What about Book Banning?

Vital Conversations is a monthly discussion group for people in the Northland of Kansas City, and since February 2007 I have enjoyed being a regular part of that group. Last week the topic for discussion was the thorny issue of the banning of books in libraries and schools. 

What Books have been Banned?

Rather than discussing one book as usual, this time participants were asked to introduce and share comments about a banned book they had read.

There was quite a variety: “classics” such as Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World (1932) and George Orwell’s Animal Farm (1945) as well as more recent books such as And Tango Makes Three (by Justin Richardson, 2005) and All Boys are Not Blue (by George M Johnson, 2020).

Actually, I introduced two books: The Grapes of Wrath (1939), the classic novel by John Steinbeck (and the subject of my 5/10 blog post), and Me and Earl and the Dying Girl (by Jesse Andrews, 2012).

A May 5 article on Esquire.com is titled “The 10 Most-Banned Books in America.” Steinbeck’s 80+ years old book is not on the list, but Me and Earl . . . is.

Given the current culture wars raging in the U.S., it is not surprising that five of those ten books are directly related to LGBTQ issues and three are about aspects of racism.

Why are Some Books Banned?

Books are banned in general because of controversial ideas that are considered a danger to the general public—or a privileged segment of society. The Grapes of Wrath, for example, was banned in some places because of its implicit criticism of capitalism.

Other books are banned because of “moral” objections. My impression from reading Me and Earl . . . was that it normalizes and even glamorizes sexual promiscuity, excessive profanity, and the use of tobacco and alcohol by high school students.*

But a major problem now is disagreement over what is moral. Religious conservatives tend to consider all sexual activity by gays and lesbians to be immoral and even their existence, as well as that of transgender persons, to be an aberration that must not be afforded public acceptance.

And White supremacists, most of whom are perhaps only latently such, find references to systematic racism highly objectionable, if not immoral, and oppose students being taught or allowed to read books that have anything to do with “critical race theory.”

Without question, it is “conservatives” of whatever stripe who clamor most for the banning of books.

Should Any Book be Banned?

The prolific science fiction author Isaac Asimov (1920~92) is often quoted as saying, “Any book worth banning is a book worth reading.”

I agree with Asimov regarding books with controversial ideas being read by adults. But I couldn’t see any basis for thinking that Me and Earl . . . was worth reading—except perhaps to understand the nature of one of the most banned books in 2021 and the nature of some high schoolers now.

Perhaps some books just don’t belong in school libraries—any more than cigarette and beer vending machines don’t belong in school cafeterias.

Teenagers are legally “banned” from purchasing tobacco and alcohol. And they are “banned” from driving a car for most of their teen years. (In Missouri and many other states, a person can’t be fully licensed to drive until age 18.)

Thus, there are some generally accepted limitations on what teenagers can and can’t do, for their protection and for the good of society. Perhaps there are books that fit into the same category.

The problem, of course, is when books are banned because of prejudice against certain people who are demeaned because of their race or because of their sexual/gender orientation.

Given the absence of widespread agreement such as there is regarding laws regulating purchase/use of tobacco/alcohol as well as the age at which teenagers can legally drive, perhaps the best course of action is not to ban any books in schools/libraries.

Parents are responsible for teaching their own children what they think is good and appropriate, but they don’t have the right to regulate what other parents see as suitable or permissible for their children.**

_____

* I usually have high regard for articles published by The Guardian, but I was surprised (disappointed?) by a 2015 review of Me and Earl . . ., the last paragraph of which began, “Everyone should read this book.”

** Helpful treatment of this thorny topic is found in “Banned Books – Top 3 Pros and Cons,” updated in April 2022.

Considering the Complexity of Human Beings: The Case of Woodrow Wilson

So, what do you think about the presidential election of ’16? Actually, there have been three elections in ’16, the first being in 1816 when James Monroe was elected POTUS. And then in the election of 2016 you know who was elected for four tumultuous years.

In between, in the election 105 years ago on Nov. 7, 1916, Woodrow Wilson was elected for a second term as POTUS. Thus, for four more challenging years the U.S. was to be led by a complex man.

The Making of Pres. Wilson

Thomas Woodrow Wilson, called Tommy until adulthood, was born in 1856 in Staunton, Virginia, where his father was pastor of the Presbyterian church in that small (under 4,000 residents) northeast Virginia town where the Wilson Presidential Library and Museum is now located.

Tommy became a well-educated man, graduating in 1879 from the College of New Jersey (which became Princeton University in 1896) and then earning a Ph.D. in political science and history at Johns Hopkins University in 1886.

Wilson served as president of Princeton U. from 1902 to 1910, then in November 1910 he was elected governor of New Jersey with about 54% of the vote. He resigned as governor as of March 1, 1913, after being elected POTUS.

