I am going to try to make a statement here that transcends the current political storm. Is that possible? I don't know, but I'll try.

When, after this election, all the dust settles, we have some serious soul-searching to do as a nation, especially as to what it means to be American. It is the vast range of different answers to that question that drives what we call "the culture wars," and which contributes to a paralyzing polarization between our parties. I would like to suggest that we have been looking to wrong places when we try to answer that question.

I would like to suggest that the essence of American identity consists in our willingness to live according to the ideals of the U.S. Constitution. One may come from any religious background, and have any theory of economics they want. They are in, as long as they desire to abide by the Constitutional pattern for the conduct of civic life. If they have embraced this idea and want to enter into it, that's enough.

We need to be careful of adding other expectations, such as, "They need to embrace an American way of life." As reasonable as that sounds, it allows us to exclude people based on what is comfortable for us, instead of whether they have embraced the idea of democracy. It allows us to exclude people who wear clothes we don't like, or wear head coverings, or the wrong kind of head coverings. It allows us to exclude them because they pray, or don't pray, or pray facing in the wrong direction, or pray in a language we do not understand. For these reasons, we cannot insist on requirements beyond the requirement that one desire and intend to live within the land governed by Constitutional ideals.

We also, though, cannot insists on less than this. If we know for certain that somebody intends to set up a theocracy on our shores, to force the practice of their own beliefs upon those who do not voluntarily share them, or to commit crimes, they are not an acceptable candidate for immigration. There is no religious litmus test that can determine this, though. Religious life in a democracy needs to be of the kind that is able to find within itself a tolerance for the practice of other religions, or no religion at all, alongside itself. The arguments about whether or not certain religions are inherently more susceptible to being intolerant than others is an important one, but our immigration policy needs to be blind to everything except the question of whether this or that particular person is capable of practicing their convictions, whatever they may be, without jeopardizing others, or infringing on their freedoms.

There is much debate about the place of religion in American identity, and about the relationship of religion, properly speaking, to the American "civic religion." I think this confusion is cleared up if we dare to think of the Constitution (along with the Declaration of Independence and the Bill of Rights) as the quasi-scriptural documents that make up the text of our civic religion. We furthermore have a series of historical moments, monuments, proclamations, and documents that have acquired status as part of the canon of our self-understanding, including (by no means limited to) the annals of the Civil War, the advance of the suffrage and civil rights movements, the words of Martin Luther King, Jr.--not to mention the record of legal interpretation by the Supreme Court.

My thinking about this is stimulated by reflecting on how the Torah, in the Old Testament, functioned as the founding myth for the nation of Israel. It was none other than a constitution. Our own constitution holds a place very much parallel to that. Most Old Testament scholars agree that, as Israel evolved in its self-identity, tribes were grafted in on the basis of their coming to understand themselves in light of this story--and not primarily because of their biological or genetic heritage. Inclusion was always by adoption, as tribes recognized the story of the Exodus to be the story that essentially defined them. They thereby came to call Israel's God their own. Israel, in turn, embraced them as one of their own.

It makes sense that we sometimes feel our nation's founding story possesses a sacred quality, and that it brought into being something transcendent to the work of mere mortals, because that is the nature of myths of origin. Establishing a reasonable premise for how things got started, they then form the basis for reasoning about what takes place from that point on--about how we will conduct ourselves civilly, for example. In other words, myths of origin reflect particular values, which then get projected out into the details of how we will conduct ourselves.

It is not then a complicated thing to understand how someone is established as "American" in their identity. It is by joining oneself to the quasi-sacred story reflected in our own myth of origin, as it is conveyed in our founding documents and our history. To require that one, in addition, subscribe to the Bible, or to any particular interpretation of the Bible--or, on the other hand, to forbid someone the practice of their religion, whether that is to a particular understanding of the Bible or any other religious perspective--is to add to this list of requirements in a way that unjustly (from the standpoint of our Constitution) excludes.

It is not, then, a complicated thing to determine what it means to be American. At the same time, it seems to have become very difficult for us to do so, and we have become polarized and contentious in the process. I would like to suggest--continuing with the understanding of our Constitution as our myth of origin--that part of the reason is that we are not very good at practicing our civic religion. Most of us have not reviewed the the basics of our Constitutional form of government since eighth-grade civics class. There is little chance we can be informed and inspired by its values if we do not have a conception of it in our minds. It is ironic but true that recent immigrants usually know more about American civics and history than those of us who were born here.

