CHRISTMAS DECORATIONS AT THE WHITE HOUSE INCLUDE A Crèche IN THE EAST ROOM (DESPITE REPORTS THAT WHITE HOUSE SOCIAL SECRETARY Desiree ROGERS SUGGESTED THAT THE OBAMAS WERE PLANNING A "NON-RELIGIOUS CHRISTMAS.") SHOULD THE WHITE HOUSE, WHO’S RESIDENTS SERVE ALL AMERICANS, DISPLAY a Crèche OR a MENORAH OR ANY STRICTLY RELIGIOUS SYMBOLS DURING THE HOLIDAYS?
Like it or not, Christmas is actually a religious holiday. I know it is easy to forget that amid the hustle and bustle of chasing hot deals on gifts, trips to the mall to see Santa and 25 days of made-for-TV holiday specials running on multiple cable channels. But the very word “Christmas” is in itself an acknowledgement that this is a day to celebrate Christ – a strictly religious persona. So despite hints from Desiree Rogers to the contrary, I would argue there was never anyway in which the Obama’s’ could have held a “non-religious Christmas”.
Also it so happens that the Obama’s are actually Christians and therefore it is perfectly natural for them to celebrate Christmas as well as all of the other Christian holidays. While it is true that President Obama is the President for all Americans, most of us knew that he was a Christian when we voted for him and I’m assuming that we expected he would participate in the typical Christian traditions. Similarly I expect that he will do many of the things that men, fathers, and people of color traditionally do, despite the fact that he serves a country that is not made up exclusively of men, fathers or people of color.
What I have been pleasantly surprised by however is that he is so comfortable and confident in his faith that he can be proactive in welcoming others of different faith traditions. Displaying a “strictly religious” symbol of his faith helps remind other Christians what Christmas is really all about, i.e. the birth of the Christ child as a tangible manifestation of God’s love for all of humanity and the possibility for the power of love to transform the world.. As a Christian I like to think our country’s leader pauses to think of such things when he sees the Crèche on display in the East room as he’s on his way to meetings to develop strategies for “winning” the war in Afghanistan, revamping the healthcare system in the U.S., reviving the global economy and slowing climate change.
But importantly it’s not just symbols of Christianity that he might stop to glance at on his way to these policy-setting discussions. Realizing that America is a religiously pluralistic country, he’ll hopefully also pass “strictly religious” symbols of Judaism, Islam, etc. And hopefully these will also give him pause and enrich his decision-making with the ideals that those religions treasure as central to their faiths. America is a country of many faiths, and he is the President for all of America.
Sunday, December 13, 2009
Saturday, December 12, 2009
Is there more to the Tiger Woods story than meets the eye?
No, I don't mean whether there are more women waiting in the wings to tell all about their tryst with Tiger. I have no idea and frankly, I'm not even curious about that.
What I do find curious however is that according to news reports and speculation, Tiger's wife chased him down the street wielding a golf club as a weapon, with every intention of doing him physical harm. In fact the only way we know about the story is because she apparently did cause him to have a car accident, resulting in injuries that sent him to the hospital. Yet when the story breaks it is his wife who is portrayed as the victim - Tiger is unquestionably convicted as the bad guy.
Now I'm not going to condone cheating on one's spouse, and I guess that cheating multiple times is exponentially worse than cheating once. But since when has it been acceptable to settle a marital dispute by beating one's spouse with a golf club? My guess is that if Tiger had been chasing her down the street with an intent to beat her up, he would have been arrested for attempted battery and she would have been portrayed as the victim.
So how does that work - no matter what, she's the victim?
And what's with the national fascination with their story? He's not the first man nor first celebrity to be unfaithful to his wife. And he's certainly not the first sports superstar to be caught with multiple counts of infidelity. So why is this one getting so much attention and early predictions of this as the end of his career because he's now "damaged goods"? Michael Jordan was widely reputed to have cheated on his ex-wife Juanita for MANY years yet he wasn't villianized for his behavior the way Tiger has been. Did he just have a better press agent?
I suspect that the aggressive response to Tiger's infidelity is due in part to the fact that he's a man of color and his wife is White. I think subconsciously, or in some cases consciously, the media has played on the old stereotypes of Black man as super stud as his wife as the lilly-white damsel in distress. I also think that the enthusiasm for pronouncing the death of Tiger's career is related to the fact that this man of color was unquestionably one of the best to play a White man's game, i.e. golf. He came onto traditional White turf (with his skills and his choice of a mate) and was more successful than most knew they could ever be. It was annoying but he is so undeniably awesome at golf that they had to give him his props. And he was also known as squeakly clean. I can only imagine how that must have added insult to injury for some.