In the presidential election of 1912, Wilson defeated the incumbent, Republican William Howard Taft, former president Theodore Roosevelt, who came in second running for the Progressive Party, and Eugene Debs, the Socialist candidate who received 6% of the popular vote.

The Positives and Negatives of Pres. Wilson

According to this American history website, “Wilson brought a brilliant intellect, strong moral convictions, and a passion for reform to his two terms as president.”

Commendably, Wilson had a strong belief in peace and international cooperation. Consistent with that belief, he appointed William Jennings Bryan, a pacifist, as his Secretary of State at the beginning of his first term.

President Wilson campaigned for re-election in 1916 under the slogan “He has kept us out of war”—and he was narrowly elected to a second term. 

Ironically, the following month after his March 1917 inauguration, the complex Wilson addressed Congress and emphasized the need for the U.S. to enter the war in Europe. Among other things, he said U.S. participation in the “Great War” was necessary “to make the world safe for democracy.”

In January 1918, though, Wilson proposed a 14-point peace plan, the last point being the creation of the League of Nations—and for that proposal he was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for 1919.

In spite of this and other very positive aspects of Wilson’s presidency, there were negatives as well—the main one being his well-documented racism, which was seen during his years as the president of Princeton U. as well as after he entered the White House.

Because of Wilson’s obvious racism, in June 2020 the Princeton University board of trustees decided to delete Wilson’s name from the university’s Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs.

The trustees stated that Wilson’s "racist thinking and policies” made him “an inappropriate namesake for a school or college whose scholars, students, and alumni must stand firmly against racism in all its forms."

The Point

As perhaps can be said about every human being, Woodrow Wilson was a complex person. As indicated above, there are ample reasons to admire him—and certainly many more could have been included.**

There are also sufficient reasons to find fault with him, although most are minor compared to his unfortunate racism.

What was true of Woodrow Wilson is true of everyone. Human beings are complex; everyone is a mixture of good and bad traits, ideas, and actions. Thus, perhaps no one deserves to be put on a pedestal and publicly honored in perpetuity.

_____

** For helpful information about key, and mostly positive, events from Wilson’s election in 1912 until the end of his presidency in 1921, click on this link.

Fifty Faithful and Fruitful Years: Jim Wallis and Sojourners

During the academic year of 1971-72, my family and I came back for a year in the States after living in Japan for five years. Those were turbulent times in the U.S. and only a little less so in Japan. During that year, I learned of a young man named Jim Wallis and a new publication, The Post-American.

The Beginning of the Sojourn

Jim Wallis was born in Michigan in June 1948, so he is nearly ten years younger than I. But he is a thinker/writer/activist from whom I have learned much over these past 50 years. 

Jim Wallis in the 1970s

Wallis enrolled in Trinity Evangelical Divinity School (TEDS) in 1970 and on his very first night in the dormitory, he talked with a next-door student about his disillusionment with the evangelical church’s support of the war in Vietnam and its indifference to racism.

Jim tells his story in Revive Us Again: A Sojourner’s Story (1983). Chapters two and three narrate the main contradictions he saw between the teaching of Jesus and the evangelical church at that time: racism and “the war.”

Part of what drew me to Sojourners was that the two main criticisms I had heard during my first three years of teaching in Japan (1968~71) were of “Christian” America’s racism and involvement in the war in Vietnam.

Here is the link to the foundational statement of the original Sojourners community (before they used that name).

The small group of Christian “radicals” that formed at TEDS published the first issue of their new magazine in August 1971. They named it The Post American, as an indictment of the civil religion in the U.S. which was supporting the Indochina War in contradiction to the Gospel of Jesus.

Fifty Years for Sojourners

In 1975, the community moved from the Chicago area to downtown Washington, D.C., and took a new name, also changing the name of their publication to Sojourners.

Last year, dissension at Sojourners resulted in Jim being replaced as editor-in-chief in August, and in November, Adam Russell Taylor replaced Wallis as president of the organization. Then last month, on June 24, Jim published “My Farewell to Sojourners.”

Wallis wrote, “I am deeply thankful for the last 50 years with Sojourners; I am honored to be its founder...and will remain an ambassador of this unique organization going forward.” This marked the end of fifty faithful and fruitful years.

In that article, Jim also announced, “I have accepted an invitation from Georgetown University to become the inaugural Chair in Faith and Justice at the McCourt School of Public Policy and the founding director of the new campus-wide Center on Faith and Justice.

My Sojourn with Sojourners

For nearly 50 years I have read and been influenced by Sojourners magazine, including the years before it took that new name in 1975. I learned from Jim Wallis, of course, but also from the wide range of perceptive authors who wrote for the publication.

In January 1977, during our second “furlough” from our work in Japan, I was able to make a two-day visit to the Sojourners’ house in Washington, D.C., spending the night with them. I was disappointed that Jim was not at home at that time.