So many of our culture wars, and the endless arguments they generate, originate from our appeal to things which, though they may be vitally important to many individuals in our society, cannot fairly be considered essential to whether or not one is American. One of the more damaging forms of this, in my opinion, is the claim that adherence to Christianity is essential to American identity. Once that becomes part of our understanding, the question of what it means to be American becomes as complicated and contested as the debate about which religion or denomination is correct. (If you haven't noticed, that's not an argument likely to come to quick and peaceful resolution.)

This view of citizenry still leaves ample room for disagreement about how to interpret the Constitution, and ample room for argument about which values--in addition to the civic values embodied in the Constitution--take precedence in public life. That's why we have democracy, so we can settle questions about how our daily lives together are going to look. That's why we have a legislative branch of government, and why that legislative process is reflected on all levels, from the federal to the local. That's why we have the Supreme Court, and state and local courts beneath that.

Framing ourselves as adherents to America's civic religion, though, and making sure not to confuse that civic religion with religion in general, will allow us to partake in these disagreements productively, and to see our government as more than just a necessary evil. Our participation in it can possess a sacred quality, in that it represents our participation in our sacred founding myth, and our continuity with those who oversaw its coming into being, and with those who have struggled to define its ideals for generations. It allows us to experience our identity as Americans as uplifting and inspiring, without confusing that with the identity that individuals derive from their participation in their religion of choice (even if that religion happens to be no religion or atheism).

I started this post by saying I hope to say something that transcends the current political storm. I hope I have. In any case, I do think we have plenty of soul-searching ahead of us. As for me, the above thoughts show some of the directions that might take.

U.S. Christians who have supported Donald Trump, you have shown how weak your judgment is, how superficially you have read your own Gospels, and how laughable is your supposed commitment to any kind of spiritual vision that goes beyond the desire for strength and toughness--exactly as the world defines those things. God forbid that the world should ever again believe you when you speak about unseeable things, when you have spoken so falsely about things that are obvious to the eye. You should have been wise enough to know not to yoke the Gospel message to such a dubious political venture, and to remain publicly silent if your heart--for whatever reason--continued to insist that you vote for it. There was no justifiable reason to contaminate the Christian message by associating it with something so obviously controversial and foul.

People in the world have access to the words of Christ, through the Bible you claim to live by. They hear these words in their plain and simple sense. They may not share your conviction that Jesus is the son of God, but they are rightly offended when you suggest that real Christianity means accepting cultural goals that cut, perpendicularly, across the plain meaning of what he said (think about the Sermon on the Mount, for example). Ironically, they see your own spiritual condition more clearly than you do, noticing that your behaviors and attitudes bear no resemblance to those of the person you claim to be the perfect embodiment of God, and God himself.

As a result, many will choose to be atheists, just to avoid association with those who honor Christ's words with their lips, but not with actions that reflect those words--or those who cherrypick those words to fit their prejudices against others, but not to judge themselves. Ironically, in doing so, many of these atheists will be more possessed by the truth of Christ's words--and perhaps by the life that is in them--than those who, although they wear the name of Christian, do not tempt anyone to apply that name to them as an adjective.

Runners are priests, in a way.
They dance against gravity
as a kind of ritual.

They exchange air more rapidly
than anything else
currently on the planet.

I wonder what village elders discover
when they run long distances
well into old age.
I will only know if I do it.

The meditation is never over
until you say it is over.

I do not fast for forty days.
I run for thirty minutes.

I do not run to get in shape.
I run to run.

The first animal we humans ever domesticated was ourselves. We have been seeking solace in lofty ideas and spiritual experiences ever since, as a way of compensation. Visions of spiritual possibilities are the projection of the order and harmony we lost when we forsook nature. The reason we experience nature as a potential evil is because we have become detached and estranged from it--to the point we perceive it as our enemy rather than as the ground on which we stand. 

Civilization is like a game we play. How high can we build it before nature tears it down once again? Also, when civilization is leveled, what parts of it will remain intact, demonstrating that they were built in a way not simply at odds with nature? What parts were built and remained sufficiently close to the ground? Finally, when it is leveled, will we remember and retain anything of what we have learned about the potential improvements to nature brought about through the idea of humanity, or will we simply return to nature with a vengeance, which is barbarism?

