An imperative statement: “Act with Honesty in response to Indignity.” Honesty and Indignity capitalized to emphasize them as the essence of an ideal. What’s the point?
- We fail to perceive the indiginity in our treatment.
- We have confused talk with action.
- We will continue to be ineffectual and frustrated unless we take action.
I hear & read a lot of talk, but don’t see much physical action? This essay isn’t meant to insult, but to challenge all of us regarding the necessity of action. I was fascinated by terminology I’d seen at MND. I learned an MRA was a Men’s Rights Activist. It may be more productive to fine tune this label. How about MRT (Men’s Rights Talker)?
My issue is recognition that both parents should be presumed FIT & EQUAL in the lives of their children. Maybe I’m a PRA (Parents Rights Activist), but we also have a lot of PRTs (Parents Rights Talkers). Where do we put ourselves?
The Internet makes it hard to distinguish people willing to take action from those who just like to talk. As organizers have noticed, many people will post comments or click on push-button petitions — not many get in a car and come to an event.
Perhaps the ultimate irony are messages from KBGs (KeyBoard Gladiators) who say they are “fighting for reform.” I don’t think I’ll find a lot of resistance here at MND, home of manly men, to the requirement any use of the word “fighting” include more risk than just carpal tunnel syndrome.
Please don’t get me wrong. Words are important and talk is valuable in the expression of our ideas & goals (Segregation is an Indignity). But unless followed by “honest” physical action (The Freedom Riders) they remain just ideas and never become reality.
DON’T ACCEPT INDIGNITY
Many parents lose significant contact with their children as part of some Court action and just accept it as a “bad bit of luck.” I have to quote a Canadian, Eric Tarkington:
“It is amazing how docile people are! They will actually allow the government to take their children and/or decide which parental rights they keep. It is rare that the government has to use even the threat of force – people comply with having their hearts ripped out, just because they think they should… You are not the government’s little dog, and they have no right to snatch your ‘puppies’ when they feel like it.
They are violating you and your children through you… Your natural commitment to your children is the awesome power that keeps the human race going. Respect yourself! Stand up and fight for your parental rights, which are the best protection of your children’s best interests.”
Many people are aware of the “Jewish Holocaust” at the hands of the NAZIs. But how about the requirement starting in 1939 that Jews had to sew a yellow Star of David on their clothes — many did it.
What about the segregation of buses? Who was the first Black that heard the words, “You, Ni$$er, sit in the back.” — and they did it!
And if WE are honest — we’d have probably done the same. After all, bills, family to support, don’t want trouble, these people are jerks anyways, nothing I do will matter — I’ll do it!
RESPOND WITH HONESTY
Honesty (noun): fairness and straightforwardness of conduct; adherence to the facts; freedom from fraud or guile; sincerity.
What does that mean as a basis for Action? I like the part of the definition that says, “adherence to the facts” — that acting honestly must be based on reality.
If we move to the back of the bus, but in our thoughts are calling the driver a “no good mother $ucking cracker!” — are we acting honestly? If we sew the Star on our clothes while joking with our friends that “Nazis are Neanderthals anyway, better stay our of their way” — we are denying them as individual people? We walk out of Court after losing contact with our kids and think….
We don’t act honestly. Why? Because we are afraid.
“Nonviolent resistance … is based on the conviction that the universe is on the side of justice. Consequently, the believer in nonviolence has deep faith in the future. This faith is another reason why the nonviolent resister can accept suffering without retaliation. For he knows that in his struggle for justice he has cosmic companionship.” — Martin Luther King
“Who am I? I have no strength save what God gives me. I have no authority … save the pure moral. If He holds me to be a pure instrument for the spread of non-violence in place of the awful violence now ruling the earth, He will give me the strength and show me the way. My greatest weapon is mute prayer. The cause of peace is therefore, in God’s good hands.” — Gandhi
If you would like something a little more manly — how about some thoughts of the Roman General-Emperor-Stoic-Philosopher Marcus Aurelius:
“Concentrate every minute like a Roman — like a man — on doing what’s in front of you with precise and genuine seriousness, tenderly, willingly, with justice… The spot where a person decides to station himself, or wherever his commanding officer stations him — well, I think that’s where he ought to take his stand and face the enemy, and not worry about being killed, or about anything but doing his duty.” — Marcus Aurelius
RESPOND WITH HONEST ACTION
It seems we have two extremes. Many people want to respond with violence. It may not solve any problems, but it will be satisfying. Revenge for a good cause! Others, because they reject violence, just want to “talk it out.” Take a rational approach, encourage education & discussion, and we win! Not so easy.