Later, I did get to meet Jim on a couple of occasions. In April 2005, I heard him give a powerful public talk/sermon. In my diary, I wrote, “It was a wonderful talk... He stressed that religion should be a bridge, not a wedge. And he said that hope is a choice.”

My appreciation of Jim Wallis still runs deep. When I published my life story last year, I included him as one of the “top ten” stimulating, challenging speakers/writers that I have heard/read. Also, Jim’s God’s Politics (2005) is one of my ten favorite 21st-century non-fiction books.

I close this article with these words by Jim Wallis published in the first issue of The Post-American, words badly needed now as they were 50 years ago. 

_____

** For a list of many significant statements by Wallis, open this link to the Goodreads.com quotes page.

Criticizing Criticism of Critical Race Theory

Critical race theory (CRT) is one of the hottest topics of the day, so it seems fitting to critique the profuse criticism of it.

Basically, critical race theory is an academic concept that explains racism as a social construct. That is, racism is understood not merely as the product of individual bias or prejudice, but also something embedded in legal systems and policies. Why, though, should that be a target of constant criticism? 

(From a 1/22/2017 post by Kyia Young)

Political Criticism of CRT

The political criticism of CRT has been strongest since September of last year. On Sept. 4, then President Trump had the Executive Office of the President issue a memorandum for the heads of executive departments and agencies.

That memo ended with these words: “The divisive, false, and demeaning propaganda of the critical race theory movement is contrary to all we stand for as Americans and should have no place in the Federal government.”

Since then, several states (Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Oklahoma, Tennessee, and Texas) have banned/restricted the teaching of CRT.

Perhaps most egregious is Oklahoma’s ban, for earlier this year it was reported that over 80% of the citizens of that state had never heard of the Tulsa race massacre at the end of May 1921.

Nevertheless, on May 7 Oklahoma Gov. Stitt signed a bill that seeks to prevent teachers from saying things so that “any individual should feel discomfort, guilt, anguish or any other form of psychological distress on account of his or her race or sex.”

But how could Tulsa 1921 possibly be taught without Black students feeling some anguish at the way Blacks were so seriously mistreated then, without White students feeling some guilt at what their ancestors had done, and without all feeling considerable discomfort?

However, all across the country Republican-led states are criticizing CRT, and more states will likely ban/prohibit the teaching of CRT in public schools.

SBC Criticism of CRT

In recent years, perhaps a higher percentage of Southern Baptists have voted for Republican politicians than voters belonging to any other major Christian denomination. Accordingly, CRT has been widely discussed, and criticized, by Baptist pastors and Southern Baptist Convention (SBC) leaders.

There was a major push by the new organization known as Conservative Baptist Network (CBN) to get Pastor Mike Stone of Georgia elected as the next president of the SBC.

In the run-off election on June 15, he lost by a narrow 52%-48% vote at the SBC annual meeting in Nashville. (Lee Brand, Jr., a member of CBN’s steering council, was elected 1st vice president.)

In CBN’s May 20 statement endorsing Stone, the third reason they gave for their support was his opposition to CRT. They boasted that Stone “holds that the Bible is the only analytical tool he needs, leading him to reject unbiblical ideologies such as Critical Race Theory.”

Criticizing the Criticism of CRT

In twentieth-century American Christianity, an important emphasis emerged on what came to be widely labeled as “sinful social structures.” Early on, that emphasis was found in the writings of Walter Rauschenbusch and other Social Gospel proponents.

In A Theology for the Social Gospel (1917), Rauschenbusch wrote that “we are continuing to sin because our fathers created the conditions of sin by the African slave trade and by the unearned wealth they gathered from slave labor for generations” (p. 79). Sin was embedded in the system of slavery.

Fifteen years later, Reinhold Niebuhr published his highly influential book with the sometimes misunderstood title Moral Man and Immoral Society. That means, for example, some slaveowners might treat their slaves kindly (morally) while simultaneously the system of slavery was grossly immoral.

True, some teachers might use CRT in harmful ways. But the greatest harm to society will come from those who refuse to recognize the reality of sinful social structures.

The longer that reality is denied and attempts to understand/dismantle it are rejected (such as by most criticism of CRT), the stronger the roots of racism will become and the longer the detrimental effects of racism will be experienced by so many People of Color.

Yes, criticism of Critical Race Theory must be forthrightly criticized.

The Tragic Tulsa Massacre of 1921

There seems to be no end to the need for acknowledging the violence done to African Americans in this country. Two months ago, I wrote about the shameful Easter 1873 massacre in Louisiana. This weekend is the 100^th anniversary of the tragic massacre of Blacks in Tulsa, Oklahoma.

The Basic Facts of the Tulsa Massacre

It all started on a Monday morning, May 30. Sarah, a 17-year-old White elevator operator charged that Dick, a 19-year-old Black man grabbed her arm as he entered the elevator. It is not known what actually happened, but the next day Dick was arrested for attacking Sarah.

