-
Quote
Life is like that, full of words that are not worth saying, or that were worth saying once but not any more ....
~Jose Saramago, The Cave
Nov
7
The Margins Are Beautiful
Filed Under ao resources, books, current affairs, from the heart, life changes, pop culture, questions, quotes
Sometimes I encounter online political discussions that feel pointless for me to become engaged in. White men discussing white men’s problems. So much debate over which of their rich, white, capitalist men lies the least … and I am drawing close the curtain.
There has to be another world.
I’ve spent the past week pondering my place in this one, with all its consumerism, celebrity gossip, fear, redundancy, and trivia. Are any of these people worth listening to? Two nights ago I turned on my television to watch Hotel Rwanda and ended up catching half an hour of Jeff Cohen on cable access. For the first ten minutes I watched him critically, observing that he was emotional about his subject: the journalistic demise of mainstream media. But when he mentioned Clear Channel, I felt a surge of connectivity. I recalled their continuous lawsuits against the City of Portland (for showing “preferential treatment” towards murals over billboard advertisements), and the frustration I have that ordinary, working people have to spend precious resources engaged in battles over their own community spaces. Suddenly, Jeff Cohen’s emotion no longer struck me as weird. The word “radical” is losing its derogatory connotation for me, and I have never felt closer to the margins.
There have been moments in the past week when I’ve felt my heart breaking. I never dreamt as a child that I would grow up to be an activist; it hadn’t seemed necessary. The world was complicated and troubled, yes - but it was not for me to fix. Only God could “sort these people out,” my dad would say. But I no longer perceive God as an entity that will one day enact justice. There is only that “monstrous” eye* of our unwritten future, staring at me.
Every where I turn, I am met with encounters. Every day, there is a fresh arrow pointing me in the same direction.
Two More Examples
a) Bernardo Alvarez, Venezuela’s ambassador to the US, spoke recently in Portland about the changes occurring in his country. One of the first things the Chavez administration set out to do, he said, was reclaim the natural resources. “The natural resources of Venezuela belong to the Venezuelan people,” he said. The profits earned from the sale of oil are being used to address the two main problems identified in Venezuelan society: poverty and social exclusion.
It was several days before I felt the weight of this concept. Clearly, this is not a belief that we hold in the United States. Here, and for the most part - the natural resources belong to whoever has purchased the right to sell them. The only claim the rest of the community has to the profits is through taxes. Sunday morning I woke up to a news story on NPR about a miner who was suing the government over some mineral-rich land he’d prospected in the wilderness. At first I merely rested beneath the blankets, listening to the story as an excuse to not rise from the bed. Then I heard the miner complain that since he had “paid” for the land the government had no business restricting his “rights.” Suddenly, I felt a pain in my head. More arguing between entitled persons. More white men’s problems.
b) Today, I was passing through the lunchroom at the office and saw that the television was tuned to Fox News. The big story of the moment was emblazoned in red across the bottom of the screen: Why are the Muslims turning on France? I took a deep breath and exited the room. It should come as no surprise that a revolt against racist institutions and policies has been utilized as more axis-of-evil, East vs. West, justification-of-war pandering. What kind of “solutions” can we expect from these talking heads?
I’ve heard the call of activism murmuring for some time. I’ve been watching it, in my peripheral vision, steal up on me. I didn’t want to become a radical person. I wanted a pleasant, comfortable life. I am not entirely ready to let loose my grip on what is familiar and easy. But, in the words of Nietzsche, “I want to learn more and more to see as beautiful what is necessary in things.” There is no longer a home for me in the mainstream.
In his primary contribution to Soul Work: anti racist theologies in dialogue, George Tinker writes:
Change requires going to and staying in the margins. People of color, oppressed people, do indeed live on the margins. Those of us who refuse to commit violence upon ourselves in the guise of adaptation are at the margin. When we demand that our story be heard and validated, we are moving to the margin. When we insist upon being seen, we cling to the margin. And our brothers and sisters who are committed to anti-racism, you must make the journey toward the margin, always fighting the centrifugal force of the dominant culture that will pull you back to the center. This work that we call anti-racism is dangerous work, and our participation in it makes us dangerous people.