At some point in our evolution, the human species became impressed with an idea: it did not need to define itself merely in relation to nature. It could create an order of its own--a second nature. It could be a nature unto itself, and to that it would refer for meaning. The realm of spirit is the projection of this ideal. The apex of this idea is the dictum that mankind is made in the image of God. Our possession by this idea is what Genesis alludes to when it speaks of God breathing a soul into our bodies of clay. It corresponds also with the development of language. 

When you see humanity in its highly domesticated forms (someone polished, seemingly living above nature’s brutish demands), we rightly may imagine that nature, in its wild state, remains underneath, and is paying some price for all this civilization. We have not entirely bred that out of ourselves, after all. Unless some conscious rapprochement with it has been made, it lives underground as shadow, and is subject to all the mechanisms that attend repressed material, including projection. 

Buildings, indoors, electric lights, and social protocol and decorum--all of these can be occasions of suffering for the underlying human animal, in whom wildness continues to live. ”My life fits me like a straitjacket," we might say. Similarly, we could describe society as a consensually agreed upon (mostly) straitjacket. Religious forms, as a projection of the spiritual ideal, console us in the tension we experience in this situation. In addition to this function though, which could be construed as a negative one, they could also be seen as inviting a retrograde movement, a return to more primitive forms of experience, that are nonetheless in service of forward motion. This would be to recognize a uniquely positive function of religion, and not merely to rest with a negative conclusion about what it accomplishes.

Some people are better at being human than others. We frame this as a moral achievement. We need to recognize, though, that our criterion of “moral” is self-referential. Failure is defined from the standpoint of those who have succeeded. There are numerous biases and presuppositions at work in this, which contribute to the suffering of those who, for whatever reason, may not be able to achieve the same integration into society. We need to recognize much of our judgment upon failure for what it actually is: the suspicion that our construct of society is not as secure as we put it forth to be, and the fear that it may not hold. Failures remind us of the fact that civilization is not guaranteed, or even the deepest truth of our own experience. Little children are like little animals. More to the point, they are like animals who have only just begun to experience training towards domestication. We tolerate instinctive behavior from them that we are less willing to tolerate in adults, by which time training should have had its proper effect.

A condition that commonly attends the above-described situation is shame. Shame is basically fear that one’s underlying animal nature will be discovered. Since that underlying animal substrate is perceived as threatening to the construct of society, we are eager to keep it entirely out of sight. In the case of the most extreme scenarios—and undoubtedly as has actually happened at points in history—the public outing of one’s animal nature has been punished even by death. In addition to fearing such punishment from others, though, we have largely internalized the attitude of suspicion, fear, and hostility towards this nature as it exists in ourselves, putting us at war with ourselves. There is hardly a hair-shirt rough enough to satisfy our animosity towards it. Most remedies for healing of shame do not touch upon this deeper layer from which it originates. Instead, they involve constructing a relatively deep image of self about which one can feel positive—yet that image is still one that must meet the criteria of civilization. The underlying animal resides beneath that, completely unassured of its all-rightness, and its safety.

The ear, the eye, and the brain are not primarily physical things, but symbols that indicate to us the interface of transmutation between the realm of the objective and the subjective (to the extent we even know what that means), and vice versa. Moreover, these symbols are not static, but evolving. This generation’s progress in neuroscience demonstrates how dynamic is our grappling with the question of how it is that we know, and how it is that we are at all. At the same time, it demonstrates how our philosophical, psychological, and material-science understandings constantly bleed together in our acts of considering, theorizing, and knowing.

We humans are by no means the swiftest of animals—yet, through our unique powers of consciousness, we routinely travel faster than any other animal on the planet. Likewise, we fly higher and faster than any bird, though there is nothing about us, on a strictly physical level, that makes it possible for us to fly at all. We do not possess traits that would make us the most destructive of creatures, yet we have surpassed, a-million times over, the damaging capacity of any other living thing on earth. Perhaps we do not ponder often enough how strange we are as humans. In us, physiology introduces a power to evolve and adapt almost at will, once an idea of the advantage of doing so becomes compelling to us. We may not be entirely able to call ourselves God, but we certainly have god-like powers.

Joy is tempered by hatred far more painfully than by sadness, these days. Hatred will have to be abandoned and renounced before entering any heaven worthy of the name.

I have broken the vessel
in more ways
than can be
imagined.
Yet, miraculously,
it still holds
water.