By mid-afternoon on May 31, threats of lynching Dick surfaced, and Blacks begin to gather to protect him—but they were far outnumbered by the Whites. About 10 p.m., a White man attempted to disarm a Black man. The gun fired in the ruckus, and the massacre began.

Beginning around 5 a.m. on June 1, Black homes and businesses were looted and set ablaze. At 7:30, Mount Zion Baptist Church was set afire.

Most of the killing and the destruction of property was over by noon, but by then Tulsa’s prosperous Black neighborhood of Greenwood, known as the “Black Wall Street,” was completely destroyed.

According to the large, impressive book The 1921 Tulsa Race Massacre: A Photographic History, “Perhaps as many as three hundred Tulsans” were killed.

Moreover, “Upward of ten thousand Black Tulsans were without homes or businesses, their lifetime possessions either consumed by fire or carried away by whites” (p. 271).**  

Why Remember the Tulsa Massacre?

One of William Faulkner’s most memorable lines comes from his 1951 novel Requiem of a Nun: “The past is never dead. It's not even past.”

Faulkner’s words were paraphrased in "A More Perfect Union," a speech delivered by then Senator Barack Obama in March 2008. He argued that many of the difficulties in African American communities could be traced to the sufferings of previous generations under slavery and Jim Crow laws.

Or, he might have said, traced back to events such as the 1906 lynchings in Springfield, Mo., and the massacre in Tulsa 15 years later.

For decades and decades, evil racist acts of the past were overlooked, disregarded, consigned to the dustbin of history—or so it was hoped.

Just 35 years after the tragic Tulsa massacre of 1921, I took an American history course in Bolivar, Mo., just over 200 miles from Tulsa. I’m quite sure no mention was made of the Tulsa massacre.

According to the online Britannica, “Despite its severity and destructiveness, the Tulsa race massacre was barely mentioned in history books until the late 1990s, when a state commission was formed to document the incident.”

Nor was there any mention of the lynchings of African Americans fifteen years earlier in Springfield, Mo., even though that city was only about 30 miles away. My small Baptist college had no Black students, and there was little, if any, interest in Black history in the classroom or on campus.

But the past is never dead—and in 2019 the city of Springfield finally, after 113 years, erected a historical marker in the city. And now, 100 years after the massacre in Tulsa, the country is finally paying some attention to the tragic events there. The past, thankfully, is no longer forgotten or concealed.

There is hope for the days ahead if the nation learns from the living past in order to create a livable future with liberty and justice for all.

_____

** The book of photographic history was written by Karlos K. Hill and published in March of this year. Another important book on this subject is Randy Krehbiel’s Tulsa 1921: Reporting a Massacre (2019). (Both of these books were available in my local public library.)

Remembering Great-Grandmother

This blog post is about two great-grandmothers: Rachel Seat, my great-grandmother who was scarcely known beyond the county where she lived most of her life, and writer Michelle Duster’s great-grandmother, the world-famous Ida B. Wells. 

Ida B. Wells (c.1917)

My Great-Grandmother: Rachel Clark Seat

Although I have claimed to faintly remember Great-grandmother Rachel, I may remember mainly the picture of me sitting on her lap in 1941 (see picture on right) and what my parents told me about her.

Rachel Clark was born in Perry County, Illinois, in 1852 and in her tenth year migrated with her birth family to Worth County, Missouri, where I was born 76 years later. 

Great-grandmother Rachel married William Littleton Seat in November 1870, the month after her 18^th birthday. Sadly, he died before they had been married ten years—and before Rachel’s 28^th birthday. At the time of his death, they had four children and one on the way.

Rachel was a widow for over sixty years, dying in the summer of 1941. In addition to five children, she was the grandmother of at least eleven, and I don’t know how many great-grandchildren there were/are—but I am happy to be one of them.

Michelle Duster’s Great-Grandmother: Ida B. Wells

Michelle Duster was born 101 years after her great-grandmother, Ida B. Wells, whose birth was ten years after my great-grandmother Rachel, in 1862, the year the Clark family migrated from Illinois to Worth County, Missouri.

Ida died 90 years ago today, on March 25, 1931, ten years before my great-grandmother. But even though Ida’s lifespan was twenty years shorter than Rachel Seat’s, her accomplishments far exceeded what my great-grandmother could ever have imagined.

Early this year, Ms. Duster’s book about her illustrious great-grandmother was published under the title Ida B. the Queen: The Extraordinary Life and Legacy of Ida B. Wells. It is an informative book that is quite visually appealing because of its extensive artwork and other images. 

No one would have the slightest reason to write a book about my great-grandmother, although my Aunt Mary Seat did write a six-page, unillustrated story about her (and available for viewing/reading here).

