for marriage

[Matt deGomme]

i would
go from one end of the universe
to the other
and back again
(that is called eternity)
with you
and never have grown
old,
bored,
or tired.

that is the distance
i see into your eyes;

that is the distance
between our lips

...when they come together
we shed time
and become forever.

“The Whites Have Become Black” & the similarly racist stuff you say daily

I’ve been looking at the #RiotsDebate trending topic on Twitter & the below video illustrates how the debate over the causes & response to last week’s London Riots is going. A guy in a suit with a lot of titles that suggest he has great judgment gives a simplistic reason for a complex problem that proves his judgment is terrible. Other people in plainclothes with much less esteem have a better picture the true issue, but don’t quite get it out clearly.

The one bit that has everyone in a stir comes from the guy in the suit, Historian David Starkey. About a minute & a quarter in he poetically describes why the rioters were of such a broad range of skin tones. “What’s happened is that the substantial segment of the ‘chavs’ that you [Owen Jones] wrote about have become black,” he explains. “The whites have become black.”

Yea. It’s racist as fuck. But, as a manner of speaking, he’s not saying something much different than what lots of people - black, white, Indian, whatever - say in their daily lives.

About two minutes into the conversation he talks about David Lammy, a Member of Parliament (MP) who is black. Starkey says that if you listened to Lammy on the radio, you’d think he was white. As someone regularly called “a well-spoken black man” by many a surprised black woman & an “oreo” by black peers throughout my adolescence, I can vouch that many of the same ideas behind Starkey’s point about Lammy & the ‘chavs’ are perpetuated among black people themselves. In fact, all Starkey is doing is calling Lammy an oreo.

Google the phrase “Real black man” & you get over 2 million results. I’m currently looking at a .pdf file titled ‘Obama and the Arithmetic of Racial Authenticity’ whose contents are as convoluted & misguided as the tittle suggests. All of these ideas have the same ingredients as Starkey’s statements. When you talk about a “real black man,” you’re talking about some conceptual “blackness” (a culture, which Starkey clarifies is what he means by ‘black’) that you want him to have on top of his literal “blackness” or skin color. To put it another way, Starkey could have just as coherently said “the blacks have become black,” where “blacks” & “black” refer to two separate things.

As the debate unfolds, Deda Say Mitchell, another panelist, says it’s inappropriate to talk about “black culture” as some monolithic set of norms. Blacks are so diverse & have so many different cultural behaviors that we should shift the dialogue to talking about “black cultures.” Great. She’s one pluralization less wrong. The problem here is actually one that’s frustrated me in discussions about culture, race, & ethnicity since high school. It’s not that we don’t have enough groupings of black people, it’s that we have those groupings at all.

The flaw is simple to expose: take two black people who come from different environments and have conflicting understandings of what it means to “really” be black, your entire paradigm is thrown off. It’s impossible to say that one’s definition of ‘black culture’ is more correct than the other. But rather than debating which one of them is really “black” (which anyone who says Starkey mischaracterizes ‘black culture(s)’ tacitly does), it’s simpler to realize the inanity of that entire way of speaking. As well-intentioned & uplifting as your ideas of ‘black culture(s)’ are, they’re never any less stereotypical or more “authentically” black than whatever it is Starkey meant. In truth, what you’re really talking about a set of environmental pressures that, as these riots made very clear, “whites” can react to in the same way that “blacks” do. The response isn’t “black” - it’s human.

So yes, Starkey’s statement was condescending & racist - but no more so than yours are when you talk about the qualities you want in a boyfriend or that one kid with the kinky hair & salmon colored polo that loves Phish. The definitions might be different, but the sentiment is the same.

Astaghfiru limomo. [MdG]

An American’s Thoughts on the London Riots

“Burn, Wall, burn.”

My mind’s eye is utterly captivated by the London Riots. A part Most of me wishes I was there to bear witness. No doubt, there is so much to say about the burning & destruction that’s well into its fourth day. With so many people involved, with so many rioters each to his own idea, with so many men & women whose livelihoods have been destroyed - all around a movement void of a charter - there will be so many accusations & complaints that the Truth can easily go buried in confused frustration. This is precisely what the system of injustice that fostered these riots wants & why we must be sure to find the Truth amid the debris before it is lost.

