The meme above is how I feel much of the time when I watch some of the squabbling over the inane in this country today. The latest example is the resurgence of the controversy about players of the NFL kneeling during the anthem. Yes, I get that it is disrespectful. Particularly disrespectful when a team takes a knee for their own anthem then stand reverently out of respect for the host country for their anthem. The anthem of the very country we spent blood, treasure and lives to extricate ourselves from.
But then our President spoke. In giving his feelings voice, he also by virtue of his office gave them an imprimatur and the legitimacy of policy. The problem with this is, when fear is what makes you stand for the anthem, then standing for the anthem means nothing. When standing for the anthem becomes required by law, then the deaths of everyone who died for that flag mean nothing. They did not die for those pieces of threads that combine to form that flag. They did not die for those words that are sung. They died for the ideals behind these two symbols. Ideas which have no physical form to assail.
Both sides seem to have lost sight of those ideas. The freedom to disagree with one’s government and seek redress is a cornerstone of what it means to be American. That one’s government is made up of your fellow citizens is another. How can you persuade these fellow citizens to the justness of your cause when your speech is to them the equivalent of peeing on their legs? How can you bring them around to what you see, when you won’t even bother to understand what they see?
One of the bright points in this came last night when the owner of the Cowboys joined hands with the players and knelt before the anthem. Then both stood respectfully during the anthem. This is how the America that I know and love works: compromise. One side reaching a hand to the other side and the other side taking it. Then discussing it and finding something both can live with and doing it. To me it was the most beautiful thing I have seen on the public stage in recent memory.
Now, let us take that idea and carry it forward. Let our representatives and senators sit down with one another and find compromises to the budget, immigration, health care and the other issues facing our country. Kick dirt over the lines in the sand, and work with one another to find real solutions, real halfway points. Then stand as one behind the new policies.
Let us take the issues of policing forward. Let our officers and their superiors sit down with the communities. Let those communities sit down with the police and their political supervisors. But both sides are going to have to let go of their lines in the sand. Are there ways to reduce the number of black men killed by officers? Absolutely. The police have been actually doing it these last few years. Look at the numbers.
A true partnership between the communities and the police will not stall this progress as some say. It would only accelerate the reduction in deaths. But we have to be realistic. It will never reach zero. Black men will die at the hands of police. White men will die at the hands of police. It’s not something the police want. It’s not something anyone wants. Working together I think they can find solutions that reduce these deaths to a bare minimum without decreasing officer safety.
And it will probably be community specific changes that work. What works in New York City will likely not translate well in Ferguson, Missouri. And vice versa. What are those solutions? I have no idea. But with the obviously bright and passionate minds on both sides of the issue, I have faith my fellow Americans have a solution in them. Work together and build a solution instead of continuing the path of destruction of one another. Because if you destroy the police, our fallen nature will destroy the community. And if you destroy the community, you destroy the reason the police exist.
Change is hard. Change is slow. It won’t come overnight. If you look back to the Civil Rights era, change didn’t happen overnight. It didn’t end with the passage of the Civil Rights Act. No singular event fixed things. It was incremental changes, over time. And the most significant progress came from men and women sitting down and talking their differences out and both sides agreeing to compromise. Both sides walking away from the table with less than what they wanted but more than what they had.
Why is change so hard? Because this truly is a government of the people. If the people don’t accept a change, it will never take root. No matter what the law says. The protests against the President prove this. The Presidents very election proves this. America is by it’s very nature anti-authoritarian. This is why we revolted against the British. This is why the Confederacy was born. Every change that happened and took root and became a part of the fabric of America, did so because it was aligned with the will of the people or at the very least not aligned against their will.
I don’t say this. History teaches us this. America both despises change and is enamored of it. Only those changes that pass through a crucible and prove itself worthy and positive for the country stay. The others stay for a season and then they are gone. America is the first experimental government. We are still experimenting. And the day the experiments end, America will go the way of the Romans, Persians, Aztecs and Mayans. If the day comes that we quit compromising and changing and instead faction off into cliques, tribes and religions, who try to impose their will on the rest of the citizenry. That will be the day that the United States of America dies.