The Life and Legacy of Ida B. Wells

In July 1862, James and Elizabeth Wells, who were both enslaved on a farm in Holly Springs, Mississippi, became the parents of their first child, whom they named Ida. She was a precocious child, and she learned to read at an early age—and read the newspaper to her father and his friends.

When she was 16, Ida’s parents and her youngest sibling died of yellow fever. Ida was determined to keep her surviving five siblings together. She studied hard and passed the test to become a teacher in a rural Black school. For two years she provided for her siblings in that way.

That was in 1878, just two years before Grandma Rachel became a widow and had five of her own children to take care of from January 1881. So, Ida was providing for her siblings by teaching school in the same year my great-grandmother was working in her neighbors’ fields for 50 cents a week.

And at the same age Grandma Rachel became a widow, Ida became the one-third owner of a newspaper and a journalist in 1889. Five years later she published her first book, Southern Horrors: Lynch Laws in All Its Phases.

For forty years before her death on March 25, 1931, Ida worked as a writer and activist, combatting the evils of lynching and other forms of racism as well as sexism. She was a tireless, and effective, advocate for the social equality of Blacks and of women.

Had she known about Ida B. Wells at the time of her death, Grandma Rachel probably couldn’t have fathomed the outstanding social impact of a little Black slave girl born in Mississippi, whose entire life was within her (Rachel’s) lifespan.    

Ida’s courageous fight for social justice has been recognized in various ways, including the USPS issuing a Black heritage postage stamp in her honor in 1990, Chicago changing a street name to Ida B. Wells Drive in 2019, and her being awarded a Pulitzer Prize Special Citation in 2020.

Thank God for the extraordinary life and legacy of Ida B. Wells!

_____

Here are some notable books by and about Ida B. Wells (in addition to Duster’s 2021 book):

* Crusade for Justice: The Autobiography of Ida B. Wells (1972, edited by Ida’s daughter Alfreda Duster; 2020, with Afterword by Michelle Duster)

* Ida in Her Own Words (2008, edited by Michelle Duster)

* The Light of Truth: Writings of an Anti-Lynching Crusader (2014, by Ida B. Wells)

Whatever Became of Sin?

Chapter Eight of my book The Limits of Liberalism is titled “The Limits of Liberals’ Views about Sin,” and this blog post is based on that chapter, which I have updated and slightly revised this month. In it, I make reference to psychiatrist Karl Menninger’s 1973 book published under the same title as this blog article. 

Defective Conservative Views of Sin

As is true with other matters that I have previously discussed in my book, the liberal ideas that I have often found defective are reactions to defective ideas that are prevalent in fundamentalism and conservative evangelicalism.

For example, in the popular mind, sin is basically thought of as bad deeds, and sinners are thought to be bad people. That popular idea reflects the religiosity of the Puritans, whose ideas were rooted in Calvinism. They identified many “sins” they thought faithful Christians should shun.

In addition to the obvious sins of breaking the Ten Commandments, until the middle of the twentieth century, and even later, evangelical Christianity that was based on Puritanism commonly condemned “sins” such as drinking alcoholic beverages, smoking, social dancing, playing cards, going to the movies, and the like.

That trivialization and narrowness of sin among conservative evangelicals led progressive Christians to cease talking about sin. Several years ago, I heard a long-time professor at William Jewell College publicly state that he rejected the use of the word sin, saying that it no longer signified anything meaningful.

Defective Liberal Views of Sin

On the other side of the theological spectrum, some liberals began to talk about human goodness and potentiality and to neglect ideas about human sinfulness.

Many liberal Christians of the past and present regard(ed) sin primarily as imperfection, ignorance, maladjustment, and immaturity.

What was popularly called sin was, they thought/think, largely a vestige of the animal nature of human beings that could be, and is being, overcome by Christian education, moral instruction, and spiritual striving. Some “sins” were, perhaps, problematic, but they could be overcome by human endeavor.

That is why Menninger (1893~1990) contended in his book that sin “was once a strong word, an ominous and serious word. . . . But the word went away. It has almost disappeared—the word, along with the notion” (p. 14).

Chris Hedges is the author of a book titled I Don’t Believe in Atheists (2008). A sub-theme of that hard-hitting book is the pervasiveness of sin and flawed human nature. Here is one of his most striking statements in this regard:

We have nothing to fear from those who do or do not believe in God; we have much to fear from those who do not believe in sin. The concept of sin is a stark acknowledgment that we can never be omnipotent, that we are bound and limited by human flaws and self-interest (p. 13).

Between the Extremes

As I emphasize in the tenth and final chapter of my book, in Christianity there badly needs to be a broad and heavily populated position between the extremes of conservative evangelicalism and liberalism. Fortunately, there are now some indications of that sort of position with regard to sin.

For decades, progressive evangelicals have been emphasizing the importance of combatting social sins, not just personal sins as is prevalent in conservative evangelicalism.