I’m a former Military officer and not a pacifist. At times violence is necessary to quickly modify physical conduct — but it’s rarely effective in changing prejudices and how people think. It’s NOT needed here. The “opposition” aren’t our enemies; they just don’t understand.
“It has always been a mystery to me how men can feel themselves honored by humiliation of their fellow human beings.” — Gandhi
“When you think you have been injured, apply this rule: If the community isn’t injured by it, neither am I. And if it is, anger is not the answer. Show the offender where he went wrong.” — Marcus Aurelius
We need to change hearts and attitudes, “don’t just talk to me, show me!” Pictures of Blacks peacefully accepting abuse from their brother “whites” in response to their peaceful actions changed how America thought about Blacks and segregation. It wasn’t easy.
Listen to the following words from the Sermon on the Mount, they are words you have probably heard before:
“But if anyone strikes you on the right cheek, turn and offer him the other; and if anyone would take your coat, give him your cloak as well; and if anyone forces you to go one mile, go with him two miles.” (Matthew 5:39)
A response to injustice? So many see these words as a call to “quiet acceptance”, but that isn’t there at all. The focus isn’t even on forgiveness, but on action. We are to act in a physical sense and to act immediately on the person who has confronted us. Commanded to magnify their action voluntarily and bringing it on ourselves – what a revolutionary concept! Are we called to be gluttons for punishment? No.
“When you wake up in the morning, tell yourself: The people I deal with today will be meddling, ungrateful, arrogant, dishonest, jealous, and surly. They are like this because they can’t tell good from evil.
But I have seen the beauty or good and the ugliness of evil, and have recognized that the wrongdoer has a nature related to my own… and possessing a share of the divine. And so none of them can hurt me. No one can implicate me in ugliness. Nor can I feel angry at my relative, or hate him.
We were born to work together like feet, hands, and eyes… To obstruct each other is unnatural. To feel anger at someone, to turn your back on him: these are obstructions. — Marcus Aurelius
Honest action will help your “oppressor” see their error. They will be forced to ask and answer the question, “why has this person done this?” Perhaps not even at that moment, but they will be forced to examine their actions and our response. Does it work immediately, not always – but we have done our duty as strongly as possible by treating our “oppressor” with love and concern to the point of bringing more misery on ourselves.
“Love your enemy and pray for those who persecute you, so that you may be children of your Father who is in heaven; for he makes his sun rise on the just and on the unjust, and sends rain on the just and unjust.” (Matthew 5:44)
And, just in case, we were the ones really in the wrong – and perhaps deserved a slap on the cheek – we just offered them the chance to give us another, no harm done to anyone but us! My reality – We are not strangers to each other, but family – sons & daughters of the same almighty God & loving Father.
WHAT IT MEANS FOR US AS PARENTS
As we embrace this idea, let us add one more circumstance to the preceding passage:
“.. and if someone should take your child; then …” What?
How do we magnify that great a wrong and bring it upon ourselves. Maybe the answer would have been, “then offer them your freedom as well.” Maybe as simple as taking a piece of chalk and writing on a public building (office building of your legislator, outside a Courthouse) –> “I LOVE MY CHILD” or “PROTECT FAMILY RIGHTS”
ALSO – peace at heart? How?
I’ve realized how timid I am about taking real honest action in response to indignity. If you were a Black and “stirred things up” in your community — there would be a good chance the Klan would burn your families home down. How about that?
How many of us would attend a Family Rights rally and run that type of risk? I’m not sure I would.
So….I don’t get that excited and upset about other people and what they have done or haven’t done. If I can’t do what I KNOW is right — why should I “demand” it of others?
The change we wish is within our grasp and depends on us — not them. In words I’ve heard another Canadian, David Shackleton, use many times, “The World changes when We do.”