While we each have our unique way
of relating to the source of beauty,
expressing it,
and partaking in it,
we are all equally its children.

I can rarely tell, by listening, whether music is created by a band consisting of few or many members, and I love music made by bands of various sizes. When I think about bands with only two members, though, I get a kind of lonely feeling. Three members seems like it would invite conflict and make it likely that someone is left out. Five seems chaotic--more of a troupe than a band. Four is just right. I have no idea what these associations say about me.

Those who have survived the hating of life are prepared to know something about the loving of it too.

To have within my attention

the suffering that goes on in each of us

just under the surface of our skin

and to care for it

as though it were a single child—

that would be a kind of salvation.

It would be like holding in my arms
the redeemer of the world.

It is a strange and mysterious thing how many Evangelicals have gone totally silent when it comes to their usual habit of finding Antichrist behind every bush, right when they have someone in front of them who fits the suit better than anyone they have tagged so far. Instead, they are voting for him! They appear to not be taking their own warnings very seriously. Then again, since they have opted to use that label for public figures who dare to value peacemaking (because anyone who promotes peace can only be a wolf in sheep's clothing, seems to be their usual reasoning), like Pope Francis, Jimmy Carter, or Obama), they may not know what to do when someone like Trump comes along, who, in a way more straightforward than any of these others, "will oppose and will exalt himself over everything that is called God or is worshiped..." (II Thes. 2:4a). Evangelicals may want to reconsider their usual bias in interpreting such passages, and also passages like, "For this reason God sends them a powerful delusion so that they will believe the lie..." (II Thes. 2:11).

This is not an attempt on my part to say that Trump is the Antichrist, but to point out that Evangelicals, who have long fancied themselves the experts regarding such things, show a remarkable rigidity of thought, and lack of creativity, when it comes to understanding how these passages are intended to keep the would-be follower of Christ on his/her toes, in the midst of a world that will constantly tempt them. Instead, they have settled into a complacency which concludes that anybody who dares to suggest that the USA may not be identical to the kingdom of God, or that we need to critique ourselves according to a standard other than the world's standard of strength and prosperity (with which our capitalist mindset can be so easily complicit) must be of the devil. At a moment in culture when a deft application of the prophetic theological perspective is called for, Evangelicalism is caught flatfooted. Its years of fancying itself as the “silent majority” have secretly been years of snuggling more and more comfortably into bed with this world’s principalities and powers. How ironic that even a biographer of Dietrich Bonhoeffer finds himself advocating for Trump! What monstrosity of self-justifying, self-deceiving rationalization makes a position like that possible?

--///-
having heard,
in music,
what can be,

all the rest
of life
struggles,
so desperately,
to keep up

The idea of freedom came to earth, looking for a place to lay its head, but found none. 

There were no peoples on earth willing to accept her presence, once they realized the generosity she would require of them. 

However much they sang her praises, there were none who would modify their dwellings so she could take up residence within them.

There were none who would accommodate their spirits to hers, so that she could be kin to them—more than visitor or invader.

There were none who could see that she would enlarge, rather than reduce, whatever heart she entered—that she came to give, and not to steal.

We proved ourselves too afraid for her; thus we were found unworthy of her.

Once more, freedom retires into the realm of mere thoughts and dreams, until a people generous enough to incarnate her appears again.

In numerous ways, in our world today, we observe the spectacle of those who are decent being attacked by those who are being brutal. This occurs not only in bouts of language, but also in acts of literal, physical violence--and not only in our own country, but around the world.

Something not understood by those who urge that the decent simply strike back--that they simply retaliate with equal force--is that the decent often have something more in mind than just outliving their attackers. It is not enough for the decent merely to survive. It is essential to them that they survive with their essence of decency intact, that they survive according to their own principles.

In the case of democracy, this means that democracy cannot betray its own principles and become repressive, tyrannical, and dictatorial as it responds to anti-democratic forces. In the case of Christianity--to the extent it is a Christianity that understands itself in light of the Sermon on the Mount--this means that it cannot simply reflexively strike back, and simply hate in return, when violence is inflicted upon it.

In each of these cases, decency's task is more complicated than just winning. It also has other values in mind, for which it would be death to itself to lose, even if it should otherwise preserve some semblance of existence in this world. To survive without these values would be to survive as a corpse.