*from Nietzsche’s “Toward New Seas”
(photo by HSA, 2003)
Popularity: 31% [?]
Comments
17 Responses to “The Margins Are Beautiful”
Leave a Reply
-
Hafidha Sofia
I love living my life and being who I am. These are selected thoughts about the way I see the world as a lifelong learner who embraces the gift of Unitarian Universalism. BookShelf
Planned books:
- Feminism Is for Everybody: Passionate Politics by bell hooks
Current books:
-
Care of the Soul : A Guide for Cultivating Depth and Sacredness in Everyday Life by Thomas Moore
-
The Chalice and the Blade: Our History, Our Future by Riane Eisler
-
What\\\’s Going on in There? : How the Brain and Mind Develop in the First Five Years of Life by Lise Eliot
-
The Double by Jose Saramago
Recent books:
- Mindset: The New Psychology of Success by Carol Dweck
- What to Expect When You\\\’re Expecting, Third Edition by Heidi Murkoff
- Fighting Words: A Toolkit for Combating the Religious Right by Robin Morgan
- The Answers Are Inside the Mountains: Meditations on the Writing Life (Poets on Poetry) by William Stafford
- Territory by Emma Bull
-
Badges
love your writing! And this post - I so understand what you mean. I had the same feeling every time I put on the news or any debate program on TV. The debates are so naive to me - most of them seem so small, so insignificant when there are so many really important matters at hand to discuss. I felt nautious from discust at some of the discussions, at all the superficial people
I want to scream sometimes. Want to shout to get attention to the really important things. I’d like to knock some people hard in the head until they understand that all beings in this world are equal.
But as a buddhist and pacifist I struggle to find other means to get the message out there.
Thank u for this post. It made my mind run wild for a moment..
I seldom watch contempory movies but my wife brought home Hotel Rwanda a few weeks. It’s a emotionally tough for her to watch a film like that but she really felt a moral obligation to do so.
About Fox and France and Islam, Edward Morrissey writes just the opposite today in the Weekly Standard on Falluja-Sur-Seine? and notes, When the media began covering the spreading violence in France, it appeared to go out of its way to avoid the notion that Islam had anything to do with the riots or their organizers.
I think it’s tough becuase it simply doesn’t fit the main stream medias perception of what would happen after the Iraq invasion and the supposed Islamic backlash against the United Stats.
In the real Falluja Americans and Sunni Kurds and Shia Arabs fight and die side-by-side in defense of a Constitutional and Liberal, Iraq.
In Falluja-sur-Seine, a white-European police force fights off an Sunni African youth the former colonial society is unwilling to offer much opportunity too.
That’s not the way things were supposed to blow back after Bush’s war.
The United States offers a land where an African American woman can become foregin minister. Where a fellow named Khalilzad is Amassador to Iraq, and there are Arab Generals.
Europe offers a ghetto and little chance of change. So the Salafist Group for Preaching and Combat will negotiate with Chirac and turn France’s African Ghettos into no-go zones for Europeans. That’ll be a violent disaster –and especially for Africans more likely than not– for all unless Europe comes to its senses.
thanks, Nerdine. Yes, sometimes it’s hard to know where to put the anger that builds up from all the crappy. Perhaps every third time I turn on the television at home I end up punching the OFF button on the remote while shouting (to no one in particular), “I can’t take this CRAP anymore!!!” LOL. Not the most meaningful outburst, but it definitely feels good to make that declaration, even if no one else hears it but my half-dead houseplants.
Bill -
It sounds as though you are making comparisons between what is available here in the US and what is available in Europe for Muslims and/or people of color. But maybe I am wrong?