I understand the limits of what I can say about this event. I am not English - I’ve never even been to England. I have few English friends & know little about the nuances of the English political system. But, firstly, I am a person & I believe that this affords me the ability to understand the mind of the rioters, citizens, police, & government involved in this event. What’s more, I’m an American, which means that I come from many of the same social, cultural, & philosophical traditions that my brothers in England do.

Most importantly, from what the rioters say about their own actions - the ones mature enough to have reasons anyway - they have many of the same grievances much of my generation does. We’re bombarded with acclaim for our exceptional political systems but perpetually see these systems openly perverted for greed. We’re told to obey the authority that does not obey its responsibility to us. We’ve grown up in an increasingly apathetic, self-centered, & self-aggrandizing society that shows few symptoms of the greatness it carries as a banner. So while I am not there, I share enough bits of the rioters’ & bystanders’ disposition that I believe I can see some of the heart of the matter. In other words, though I recognize I cannot name a street that’s on fire or local politician, I sympathize with the essence that spurns the rioters on.

Many Londoners who observe the riots from without believe the riots are nothing more than criminal frenzy. The rioters, they say, are only out to selfishly loot & destroy. I believe this is an oversimplification of what is in truth a sordid mix of helplessness, justification, & confusion. Ask the rioters & they will respond that they’re sick of the police & the government – “The Man” – that takes advantage of them but neglects to care for them. It is, no doubt, happy coincidence that they are free to take what is not properly theirs & that they’re having what some of them call “fun,” but that is their unsavory response to the truth that they have been wronged. Their justifications are sordid, but no more so than hearing “fairness” & “liberty” as justifications of their oppression.

If I am wrong about this & they are merely criminals lost, then the accusers should look first inward at themselves & their role in the society that permits, however indirectly, such behavior. Anyone who questions the rioters should first question the generation that raised them; the generation who showed them that looting & plundering would go unpunished (if not corroborated) so long as the criminal has the anonymity a mask, like the businessman’s money & corporate walls, provides.

Despite the looters’ intent, their victims are arbitrary. That is a fact that every bystander & police officer recognizes. It is also one that the rioters, when they see the fruits of their labor, will recognize themselves. If the attacks had half as much intelligence as righteous indignation, the damage would be limited to buildings like police stations, banks & perhaps government institutions. The thing is that, right now, the rioters do not feel that their attacks are arbitrary. Many of the rioters don’t know the difference between big business & small business - they see business & are sick of it continuing as usual, so their rocks fly indiscriminately.

& you’ll say the difference between a police station & a business is a matter of degree - citizens still pay the taxes that build police stations. Herein is buried the truth that as much as these teenagers burn your tax dollars to the ground, these police officers slap those same tax dollars around your & your children’s wrists for crimes much less grievous than the those committed by the wealthy; the same wealthy who, for decades now, pay less & less in those same taxes for your bondage. At their very worst, the riots make tangible what corporations & the government they own have done to your hearts for years.

Last night on BBC Radio, I heard a small-business owner respond to criticisms that the rioters would cause more struggles for the people in the neighborhood. He responded that he understood the rioters frustration, but more importantly any victim was probably struggling already. The little these owners had was everything to them, but in the end, it was little. So yes, their troubles have been magnified, but now - perhaps - their long overdue aid will be increased in kind. If the victims’ needs are not met, the riots have burned with a cold sense of Justice. The rioters will only have proven the callousness against which they rally; they will have proven the ineffectiveness of the political system the pacifists believe they would have done better to use.