So now the waiting of those who were jealous of his talent and success has been rewarded. At the end of the day, Tiger has proved to be human. Maybe not a surprise, but disappointing nonetheless. What has been a surprise is the speed and viciousness with which the media and some of his "friends" have publicly turned upon him.
Yesterday he announced a break from golf. I hope he gets a break from all of us as well.
What I do find curious however is that according to news reports and speculation, Tiger's wife chased him down the street wielding a golf club as a weapon, with every intention of doing him physical harm. In fact the only way we know about the story is because she apparently did cause him to have a car accident, resulting in injuries that sent him to the hospital. Yet when the story breaks it is his wife who is portrayed as the victim - Tiger is unquestionably convicted as the bad guy.
Now I'm not going to condone cheating on one's spouse, and I guess that cheating multiple times is exponentially worse than cheating once. But since when has it been acceptable to settle a marital dispute by beating one's spouse with a golf club? My guess is that if Tiger had been chasing her down the street with an intent to beat her up, he would have been arrested for attempted battery and she would have been portrayed as the victim.
So how does that work - no matter what, she's the victim?
And what's with the national fascination with their story? He's not the first man nor first celebrity to be unfaithful to his wife. And he's certainly not the first sports superstar to be caught with multiple counts of infidelity. So why is this one getting so much attention and early predictions of this as the end of his career because he's now "damaged goods"? Michael Jordan was widely reputed to have cheated on his ex-wife Juanita for MANY years yet he wasn't villianized for his behavior the way Tiger has been. Did he just have a better press agent?
I suspect that the aggressive response to Tiger's infidelity is due in part to the fact that he's a man of color and his wife is White. I think subconsciously, or in some cases consciously, the media has played on the old stereotypes of Black man as super stud as his wife as the lilly-white damsel in distress. I also think that the enthusiasm for pronouncing the death of Tiger's career is related to the fact that this man of color was unquestionably one of the best to play a White man's game, i.e. golf. He came onto traditional White turf (with his skills and his choice of a mate) and was more successful than most knew they could ever be. It was annoying but he is so undeniably awesome at golf that they had to give him his props. And he was also known as squeakly clean. I can only imagine how that must have added insult to injury for some.
So now the waiting of those who were jealous of his talent and success has been rewarded. At the end of the day, Tiger has proved to be human. Maybe not a surprise, but disappointing nonetheless. What has been a surprise is the speed and viciousness with which the media and some of his "friends" have publicly turned upon him.
Yesterday he announced a break from golf. I hope he gets a break from all of us as well.
Sunday, December 6, 2009
when in switzerland, do as the swiss do - or else?
Q: What's your reaction to Sunday's decision by voters in Switzerland toban construction of minarets, the slender towers from which Muslims arecalled to daily prayers?
A. Sad. Disappointed. And a frankly, more than a little afraid. Ironically however my growing apprehension isn’t about the Muslims but rather about the Swiss people and more broadly, the re-emergence and validation of societal mob-action motivated by fear. The posters created by proponents of the ban are menacing – and to think that they are in reference to a prayer tower is absolutely terrifying to me as an example of propaganda created by leadership in a country that we normally think of as the poster child for tolerance.
As a Christian, upper middle class privileged American living in a predominantly White suburban neighborhood and working as a senior executive in a multi-billion dollar corporation, I can relate to the visceral fear that the close presence of a people that has publicly denied many of my cultural values evokes. When I’m at my best I see Muslims as my neighbors, but I’m always aware that there’s a strong underlying thread of difference between us and sometimes that difference has provoked “them” to violent actions against “us”. So if we’re all going to live together peaceably it seems reasonable that the best course is for them to minimize my discomfort with our differences by acting more like me – after all, if they came to live in my neighborhood I’m assuming that they like what we have to offer and they should work hard to fit in. Establishing architectural permanent markers of our differences, i.e. a minaret, is clearly contraindicated with assimilation from that perspective. And this is one of the arguments that the proponents of the ban persuasively made.
But then I recall childhood memories of when my family became the first African Americans to move into an all-White neighborhood in the far western Chicago suburbs in 1967. The fear of our soon-to-be neighbors was palatable. There were neighborhood meetings, some of which devolved into threats – and that was before we even physically had moved in and begun to make any changes to the property or entice our stereotypical Black friends to visit from the city or the South and change the tenor of the safe haven that our neighbors had created for themselves, blocking out the discomfort that the civil rights movement was creating in other parts of the area. Their approach to our presence was to suggest, and then insist, on 100% assimilation. We were welcome as long as we were willing to leave our “Blackness” behind when we moved in.
