Culture/society/politics

Mob Justice

September 20, 2011 — 1 Comment

“Many that live deserve death. And some that die deserve life. Can you give it to them? Then do not be too eager to deal out death in judgement. For even the very wise cannot see all ends.” – Gandalf, in J.R.R. Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings trilogy

The execution of Troy Davis is scheduled for tomorrow, slating him to be next after 33 people who have already been executed in the United States this year.

Some – including notable public figures such as Pope Benedict XVI, Desmond Tutu, and Jimmy Carter – say there is too much doubt in Troy Davis’s case, that our justice system may likely be killing an innocent man. The prosecuting attorney says differently, in this CNN article in which he was interviewed. I found the last quote especially interesting –

“Lawton [the prosecuting attorney] said he’s against mob justice of any kind.

“‘Would it be different if all these people were agitating to have someone executed? The criminal justice system should cow in the face of that kind of mob action? No, we would all say no,’ he said. ‘That’s not the way the system is supposed to operate.'”

No, the system is supposed to operate coldly and correctly, immune to human whims and emotions. I know.

But death is just so . . . final. Are we sure about this? Really?

Speciality

June 22, 2011 — 4 Comments

In case you missed it, there is some great discussion going on around the last post, which was mainly a link to this article. The main topic of interest to myself and the commenters was this seeming paradox between our society’s push towards telling everyone they are “special,” while simultaneously minimizing competition and downplaying both strengths and weaknesses of individual people so that no one feels badly.

Last night our four-year-old son Silas went to “sports camp” at the park where they had a little track meet for the campers. Silas came home with a [plastic] gold medal around his neck that said “Winner,” and I was immediately suspicious. Did everyone get a gold medal? My husband Nathan said that Silas won the long jump. I still wasn’t sure that meant anything in particular. Maybe all the kids “won” the long jump simply because they jumped. But upon further inquiry, I learned that Silas indeed was the first-place long jumper. He also showed me a purple “participant” ribbon that he (and all the other kids) won for participating, and a third-place ribbon for another event in which he actually won third place. I was relieved that our local parks and recreation department is not afraid of competition like the coach who was interviewed in the article. (And of course I was also proud of my little guy!)

About an hour later our seven-year-old daughter Luthien came home and saw Silas’s gold medal around his neck. Her first response was an indignant, “What? Where did he get that? That’s not fair! I didn’t get one!”

I explained that Silas had won the medal in his track event. “But that makes me feel bad, Mom, because I didn’t get a medal!” she insisted. And again today, she came across Silas’s ribbons and was freshly outraged at the thought that he won awards which she did not.

Hopefully she will work through this and grow into adulthood with an ability to both celebrate the beauty and excellence and forgive the failings of herself and everyone else.

I do believe that everyone is special. Or perhaps unique, as Jodi noted in her comments on the last post. For some reason, we often equate the word “special” with the idea of being more important. But really the word means very much the same as “unique,” and it shares a root with “species.” Each of us is, in a way, a singular species. No one of us is more important than any other, or self-sufficient, but each of us does have strengths and weaknesses which can be celebrated and forgiven, respectively. Celebrated and forgiven. Not minimized, qualified, smoothed out and laden with disclaimers.

 

Helicopter Parents and Trophy Kids

June 14, 2011 — 12 Comments

I heard Lori Gottlieb interviewed on Minnesota Public Radio this morning. Here is the article about which she was interviewed. This idea of not fixing everything for our kids seemed especially timely in light of my last post.

I’m interested too in thinking about our culture’s disdain of the ordinary (as noted in the article, no one wants to be “average”). And yet, there is a sort of pushback in our mainstream culture, against a drive for excellence. It’s sort of a paradox; we tell our children they are special, we say everyone is special, but if everyone is special, then really no one is special! Then if someone aspires to excel in a certain area, we call them arrogant or competitive. And, as Gottlieb notes, if someone is weak in a certain area, we try to discover what is wrong, what external circumstances are standing in their way; and we communicate that no one should be especially weak or especially strong in any distinct area of life.

What do you think – about this or any other issue raised in the article? I’m looking for a stimulating conversation here, folks!

Bring a Torch

March 25, 2011 — 17 Comments

For ten months, a now-23-year-old man has been held in solitary confinement by the United States military, on charges of sharing classified military information with WikiLeaks. Included in this information was a video of an Apache helicopter crew firing on civilians in the streets of New Baghdad in 2007.

While this young man named Bradley Manning spends his days alone in prison, and faces charges that could keep him there for life, the soldiers who murdered the civilians have been charged with nothing.

“All’s fair in love and war.” (John Lyly)

“War is hell.” (William Tecumseh Sherman)

“No one cries like a mother cries for peace on earth.” (U2)

Bring a torch, Jeanette, Isabelle. (16th century French carol)

The official name of the Statue of Liberty, a gift of the French people to the people of the United States of America, is Liberty Enlightening the World. As a nation, we have held this ideal high, and mostly fallen short. By attempting to “spread democracy” with military force, and then keep secret the inevitable crimes like this one committed in our country’s name, our government has failed to let the light of liberty shine bright.

You can learn more by viewing the videos at collateralmurder.com (the testimony of Ethan McCord, the soldier who discovered the seriously wounded children, is especially eye-opening), and if you wish to support Manning, visit bradleymanning.org.

There are many facets to this story. If you read the “Wired” interview with McCord and the Wikipedia article about Manning, you will encounter some of them. Thinking about our nation’s military involvement around the world on a deeper level, including the right of citizens to access information about our military’s actions, is a vital part of maintaining the liberties we claim to be ours.

This letter written by McCord and fellow veteran Josh Stieber is a note of hope, and another opportunity for concerned citizens to act.

Humanitarian Aid to U.S. Education

December 21, 2010 — 9 Comments

We got our World Vision gift catalog in the mail recently. Paging through the overwhelming list of giving opportunities (clean water, school tuition, clothes, food, etc. for poor people around the world), I was jarred to see an opportunity to provide school supplies for U.S. school children.

I’m not about to say anything new here, but we U.S. citizens seem a little too comfortable with this state of affairs, so I think it’s worth mentioning again: our nation easily spends billions of dollars on wars we never budgeted for, destroying people and property in other places, while cutting funding for educating our children, citing the deficit, the recession, hard times, whatever.

In an interview with Michael Moore for his documentary Sicko, former British cabinet minister Tony Benn said that his government, coming out of World War II, decided that if they could afford to kill people, they could afford to help them, and subsequently built a nationalized health care system (or “nationalised” as they would spell it).

I’m all for nationalized health care here too. But I’d also love to see proper funding of our schools. And to do that, I’m thinking we should stop funding these despicable wars. But I realized recently that the world powers (including our own nation) really don’t want world peace. Peace would mean that everyone would have enough, that no one would hold too much control. Peace for the poor among us would be a great gain. But peace for the wealthy and powerful would be a painful loss.

So, let’s just talk about world peace, especially at this time of year, and let’s feel good about giving to causes that our government lets fall by the wayside. We get the warm fuzzies, and they can keep blasting people in other places.

One problem, though – our government is supposed to be “of the people, by the people, for the people.” Why do we speak of it as “them”?

(I realize this post is raw and far from highly reasoned. We can hash things out in comments if you’d like. Let’s have a conversation!)