None of this is understood by those who interpret decency's reticence as weakness.

There have been various attempts to explain Donald Trump's strange appeal. I think any adequate explanation needs to recognize how he summons within us a set of instincts which, if we are not careful, can override our more advanced processes of thinking and judgment. In Western society, inspired by the Enlightenment and organized into nation states, we have long since moved beyond the idea that society is guarded by divinely appointed kings. The idea remains compelling to us on a level deeper than intellect, though, and it retains its power to woo us when we feel our best ideas and rational solutions have failed us.

More than we realize, we depend on sets of instincts and patterns for behavior to tell us what to do next. These patterns come to us, in ways we only partly understand, through our genetic endowment, our cultural, religious and family heritage, and our individual experiences. In the language of Jungian psychology, we live in a world of archetypes--basic forms that seem to underlie our experience of reality. We do almost nothing from scratch, but instead call up from these available templates and turn control over to one of them or another. It is like choosing from preprogrammed scripts on a computer or (in the near future) a self-driving car.

Extreme anxiety can cause us to grab for scripts that may not be the most helpful ones, but we are frightened at what might happen if we don’t come up with something quickly. In periods of stress and emergency, templates that tell us how to survive at any cost can clog the flow of other templates which might actually be more useful. Until the alarm bells of emergency can be turned down, we may not be able to access these more helpful scripts.

The experience of not being able to access a useful set of instincts can be terrifying. When this happens, we are especially vulnerable to people who offer to fill the gap for us, to give us a game plan—their own set of instincts and templates for behavior—so that we can be saved from the discomfort of not knowing. Such people can also be masters at activating and turning up the volume of our alarm for emergency. This gives them power to persuade us that we are in desperate need of what they offer.

So, what exactly does Trump offer us? He seems to constellate (another Jungian term) within us archetypes related to the "great man." Trump has been compared to Hitler. I think it may be more accurate, though, to recognize that Trump and Hitler share certain archetypal characteristics, which hearken back to examples much earlier in history, such as Napoleon and--even earlier--Julius Caesar. The idea of the great man is that of someone who brings a new direction to the world, not through ideas, words, and persuasion, but through the sheer force of their personality and action. They are not bound by normal rules or morality, because they are seen as possessing something in their essence that is more important than what these rules are designed to protect. They come into the world like a force of nature, and they move history with the gust of their presence. In this way they are bigger than nations and governments, which are merely the result of ideas and plans.

There is much evidence that we, in our culture, are at a moment of great anxiety concerning what script we should entrust ourselves to now. This puts us at risk. Whatever templates we eventually entrust ourselves to, we may be compelled to live with their consequences for a very long time. Trump offers the possibility of settling into a set of instincts that seem to absolve us of profound anxiety: the anxiety of having to clean up the mess we have made of our civil society. It feels good to believe our current challenges can be swept away by someone who is not bound by society's rules. The cost of giving ourselves over to these relieving instincts, though, is that society will break in the process. At the end of our expensive vacation in fantasy, we will have plenty of work to make up. There is no guarantee that what is reassembled after such a break will be better than what we have right now. The reconstructed world can only be as good as the people involved in making it, and we are those people.

I deplore police militarization, but it is a logical consequence of allowing an increasingly armed public. I also deplore the "take no prisoners" attitude evidenced in some police interactions with the public, in which an alarmed and hyper-vigilant officer shoots before real risk can be ascertained, or when a citizen's behavior would respond more readily to an approach sensitive to mental health concerns. This too, however, can be seen as a result of having a heavily armed populace.

I think police have a reasonable right to expect that they will be more adequately armed than they people they may need to arrest, or otherwise interact with. This is a privilege we afford them as part of the social contract, wherein we give up some of our individual power for the sake of a broader general good. In some societies (real or imagined), a simple baton or a bowie knife, in the hands of an officer, would be enough to ensure physical superiority if things turn south. In a society like ours with its proliferation of guns, though, such superiority cannot be assumed--unless (as is actually happening) police become increasingly militarized, both in weaponry and approach.

We are destined to see a continual ramping up of aggressiveness and force from police as long as they need to contend with increasing levels of risk. It is also not surprising that the underlying judgments about danger that are brought to light by these hyper-vigilant responses will reflect the various forms of prejudice and racism that live in society on conscious and unconscious levels. The effect of this is circular. Mistrust of police can then lead to scenarios in which police feel more threatened. So the story continues. We are in a mess, but we have done plenty to allow ourselves to get there.

