persons who benefit from the exploitation of others) cannot recognize justice. Because oppressors normalize their everyday experiences and typically ignore the fact that others have to suffer so that oppressors enjoy what they do, oppressors think that any attempt to take away their benefits is an injustice. We see this all the time. For instance, despite the fact that whites are WAY over represented at TAMU, white students still complain that affirmative action is benefiting students of color at whites' expense. [In truth, we don't even have an affirmative action policy. Not to mention, there are nearly 2 whites enrolled for every 1 there should be if TAMU reflected the state's population.] Men constantly complain that women get everything (e.g. alimony and custody in divorce, job preferences, the right to "scream rape" or make sexual harassment accusations), the truth is men still make more money than women, even for the same work. Men still dominate the highest levels of employment, and we continue to demand and take advantage of women in sexual matters (e.g. 75% or more of sexual assaults go unreported, women's bodies are continually devalued as sex objects with no concern for women as whole people).

In many ways, I am among oppressors. I am American, male, well-educated, and God-willing will some-day have middle-class employment. If suddenly, the United States was not the dominant military and economy in the world, it would seriously hurt my lifestyle, and I would be pissed. I would mobilize to elect someone who would "improve the economy." If patriarchy suddenly vanished, I would still subconsciously demand to be heard whenever I wanted to speak, regardless of how many women wanted to speak first. I would still expect the subtle deference I enjoy as "an educated" person. I am no different from anyone else. I try to check these impulses in myself, but I am not perfect and I would be even less perfect under real pressure. We all would.

I appreciate your confidence, Anonymous, but I honestly do not believe I or anyone else can completely extract ourselves from exploitative social arrangements. I would love to get out of our white supremacist world, but I cannot. I will still be affected by a preference for "western" medicine, logic, clothing styles, language, cultural norms, etc.

I really believe that the "body of death" Apostle Paul mentions at the end of Romans 7 is more than just an individualized sin nature. It is the desire and preference to stick to what's familiar and comfortable, even when those things are systems that exploit others.

bell hooks spoke at TAMU last evening. One thing she talked about is the nearly universal tendency people have to be "split-minded." She noted that nearly every white person will claim not to be racist. But if you ask a white person what steps we should take to end racism (i.e. address the inequality of outcomes white racism has caused), the same white person will not only fail to make suggestions, he will oppose any suggestion you offer (see Bonilla-Silva's Racism Without Racists). People have split minds. They simultaneously hold conflicting beliefs. They take actions that subvert their own deeply held values and beliefs.

The same can be said of us as Christians. Being double-minded (i.e. the book of James) is about more than wavering in one's faith in God. It is about simultaneously believing in God and trying to follow Jesus Christ's example while voting against universal healthcare. It is about supporting Christ's example of loving children, while ignoring the plight of poor children in underfunded inner-city schools.