For example, back in 1992 Jim Wallis and a colleague published "America’s original sin: A study guide on white racism." That publication has been updated and expanded several times and was last published in 2015 as America’s Original Sin: Racism, White Privilege, and the Bridge to a New America (with Wallis listed as the sole author).

There is also, significantly, at least some recognition of the reality of social sin by those who are not evangelicals. Recently, there have been references in the “liberal” media to America’s “original sin,” and mentions of “the sin of racism.”

Speaking in Kenosha, Wisconsin, earlier this month, Joe Biden declared that “we’re going to address the original sin in this country . . . slavery, and all the vestiges of it.”

So now, perhaps, sin is being more widely recognized than it was 50 years ago when Menninger was working on his book. I hope so.

Needed: Justice, Not (Just) Friendship or Even Money

Just as in 1968, racial tension in the U.S. has been rampant these last few months in 2020, and, again, just like back then, one presidential candidate is calling for LAW AND ORDER. But what is the most pressing need for People of Color, and how can the current unrest best be addressed?  

Are Reparations the Answer?

There have been strong calls by some for the U.S. government to provide reparations to the descendants of Black people who were formerly enslaved. In his long, oft-cited June 2014 piece in The Atlantic, Ta-Nehisi Coates makes a strong appeal for reparations.

If it could have been arranged, this month would have been a fitting time for reparations to be paid, for it was 170 years ago on September 18, 1850, that the Fugitive Slave Act was passed by the U.S. Congress, making the enslavement of Blacks in the South even more secure—and more odious.

Harriet Tubman escaped slavery in 1849, but then her daring work freeing other slaves by means of the Underground Railroad was made even more dangerous and challenging after the Fugitive Slave Act took effect the next year.

But there are many problems with reparations: how could it be satisfactorily determined who is eligible for reparations after all these years, and how could adequate funding be provided? With the massive expenditures on covid-19 relief this year, there is no possibility of funding being provided now, even if there were the will to do so.

Reparations are most likely not the answer to the problem of racial unrest in this country for the foreseeable future—or ever.

Is Friendship the Answer?

There has been much talk over the last sixty years about the need for racial reconciliation and for eliminating the segregation of Blacks and whites.

Near the beginning of “A Segregated Church or a Beloved Community,” the sixth chapter in his 2016 book America’s Original Sin, Jim Wallis recounts how in the 1950s Martin Luther King, Jr., sadly said, “I am [ashamed] and appalled that eleven o’clock on Sunday morning is the most segregated hour in Christian America.”

Then Wallis went on to lament that still now “the racial segregation of US churches is nothing short of scandalous and sinful” (Kindle ed., pp. 97, 98).

While I strongly believe that churches should never be segregated because of unwillingness to accept people of different races/ethnicities and have long regretted not being a part of a church here in the U.S. with a significant number of People of Color, I now think that integration is not the primary goal we whites should seek.

Last month, Jennifer Harvey, a religion professor at Drake University in Iowa, wrote a powerful opinion piece for CNN. While her piece was largely in support of reparations, I was struck by her disparagement of all the work that has been done for “racial reconciliation” and the emphasis in recent years on “diversity and inclusion.”

Harvey insists that “we need to be clear that friendships are never a substitute for justice.”

Thus, while definitely important, friendship/reconciliation is not the primary answer to the problem of racial unrest abroad in the land.

The Need for Justice/Equity

In her highly acclaimed book Caste (2020), Isabel Wilkerson writes, “We are not personally responsible for what people who look like us did centuries ago. But we are responsible for what good or ill we do to people alive with us today” (p. 387).

Accordingly, rather than focusing on reparations for the past, what is needed most now is the creation of a more just, equitable society.

If we whites want to help People of Color (PoC) have better lives in this still-racist society, we need to focus most on legislation and law enforcement that, among other things, combats police brutality against PoC; corrects the inequities in the prison justice system; and eliminates discrimination in housing and discriminatory finance charges for both houses and cars.

To do this we can support various nationwide organizations, such as the ACLU, for example, which urges us to Demand Justice Now.

Is it Bad to be “Woke”?

Over the last few years, the word “woke” has been used, and praised, in some circles, largely misunderstood and/or ignored in others, and castigated in some. But what about it? Is it bad to be “woke” as some charge? 

Definition of “Woke”

Perhaps it is best to start with a good definition of “woke.” Here’s one: “Woke means being conscious of racial discrimination in society and other forms of oppression and injustice.” This is from Dictionary.com’s “slang dictionary,” which also summarizes the historical development of “woke.”

The above article also includes this explanation:

Woke was quickly appropriated by mainstream white culture in the mid-2010s, to the criticism of many black observers. In many instances, woke did spread in keeping with its activist spirit, referring to awareness of other forms of injustice, such as sexism, anti-gay sentiment, and white privilege.