Maybe in the final act, there's room for a Donald Trump character--and Donald Trump will play him as well as anybody will. And, there's room for a Hillary Clinton. Maybe, just maybe, there's room for everything and everyone, and it's just that with our novice minds we have no idea of what goes where or why. Maybe In the end there's that final scene and the music plays and all the characters sway--for the first time together--showing that they are all choreographed by the same director, and that they resonate to one human chord. Maybe even the most despised character sheds a tear in that scene, and we find ourselves crying along with him as though he were an uncle, just redeemed from the grip of some colossal error, and we cannot wait to hug him. And if, as with the great Greek tragedies of ancient times, we catch a glimpse of ourselves, and cathart ourselves to a higher plane of awareness, then maybe the whole thing will have been worth it.

There are moments in which one’s freedom resides solely in the power to turn his or her other cheek.

There are moments when turning the other cheek is the only possibility of turning anything at all.

There are moments when the other cheek is the only thing that one has power to turn.

The turning of a cheek—by someone, somewhere, in some measure—is the only possible way by which peace begins to supplant violence.

The turning of the world is commenced with the turning of a single cheek.

The option of turning the other cheek can never be mandated, for anyone. It cannot come into being except by the free choice of the one who offers to do so. It can never be imposed, as an obligation, upon someone else. It can only be undertaken, voluntarily, by oneself. It requires incredible courage and strength to do so.

Our evaluation of others always needs to balanced with an equal measure of evaluation towards ourselves. None of us are merely cogs in a machine, with our lives being made miserable solely by the actions of others. We are not merely acted upon. We are also actors ourselves, affecting others with our own behaviors. Our responses are never merely a mechanistic backlash, for which we have no responsibility, but are the result of how we interpret events, and the meanings we assign to things that happen.

If the world seems chaotic, it is always necessary and helpful to address the portion of that chaos that relates to what is going on inside of ourselves. That is not to say that the rest doesn’t matter, but that we are not in a position to address the storm that rages outside of us until we’ve understood and accounted for the one that rages inside of us. Doing so does not guarantee that the world won't ultimately fall apart, but it does guarantee that, if it does, I will not forget who I am in the midst of it. It is more likely, though, that the world will not ultimately fall apart, and that part of the reason it won't is that I, along with others, have gotten ahold of my own reactions, and struggle to find a way to reason peacefully about the disputes that remain.

If I don't come to grips with my own internal reality, and take responsibility for my own reactions, I will not be in a position to experience peace, even if the external disputes become resolved. I will still be the victim of my internal storm. In a world that is out of control, self-knowledge and self-control are not merely a quaint, Victorian prescription. They are indispensable conditions for a better possible tomorrow--for all of us.

The whole world is the baby that Solomon offered to cut in half. Those who are willing to make the world a pool of blood for the sake of their truth
prove that their truth has nothing to do with that blood, the heart that pumps it through our veins, or the sap that runs through trees. Their god is an alien one,
not familiar to any creature of the earth.

The appeal, the myth, and the unhelpfulness, of a the single-cause explanation

In order to process and make sense out of absurd violence, we often scramble to find a single explanation for its origin: He/She “…was a terrorist,” “…was motivated by religion and ideology” “…was a misfit, a malcontent,” “…was mentally ill,” or “…was in possession of firearms.” We desire to boil things down to one cause, probably because it helps us make sense out what otherwise seems to be unexplainable. (Also, we do this because it allows us to promote a specific political goal.)

I think this desire for the single cause, though understandable, is a mistake. It is a mistake because, for one, it is not realistic. We think we have found the single cause, until we think of other people who were subject to that same factor, yet never acted out in a violent manner. It is also a mistake, though, because it leaves us with little information about how we might intervene in order to prevent future violent instances. The single explanation leaves us only one possible place where we might make a difference, and causes us to overlook anything else that may have contributed to the violent act.