The most inspiring aspect of these events comes not from the rioters; nor from the government whose leader remained on vacation 3 days while parts of the city burned; nor from the police officers, who stand in as much solidarity against the rioters as they collude in defense of a corrupt comrade. Rather, the purest aspect of this altercation is the response of the community. This morning, London awoke & repaired itself. Individual citizens donned gloves, trash bags, & brooms to help their neighbors recuperate from the destruction. When the sun rises again in London a few hours from now, I’m sure the response will be even greater. With thousands fewer police officers responding to the city in flames than stationed at a pompous & circumstantial wedding, Londoners were right to not wait for police & the government to aid them. Today London affirms that, whether from the government or from your neighbor, help is help. Government is meant to fill in where society cannot - not the other way around. This is what, it seems, England - like the US - has forgotten but as discovered again today.

London, scorn the rioters less than you learn from them. Their crime is a momentary spark of juvenile irritation & will be snuffed out while greater, more penetrating crimes persist. London, take care - & not just of yourselves, for that is the selfish disposition that fostered this destruction. As you did this morning & will do again tomorrow, take care of one another. Start there & your - our culture will begin to heal these wounds.

[MdG]

Chapter 439 Scene 1T (or “Pamphlet”)

[Matt deGomme]

       “Excuse me, sir. I see you have a Bible there,” said an unfamiliar man who extended a tiny pamphlet. “I have some information.”
        He did have a Bible resting on his lap, spine outwards. One of the casualties of living in America is that anyone who sees you reading a Bible assumes you believe its contents. There, in the back of the bus, he looked through sepia tinted sunglasses first at the stranger across the aisle and then down at the pamphlet. He didn’t dwell on either image very long, but he could see on the cover the drawing of a man’s back. The figure was standing and facing into some giant door or opening out of which came a bright, consuming light. “How Will You Survive?” was written in large white text immediately underneath the figure’s feet.
        He could imagine the contents already. It was likely a specific account of how the Bible long ago predicted so many recent tragedies, which meant the end of the world was nigh. Failing that, it was almost certainly a more general account of the eternal damnation he and anyone else who didn’t so believe could expect after death. There was probably a ‘Did You Know?’ column and perhaps even some juvenile animations of the kind he’d read in Sunday School years ago. In his heart he knew he already had all of the apocalyptic proclamations and promises of eternal damnation he needed in his lap and at home, he didn’t need another pamphlet.
        Nonetheless, he knew that it would be rude to deny the offer, so he thought to take it. In a split second, he imagined receiving the pamphlet and at least pretending to look at it - the polite things to do. After a quick though curious glance, he would fold up the paper and slide it into his already cluttered backpack and promise himself that he’d discard it as soon as possible. He’d smile at the stranger for the gift but, since he was so forgetful, would find it weeks later crumpled and covered in ink or ketchup. Between the existential and practical stresses, he decided it’d be simplest to decline.
        He raised a hand to the pamphlet. “No, thank you,” he said. (He always meant those thank you’s since he knew first-hand where these offers came from. The greatest thing you can do for someone is secure their place in eternal glory, if not save them from damnation. Such pamphlets, then, were only ever given out of concern and selfless love, and for this he was sincerely grateful. It is what the pamphlets give men into that pushed him away.) He realized how softly he’d said it, but something about the fatigued way he rose his hand assured him the message got across clearly. He kept eye contact from behind his glasses and could feel how still his lips were. The man looked down at the pamphlet with something like confusion and slowly retracted it.
        Sitting across the aisle, he could feel frustrated thoughts in the stranger’s head. The man slowly pulled a little zip-up case he had at his side onto his lap and put the pamphlet inside gently, like an animal that had just been badly and unnecessarily bruised. The stranger let his hands rest nervously on the case for a minute before he leaned forward, picked up the bag seated on the ground in front of him, put the case with pamphlet inside, and walked up to the front of the bus.
        The timing of his departure disclosed that it was unnatural. The bus wouldn’t stop for another several minutes, so to exchange sitting comfortably in the back for standing in the crowded front must have been spurred by some deep discomfort. Still seated in the back, watching from behind his sepia tinted sunglasses as the stranger walked away, he knew that something about their interaction had caused the man to leave. What that was exactly, he couldn’t say - at least not with certainty; at least not with faith.