Criticism of “Woke” in Religious Circles

In my May 30 blog post about the Southern Baptist Convention (SBC), I made a brief reference to the new movement calling itself the Conservative Baptist Network (CBN). I first learned about it in “Conservative Baptist Network launched amid 'woke' trend in SBC,” a Feb. 15 Christian Post article

Being “woke” was linked to ideas CBN deems objectionable. On their website they state clearly, “The Network rejects various unbiblical ideologies currently affecting the Southern Baptist Convention such as Critical Race Theory, intersectionality, and social justice.”

Russell Moore and Al Mohler are two prominent SBC leaders whom CBN finds most problematic. Moore is a former professor at The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary (SBTS, where Mohler is president) and since 2013 has been the president of the SBC’s Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission.

It seems quite ironic to me that Mohler, whom in my book Fed Up with Fundamentalism I discuss as one of the four most influential fundamentalist leaders after 1980, is now being attacked by conservatives for being too “woke.”

The Black Lives Matter (BLM) organization was started by people who affirm Marxism. So perhaps partly in response to the criticism of him earlier this year for being “woke,” last month Mohler wrote an article titled “Black Lives Matter: Affirm the Sentence, Not the Movement.”

The BLM movement is criticized mainly because the founders are Marxists.

Critical Race Theory (CRT), which is supposedly being (or has been recently) taught at SBTS is seen by some as linked to Marxism, or Marxist ideas at least. (If you need a neutral description of CRT, check out this Encyclopedia Britannica article.)

Among Christian conservatives and others, it seems to be widely held that the concept of “systemic racism” is a Marxist idea. That is one main reason why they, as well as conservative (Republican) politicians, are prone to deny there is systemic racism in the USA.

Intersectionality basically means that “people are often disadvantaged by multiple sources of oppression: their race, class, gender identity, sexual orientation, religion, and other identity markers.” This, too, gets linked to Marxism and thereby criticized.

So, SBTS is being criticized by CBN for being “woke,” that is, too much in favor of Critical Race Theory, intersectionality, and social justice, all linked, in one way or another to Marxism—and by extension, perhaps, to socialism, currently the big bugaboo to the Christian Right and DJT's base.

Criticism of “Woke” in Political Circles

DJT has made some attempt to reach out to Black citizens in the U.S. He wants and badly needs their votes if he is to have any chance of winning the Nov. 3 election.

A webpage on the DonaldJTrump.com reelection campaign website has a page advertising a Woke cap (for $35). The sales appeal says, “Proudly wear your official Woke hat and show your support for our great President.” 

But in reality, DJT seems to have been moving in the opposite direction in recent days. A July 2 article in the online Intelligencer is titled, “Trump Believes That He Is Losing Because He Hasn’t Been Racist Enough.”

That piece quotes DJT as saying that he wants “no more of Jared’s woke s[**]t.”

Enough said.

Monumental Decisions (2)

The title of this blog article includes (2) because in August 2017 I posted an article using the same two words (see here). I ended that post with this statement, “Maybe the time has come just to make decisions that will rid our nation of monuments honoring the racism of the past.” Now I think that is definitely the case.

Necessary Decisions

From the U.S. Congress down through state and city legislatures, decisions must be made now about what to do with monuments, statues, and names honoring people intimately connected with the racist past of this country.

Earlier this month, Speaker of the House Pelosi called for the removal of 11 sculptures in the Capitol, for they all have definite Confederate ties. (Here is the list of those sculptures.) This seems to be the right place to start in making decisions to rid the nation of the commemoration of its persistent racism.  

Lee statue in Richmond, Va.

On state levels, monumental decisions also need to be made, as was done in Virginia with regards to the imposing statue of Robert E. Lee on Monument Avenue in Richmond. Here is the link to an informative article about taking down that and other monuments in what was once the capital of the Confederate States of America. 

On the city level, there are also important decisions to be made. In Kansas City, the central issue is not of a monument but of a fountain. The J.C. Nichols Memorial Fountain stands in a prominent place near the Country Club Plaza.

Today (June 30) the KC Parks and Recreation Board of Commissioners will be deciding whether to recommend the removal of the current name, for J.C. Nichols was not only a brilliant businessman and developer of Kansas City—and Johnson County, Kansas—but also the instigator of redlining and a clear malefactor of African Americans in the city.

Wrongheaded Decisions

In my “Celebrating Juneteenth” blog post, I averred that racist monuments should be removed in a legal and orderly manner, not by “lynching.” (I used that highly fraught word metaphorically with the broad meaning of “premeditated extrajudicial killing by a group.”)

So, yes, the rash decisions of anti-racists to unlawfully deface or destroy monuments are wrongheaded, most likely hurting their cause far more than helping it.