More on France and the “Muslim riots”: Lounsbury Blog
Check Fist Full of Euros on France, and this quote you’ll find there,
The French have determinedly avoided multiculturalism or affirmative action. They have insisted that everyone is French together and on a “color-blind” set of policies. “Color-blind” policies based on “merit” always seem to benefit some groups more than others, despite a rhetoric of equality and achievement.
You won’t find a Colin Powell as head of the French Army and then Foriegn Minister. You wouldn’t find a Rice.
I worked in Europe (it was in the early 80s) but I can’t imagine a diversity training class in Europe as we typically do here.
PS, also read the Belmont Club and the History of the 1961 riots and the involvment of the same cops who deported Jews during Vichy.
We have our tragedies in our own past, but it’s a big help not to have to overcome the kind of history the Europeans are burden with. It’s here:Intifada or Watts.
Becoming an activist for me was sort of like a conversion experience….wretching,
the experience an old self dying. . .
and a new strange person, not fully confortable and expected becoming my new self. . .
liberated from some old conventions, empowered, but afraid…
It takes some time to get to know the new activist self.
I’ve read the post and the response from clyde. I have a response to the waves of frustration that can paralyze an activist.
I have gone through two major cycles of being involved in social justice work. One of solidarity with the indigenous communities in Chiapas and another as a male ally in the movement to end violence against women. On both cycles I felt emotionally wasted to the point that I could no longer be an effective ally. I wonder if one of the troubles with “activistism” is that we are so focused with the goals of the struggle we disregard the need to develop skills to take care of ourselves, each other and to build community. I would like to know if there are instances where the progressive movement has given as much focus to the human caretaking element as the task of advancing social justice in the larger world.
Enrique asks about how progressives sustain themselves and each other in the journey.
I have seen models of small community based circles of progressives that supported one another. Self care, care for each other is essential to a sustained struggle for liberation.
The focus groups of the liberation churches, the small groups and house churches of a renewed movement for liberation in the belly of the beast…on the agenda.
Welcome to the “margins”.
Look around you. You might be surprised at how many “white” men you see standing with you.
To anonymous:
I see white male activists all around.
Me too. . .
This is a wonderful post!
This seems to be as good a place as any. . .
To post the following recently issued fatU*Ua from The Dagger of Sweet Reason® -
Please disregard any typos it may contain. . .
The Dagger of Sweet Reason really should wake up and have another coffee or two. . .
Due to the error of his ways The Dagger Of Sweet Reason feels much obliged to issue a new FATU*UA© in his ongoing Unitarian Jihad -
Henceforth The Dagger of Sweet Reason must drink at least two cups of coffee every morning before posting anything to the inter-connected web of the world-wide web of the internet.
The Dagger Of Sweet Reason also must remember to add a
or 
;-) after self-deprecatingly referring to himself as -
Robin *Narcissist* Edgar
;-)
Henceforth The Dagger of Sweet Reason must add the salutation PB2U*Us below every internet signature of The Dagger Of Sweet Reason.
Henceforth The Dagger of Sweet Reason must ask the question -
To troll?
Or not to troll?
That is the question?
Pryor to trolling on the internet in his ongoing Unitarian Jihad.
Subsequent to trolling© on the internet© The Dagger of Sweet Reason must ask the question -
To correct?©
Or not to correct?©
Typos is the question?©
The Dagger of Sweet Reason declares that henceforth, the “alternative spiritual practice”® of the The Dagger of Sweet Reason’s “Unitarian Jihad” may be alternatively referred by himself and by other U*U U*Us as the Sweet Dagger of Reason’s “U*U Jihad”
The Dagger of Sweet Reason aka The Emerson Avenger aka The Transcendentalist Super Hero aka Robin Edgar aka Robin Michael Edgar (who is also sometimes for legal purposes etc. etc. alternatively referred to as Robert Edgar aka Robert Michael Edgar) hereby declares his sole and exclusive ownership of the Copyright(©) 2005 of the term “U*U Jihad©” and reserves all rights to its use in the UU World (henceforth alternatively known as the U*U WORLD©) and indeed its use in the REAL WORLD®. . .