A more productive approach is to let the problem remain complex. This means refusing the temptation to understand the problem as “Factor A = Result Z,” and instead understanding it as “Factor A + Factor B + Factor C, etc. = Result Z.” When we do this, we understand that there are many, many points at which some influence may be had upon the outcome, pertaining to everything from social conditions which predisposition one towards certain acts and make them vulnerable to certain influences, to policies and laws which affect these social conditions and allow the violent act to proceed without interruption. This approach does not deny the uncertainty and mysteriousness of the individual human will. The fact is, preconditions and conditions may be nearly identical for any two people, yet each may respond in nearly opposite ways. Nonetheless, identifying preconditions and conditions in which actions occur allows for a realistic degree of influence (which is different than control) over outcomes.

Breaking down a problem in this way invites specialists in a variety of areas to become involved. This includes people who are parents, teachers, law enforcers, scientists, politicians, religious leaders, and even friends. People in each of these categories have unique windows through which they interact with the lives of others, and can alter one of the conditions that contributes towards that final outcome. This is not merely a hopeful, Pollyanna-ish perspective, nor is it merely a political avoidance of the words, “radical Islamic terrorism.” It is a realistic way of understanding the factors that result in certain people committing certain violent acts. Until we stop seeing problems myopically, as the result of simply this or that cause, we will not begin working towards change that has promise of improvement concerning outcomes of violence. The cost of this perspective, though, is that it makes us all accountable for being the best possible people towards each other, in each of the unique roles, relationships, and capacities we hold.

Blanket cynicism is as useless as blanket optimism at helping us to know what to do next. A lens that makes everything uniformly white is as useless as one that makes everything uniformly black. Sensation requires being able to distinguish between varying shades of gray, so that details can be seen in their nuance.

The idea that everybody in government is equally corrupt is useless when it comes to participation in a democracy, because democratic choices depend on using the little bit of power and influence one has to move things in directions that are good—or are at least better than alternative possibilities. The rage of some of my fellow citizens, along with their claim that the system is uniformly corrupt, leads one almost to conclude that they no longer consider the U.S. democratic project to be viable, and that they consider the chaos of revolution to be preferable to continuing to work towards solutions in our present system. I hope this tone can be moderated. I suspect many have not truly considered the implications of throwing out our current incarnation of the democratic ideal—the one we have learned about in civics lessons since kindergarten. Please take a moment to consider that the reason you have the freedom to vocally contest the merits of the present system, and the way it is being executed, is itself to the credit of the present system.

I cannot pretend that everything is equally bad, and will not give in to pressure to see things in that way. In the spirit of honoring nuance and the distinctions not only between good and bad, but also between relatively good and relatively bad, I want to say that I am proud to have Barack Obama as President. He has done a good job. He and his family have contended with public pressures which far exceed those which were faced by many other Presidents, who accomplished far less than he has during their terms. He has modeled a level of dignity, calmness, and grace, that will go down in history as exemplary. He has implemented programs, including the Affordable Care Act, which have improved conditions for the middle class and the general public—and which I suspect would have been lauded as landmark social advances, had they been implemented by a President who was not otherwise the target of social and political bias and discrimination. (I myself am a beneficiary of the Affordable Care Act, being able to get insurance for myself and my family after years of not being able to do so. The same is true for millions of other people.)

In that same spirit of honoring distinction, I would be proud to have Hillary Clinton as our next President. In terms of being able to maintain conditions necessary for the wellbeing of adults and children, in the U.S. and around the world, and those who face vulnerabilities as a result of economic hardship and minority status, she is better by far than the Republican alternative. Moreover, she is as deserving as anyone of being the one to break through the glass ceiling of U.S. Presidency for a woman. I believe she would assume and carry that mantle with dignity and grace.

By the way, I also would have been proud to have Bernie Sanders as our next President. I voted for him in the Oregon primary, because his candidacy appeared as a unique opportunity to address systemic inequalities and corruption. I did not vote for him because I saw Hillary Clinton as evil, though. I voted for him as though trying to choose the brighter of two lights—knowing all along that I would support either him or Hillary when it comes to the general election. I do not have to deride one to appreciate the other; nor will I.

I realize it is currently unpopular to express approval for one’s conduct in a political job, or to express optimism about possible futures. We gain nothing by concluding that all is hopeless, though, or that all is equally corrupt. Short of the demolition of our entire democratic system, we operate in the realm of relative judgments. In exercising our democratic privileges, voting included, we are deciding about which human beings will do the best job in making decisions on behalf of other human beings. We are not voting for a divine regime change, in which case—perhaps—our language of absolute good and evil might make sense. If we forfeit the ability to recognize distinctions, either through blanket cynicism or blanket optimism, we forfeit our powers of intelligence and discernment. We yield power not to what is best, but merely to what is most forceful.