But is it not also wrongheaded for DJT to seemingly be more interested in punishing the anti-racists (“10 year prison sentences!) than in dealing in constructive ways with the racism that has spurred the defacing or toppling of statues?

Further, the decisions of legislators to do little, if anything, now are also wrongheaded.

For example, Sen. McConnell recently rejected efforts to remove Confederate statues from the U.S. Capitol building, calling House Speaker Pelosi’s efforts to remove the 11 sculptures with Confederate ties “nonsense” and an effort to “airbrush the Capitol and scrub out everybody from years ago who had any connection to slavery.”

Missouri Senator Roy Blunt also opposed the efforts of House Democrats to remove those offensive statues—and was denounced by a sharp 6/22 op-ed piece in The Kansas City Star. 

Desired Decisions

Removing offending monuments, statues, or names does not erase history. Those acts, whether done by legislative decisions or rash, wrongheaded decisions of angry protesters, are simply removing the honor and prestige given to those men of the past who advocated or perpetuated an unjust social system.

There is good reason, and ample opportunity, to learn about those men of the past (and note that there seem to be no objectionable monuments/statues of women) in history books and in museums.

So, let’s support and actively advocate for the swift removal of monuments and other public acclaim of historical figures who were promoters of white supremacy to the great detriment of people of color in this country.

Those are the decisions strongly desired by those who have suffered, and are suffering, from the bitter poison of racism and by those of us who seek to be their allies.

*****

For those who are interested in my 8/17 blog article about the monument in Brandenburg, Kentucky, here is an update from activities there this month as reported by Newsweek. Sixty years ago (!) I was the pastor of a nearby church; I wonder what I would say and do if I were the pastor there today.

Confessions of a Reluctant Chiefs’ Fan

“Super Bowl Idolatry” is the title of a blog article I posted in January 2015, and I stand by what I wrote in that posting that has been viewed more than 1,650 times. But I must confess, I watched the Super Bowl this year for the first time in many, many years. Quite reluctantly, I am a Chiefs' fan. 

Cheers for the Chiefs!

There is hardly anyone of my Thinking Friends in this country, or even in Asia, I assume, who doesn’t know that the Kansas City Chiefs won an exciting come-from-behind victory in Super Bowl LIV on Sunday evening, Feb. 2. 

Since June and I have lived in the Kansas City metropolitan area for 14½ years now, I confess that we got caught up in the hype and even June, who never watches football games, watched the game with me along with our daughter Kathy and her husband Tim. We had a fun Super Bowl party of four.

I also must confess that at halftime, with the score tied and the momentum clearly on the side of the San Francisco 49ers, I predicted that the Chiefs were going to lose. June said I shouldn’t be so pessimistic--and she was right.

Who would have thought that the Chiefs would score more points in the 4th quarter than the 49ers did in the whole game! I had underrated “Mahomes’s magic.” 

One reason why it is easy to be a Chiefs fan now is because of Patrick Mahomes, the young quarterback who has had an amazing beginning to his career as an NFL quarterback.

Mahomes (b. 1995) seems like such a fine, personable young man, it’s hard not to be a fan of a team that has a quarterback like him.

Jeers for the Chiefs

While I have various negative feelings about football in general and professional football in particular, and while I have even more negative feelings about what I have called the idolatry surrounding the Super Bowl, the rest of this article is about the problematic name of the Kansas City team--as well as the name of their Super Bowl opponent.

The Chiefs’ name is a problem because there are Native Americans, and their sympathizers, who think that the name is racist. I realize that there are Native Americans that have no problem with the Chiefs’ name--or with the name of the 49ers or even the Washington Redskins. But some/many do.

Cyberspace brought to my attention several articles highlighting the problem. I read, and recommend, this 1/27 article in The Washington Post, this 1/29 article in The New York Times, and especially this 2/1 NBCnews.com article by Simon Moya-Smith, a Native American.

The two articles I was most influenced by, though, were this 2/1 Vox.com article and this article from a website I hadn’t previously heard of. The former was written by Rhonda LeValdo, an Acoma Pueblo woman who teaches at Haskell Indian Nations University in Lawrence, Kansas. Her article begins, “The Kansas City Chiefs’ chant isn’t a tribute to people like me. It’s racist.”

The latter article by Zach Johnston in Uproxx.com is titled “Why Both Super Bowl Team Names Should be Replaced.” He forcefully points out the racism ensconced in both names, Chiefs and 49ers. (If you read just one of the linked-to articles, I suggest this one.)

The adult Sunday School class I am currently attending is discussing the Doctrine of Discovery. In our discussion on Super Bowl Sunday, I suggested that perhaps next year we might want to plan for some consciousness-raising about the Chiefs’ name, especially if they are in the Super Bowl again (which is a distinct possibility).

Maybe the time has come for more of us to be at least as concerned with the fair treatment of Native Americans as with watching/enjoying a football game.