Of course that didn’t really work. Both because we didn’t want to and probably because we couldn’t have authentically done so anyway. But that worked out better for the neighbors anyway because we all were enhanced and transformed by forced exposure to the ways of those we feared. We had a base of commonality (i.e. we both wanted the things that brought us to live in the same neighborhood) and that gave us a neutral zone from which to acknowledge, explore, and in some cases even appreciate, our differences.
I’d like to believe that this same sort of transformation was beginning to take place in Switzerland, and in other places, where people of different faith traditions are getting to know and appreciate each other as human beings vs. stereotypes. Perhaps that is why Mutalip Karaademi finally felt comfortable enough with his neighbors to request that a minaret be added to the local mosque.
But clearly his neighbors didn’t feel nearly as comfortable. And reaction of the Swiss people seems to send the message that Switzerland is and should be for the Swiss, and those who wish to re-create themselves in the Swiss image – the “right” image. And that is what I find frightening. Not just the lack of tolerance but the implication that assimilation is the gold standard – and those who can’t or won’t assimilate are the enemy.
What is my reaction to the vote in Switzerland? Sadness, disappointment and fear that somehow tolerance becomes redefined as “sameness” and fear of difference becomes a valid rationale for restriction of human and civil rights.
But also hope - based on the reaction of many in the international community to the vote. Perhaps this will just mark the painful beginning of a new phase of dialogue in the global community.
A. Sad. Disappointed. And a frankly, more than a little afraid. Ironically however my growing apprehension isn’t about the Muslims but rather about the Swiss people and more broadly, the re-emergence and validation of societal mob-action motivated by fear. The posters created by proponents of the ban are menacing – and to think that they are in reference to a prayer tower is absolutely terrifying to me as an example of propaganda created by leadership in a country that we normally think of as the poster child for tolerance.
As a Christian, upper middle class privileged American living in a predominantly White suburban neighborhood and working as a senior executive in a multi-billion dollar corporation, I can relate to the visceral fear that the close presence of a people that has publicly denied many of my cultural values evokes. When I’m at my best I see Muslims as my neighbors, but I’m always aware that there’s a strong underlying thread of difference between us and sometimes that difference has provoked “them” to violent actions against “us”. So if we’re all going to live together peaceably it seems reasonable that the best course is for them to minimize my discomfort with our differences by acting more like me – after all, if they came to live in my neighborhood I’m assuming that they like what we have to offer and they should work hard to fit in. Establishing architectural permanent markers of our differences, i.e. a minaret, is clearly contraindicated with assimilation from that perspective. And this is one of the arguments that the proponents of the ban persuasively made.
But then I recall childhood memories of when my family became the first African Americans to move into an all-White neighborhood in the far western Chicago suburbs in 1967. The fear of our soon-to-be neighbors was palatable. There were neighborhood meetings, some of which devolved into threats – and that was before we even physically had moved in and begun to make any changes to the property or entice our stereotypical Black friends to visit from the city or the South and change the tenor of the safe haven that our neighbors had created for themselves, blocking out the discomfort that the civil rights movement was creating in other parts of the area. Their approach to our presence was to suggest, and then insist, on 100% assimilation. We were welcome as long as we were willing to leave our “Blackness” behind when we moved in.
Of course that didn’t really work. Both because we didn’t want to and probably because we couldn’t have authentically done so anyway. But that worked out better for the neighbors anyway because we all were enhanced and transformed by forced exposure to the ways of those we feared. We had a base of commonality (i.e. we both wanted the things that brought us to live in the same neighborhood) and that gave us a neutral zone from which to acknowledge, explore, and in some cases even appreciate, our differences.
I’d like to believe that this same sort of transformation was beginning to take place in Switzerland, and in other places, where people of different faith traditions are getting to know and appreciate each other as human beings vs. stereotypes. Perhaps that is why Mutalip Karaademi finally felt comfortable enough with his neighbors to request that a minaret be added to the local mosque.
But clearly his neighbors didn’t feel nearly as comfortable. And reaction of the Swiss people seems to send the message that Switzerland is and should be for the Swiss, and those who wish to re-create themselves in the Swiss image – the “right” image. And that is what I find frightening. Not just the lack of tolerance but the implication that assimilation is the gold standard – and those who can’t or won’t assimilate are the enemy.
What is my reaction to the vote in Switzerland? Sadness, disappointment and fear that somehow tolerance becomes redefined as “sameness” and fear of difference becomes a valid rationale for restriction of human and civil rights.
But also hope - based on the reaction of many in the international community to the vote. Perhaps this will just mark the painful beginning of a new phase of dialogue in the global community.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)