A Reflection on the Culture of Name Calling

Negative name-calling, as an emotional style and way of relating, leads not merely with an accusation but with the verdict. It is as if sheriff, judge, and jury have all had due process and rolled their conclusion into the very introduction of who a person is. It commits the logical fallacy known as "begging the question," which means that the point which is in question (for example, the merit of a person being discussed) is secretly concluded and embedded within the question itself as an unchallenged premise. Name calling takes away the chance for the listener to examine the basis on which the name is given. 

Name calling is dangerous. Because it makes judgment upon the person being discussed a foregone conclusion, the next reasonable step in responding to that person includes the possibility of punishment, including everything from ostracism to death. Name calling is like walking around with a gun, cocked and aimed at other people, finger on the trigger--which also happens to be a hair-trigger. Ordinary discourse, when it is civil, puts a hedge between ourselves and this danger, like having a safety lock on the gun. 

Name calling packs judgement of the person all into the initial epithet, where it cannot be easily unpacked and assessed, because the emotion of the judgment has already been imparted, even if later questioning causes us to recognize the name is unfair. Name calling inevitably damages our image of the person being described, or injures our own emotions upon hearing it, in the same way that vandalism unfailingly leaves an uninvited consequence. It always leave something to clean up or to heal. Only eventually does it also damage the reputation of the one calling names, which is perhaps the most appropriate place for the damage to land. 

Name calling is also unnecessary. Once we recover from the initial shock or euphoria of hearing names being called, we eventually move to the question of whether the name is fair or not. Whether we determine it is or it isn't, we apparently already had enough evidence at hand to conclude the matter ourselves, without the dubious assistance of the hurtful name as our introduction to the question. The name calling did nothing but prematurely inflict injury by pointing out a flaw, the validity of which we have not yet been given a chance to consider.

There are reasons why name calling is a favorite tactic of bullies. And, there are reasons why we do not want bullies defining how it is that we talk in public life. 

A Reflection on Political Correctness

It has become a matter of pride, on the part of some, to say, “I have no need for political correctness,” and to portray political correctness as though it were a reprehensible conspiracy to squelch straight talk. I’d like to share some thoughts, to try to clarify what political correctness actually is, and what is the cost of discarding it.

What it boils down to is this: Political correctness is to conduct one’s speech in such a way so that people believe you are sensitive to characteristics that may be unique to them, that may put them in the minority, and that may render them socially vulnerable. It means to avoid speech or behavior that leads them to believe you are ridiculing or demeaning them. Political correctness, at its root, is connected to the idea of being “polite.” This is not such an outrageous expectation. We all want to feel we are respected by people and treated with dignity—even if they have disagreement about aspects of how we live our lives. A person who is politically correct—a person who is polite—is automatically granted a degree of influence over people, simply because, when people believe they are being treated with respect and dignity, they are likely to return the favor. I suspect none of us are exempt from this principle.

Moral influence is different than the influence that comes from being politically correct, but is deeply dependent upon it. If you disapprove of what you perceive to be a failure in someone’s morality, you stand a much greater chance of influencing their choices by stating your disagreement in a respectful way, so they do not feel you are ridiculing them in the process. In other words, there is no distraction of rudeness on your part, which would lead them to believe you are trying to change them simply because you consider them to be of lesser value than yourself. If you believe you have something of moral importance to communicate, you dare not dispense with political correctness—with politeness—because it is the sole bridge by which you might invite someone to join your perspective.

The cost of denigrating political correctness is this, then: The persuasive power and influence you might find through politeness is forsaken, closing the door to anything of moral importance you might believe you have to say. Positive social influence is thereby abandoned. The most powerful tool we have in our sociological, psychological, and spiritual toolbox, when it comes to exerting social influence, is thrown out.

The only means of influence that are left, when political correctness is jettisoned, are the motivations of punishment, reward, fear, and force. But, devoid of intentional respect, these motivators are all impersonal. They do not engage people in a bond of solidarity and community, but operate entirely on the basis of how they can guard their self-interest, in light of your antagonistic stance towards them. A world that is fashioned in the absence of political correctness is one that is destined to be adversarial at its core. It is a recipe for control, perhaps, but not for a society in which private and social aspirations ever come together. It is not the kind of world in which any of us would want to live.