The Sweet Dagger of Reason none-the-less most graciously and benificently bestows the right for all other U*Us©, and even non-U*Us©. . . to freely use the term “U*U Jihad©” to refer to their own U*U Jihad©, U*U Jihads© or indeed their U*U Jihadism©. . .
The Dagger of Sweet Reason pronounces that U*Us© and non-UUs© must however undertake to protect the copyright © and trademark aka ™ aka SM aka ® of The Sweet Dagger of Reason® by referring to their own U*U Jihad or U*U Jihads as - U*U Jihad© or U*U Jihads© or U*U Jihadism©.
Alternatively U*Us© and non-U*Us© may refer to their own U*U Jihad©, U*U Jihads©, or indeed their own U*U Jihadism© as U*U Jihad™, U*U Jihads™ or U*U Jihadism™.
Or even more alternatively. . . U*Us© and non-U*Us© may refer to their own U*U Jihad©, U*U Jihads©, or indeed their own U*U Jihadism© as U*U JihadSM, U*U JihadsSM or U*U JihadismSM.
The Sweet Dagger of Reason reserves the copyright and all related rights, including but by no means limited to the moral rights, to the terms U*U Jihad©, U*U Jihads©, and U*U Jihadism© and reserves the exclusive right to refer to his own U*U Jihad©, U*U Jihads©, or indeed U*U Jihadism© as U*U Jihad®, U*U Jihads® or U*U Jihadism®.
The Dagger of Sweet Reason strongly believes that he might be very well advised to copyright the terms U*U JihadSM, U*U JihadsSM, and U*U JihadiSM and hereby does so. Henceforth the terms U*U JihadSM, U*U JihadsSM, and U*U JihadiSM must be referred to as U*U JihadSM©, U*U JihadsSM©, and U*U JihadiSM©. Sorry FaustoSM© aka smcisaac aka smcisaacSM©, (aka please accept my deepest and most profound apologies FaustoSM© aka smcisaac aka smcisaacSM©) but that was pretty much unavoidable. . . Consider it a twist of fateSM©. . .
Allah prochaine,
The Dagger Of Sweet Reason®
PB2U*Us
P.S. The Dagger of Sweet Reason hereby copyrights © and trademarks ®, ™, SM the terms PB2U*U and PB2U*Us and indeed the term PB2U*Uism; however, in order to keep the terms PB2U*U, PB2U*Us and PB2U*Uism pure and free from any unsightly corruption, esthetic or otherwise. . . The Dagger of Sweet Reason hereby graciously and benificently waives any legal or other necessity for U*Us® or indeed non-U*Us® to refer to the terms PB2U*U, PB2U*Us and PB2U*Uism as PB2U*U©, PB2U*Us© and PB2U*Uism©.
Likewise, in the same letter and spirit, The Dagger of Sweet Reason aka The Dagger of Sweet Reason® hereby waives any legal or other necessity for U*Us® or indeed non-U*Us® to refer to the terms PB2U*U, PB2U*Us and PB2U*Uism aka PB2U*U©, PB2U*Us© and PB2U*Uism© as - PB2U*U®, PB2U*Us® and PB2U*Uism® or PB2U*U™, PB2U*Us™ and PB2U*Uism™ or indeed PB2U*USM, PB2U*UsSM and PB2U*UismSM.
Allah prochaine®,
The Dagger of Sweet Reason®
PB2U*Us
Emerson -
With all due respect, I ask that you please not post anything like this to my blog again. It looks like spam, and I take offense to your use of the words jihad and fatwa. Lastly, my blog is not for you to treat as your blog.
Many thanks,
HS
[...] to feel more grounded, and more invested in the well-being of all? How do I make my way back to the margins? I’ve got to do some deep thinking about this. Share This Popularity: unranked [...]