Reflections and Insights of an Unabashed Old-schooler.

After nearly five years’ writing of my Omnium-Gatherum-Millerum musings I am ready (soon) to give it a facelift and a new title.  I am still, and always will be, highly indebted to the ‘giants’ whom I have never met—except through their writings—who have inspired me and persuaded me to continue in the hopes that my own postings (and theirs) may be helpful to someone else.

 

As I acknowledged in one of my very first forays into public writing I make no claim on ‘pure originality’ in most of my postings, but I do make them as an educated man. (Indeed, I believe that few writers from any age were ‘purely original.)  I give credit to the commonly attributed source when I know it, but often use my lifetime of notes and thoughts generated by my past and current reading, personal experiences, and, yes, ‘inspiration’ to provide my material.  What the reader can count on is that I believe in that which I write and which I selectively share in the writings of others, and I believe these things can have a positive influence on those who read with an open mind and open heart. 

I also remind the reader of this essay that I originally started my weblog at the urging of my wife and for the benefit of my children and stepchildren and close friends.  Unfortunately, I believe that few of these loved-ones read these things anymore (or ever did) with any regularity.  I console myself that one infinitely greater than I faced the same difficulty: “And when [Jesus] was come into his own country, he taught them….[And] they were astonished, and said, Whence hath this man this wisdom, and these mighty works?  Is not this the carpenter’s son. . . ? And they were offended in him.  But Jesus said unto them, A prophet is not without honour, save in his own country, and in his own house.  And he did not many mighty works there because of their unbelief” (Matthew 13:54-58).  I am not a prophet, but I am a man who loves his family.

Lastly, as anyone who has read me knows, my postings are of a decidedly ‘moralistic’ flavor.  This is intentional.  It is intentional even at the expense of ‘offending’ potential readership.  Being a moralist in the 21^st Century is very out-of-style and out-of-step with the Millennial and even the late Baby-boomer generations.  But being a moralist, “the voice of one crying in the wilderness” (see Matthew 3:1-3) seems more and more in my old age to be my calling.  There are few who do it because of its ‘political incorrectness’ and because many good people have been cowed into submission because of the twisting of the terms ‘tolerance’ and ‘judgmental’ and even ‘bigoted’ or ‘mean-spirited.’ People who use these and similar terms are not on the high ground.  More often than not they are just strident self-justifiers of their own immorality.

The weight of the centuries—the values and virtues and principles that have sustained civilizations are at issue.  We devalue or disregard them at our own peril. I, for one, defend them unabashedly and invite others to come on board.

Times and Seasons

In the 2^nd and 3^rd chapters of the book of Ecclesiastes of the Bible the ‘preacher,’ or teacher, (perhaps King Solomon in his elderly years) looks at his life and comes to the conclusion that most of it was meaningless.  He uses the word “vanity” at least 35 times.  Vanity, in King James English derives from the Hebrew word ‘hevel’ meaning a mere breath, a ‘puff’, a ‘whiff’ that is here and gone, or transitory and not enduring.  He looks at the human experience and sees man pursuing hopes and expectations that being centered on worldly pleasures cannot be satisfied.

 

What makes life not meaningless, he finds,  requires a change of focus, from that of material ‘things,’ or transitory pleasures, or honors of men, or man’s wisdom,  to the purposes of God for man—God’s wisdom.

  

God sees the end from the beginning and so gives (or gifts) man with 'times and seasons' to do that which will lead him to a fulfilling life. The ‘preacher’ acknowledges this in the 3^rd chapter and tells us “To every thing there is a season and a time to every purpose under the heaven” (vs. 1). In verse 11 he says “[God] hath made every thing beautiful in his time.” It can likewise be so in our time if we discover the purpose and use it well.

  

In his existential despair the ‘preacher’ fluctuates between insightful wisdom and his own personal angst in the twelve chapters of this little book, but the  overarching insight he comes to is that God has ordered all things for the proper use by man (in its ‘time’ and in its ‘season’) and “for a man to rejoice and to do good in his life” (3:12).

 

I distill all this down to a few thought that come to mind with this reading from the holy scriptures:

• ·Every day is a good day—no matter what the weather.
• When it is the time or the season to plant then plant; to harvest, harvest; to lay up for the future then sacrifice or save or insure; to get an education then do it; to find a mate or an occupation then apply yourself to it; to serve, then serve.  But “do not run faster or labor more than you have strength and means provided . . . but be diligent unto the end.” (D&C 10:4)

• See the world for what it is and enjoy it.  Leave the environment alone enough to let it do what it is supposed to do for us; the earth was made for man to discover, enjoy, use with wisdom but not to abuse.

• Try to achieve and maintain a balance in your life.  Get into a rhythm and harmonize with the world around you—with the gift of your mind and body; the people around you; the environment and circumstances you are put into; the resources you find yourself stewards of.

• As the turning of the earth around its own axis each day and the orbiting of the earth around the sun each year we find ourselves with new beginnings: a new day, a new year, new opportunities to repent, to grow, to move forward. Resolve, in some way, to make every day better than the last one.

• When a season, such as the Christmas season, comes around do everything you can to get in harmony with it.  The same with Springtime, or times of Thanksgiving and harvest, times when we have increased capacities such as the strength of youth, or the seasoned perspective of advanced years, or when we have more material resources than we need.

• Use the new seasons, the new times, the new people we meet, the new knowledge we discover, our accumulated resources, for the purposes they were given to us—to become better people, and to help others to become better; in short, to meet the measure of our creation and lay the foundation for joy in this life and eternal felicity in the life to come. 

A Conversation on Race Relations

A brief review of immigration in America reveals some interesting historical facts that may shed some light on the most recent African-American uprising stemming from the deaths of two young Black men.  Seventeen-year-old Trayvon Martin was killed in 2012 by a white neighborhood-watch volunteer in Florida and 18-year- old Michael Brown was shot this year by a white police officer in the line of his duty in Ferguson, Missouri.  Response by the Black community was swift in both instances claiming that justice was not served in behalf of the young men whom they, of course, claimed were innocent of any wrong-doing.  The academic and juvenile criminal records of both young men suggests otherwise.

 

I will get to what immigration has to do with this in a moment.

    

In both cases the focus by the Black community and news media shifted immediately from the actions perpetrated by the Black youths:  first to the lethal response of the shooters and then to the local court that acquitted the Florida volunteer of shooting in self-defense and the Missouri grand jury that did not indict the police officer who responded to a crime-in-action being caught on a security camera and in self-defense when trying to make an arrest.  Social media and the liberal press then quickly fanned the flames of the local response to condemn law-enforcement in general and then the larger institution of the justice system in America as being oppressive and discriminatory toward Black people and young Black males in particular.  

My take on this ongoing situation is that the Black public reaction to these unfortunate incidents was really not about Trayvon Martin and Michael Brown, but about the still unsettled race issue in America of what is perceived by African-Americans as intolerable inequality and social discrimination.  Law enforcement and the justice system has become the scape-goat of their perception and their frustration. 

 

To the discredit of their cause they have chosen racial profiling as the issue.  Put baldly, many Blacks feel they are being picked upon—because they are Black—and are targeted for police brutality.  I have recently reviewed the statistics from the 2013 U.S. Census Bureau and the 2012 FBI Crime statistics (and encourage the reader to do the same) and it is clear that Black America does not have a case against law enforcement or the justice system being institutionally discriminatory or heavy-handed in the administration of the law.  Blacks simply have a greatly disproportionate involvement in law- breaking in the cases that require a strong response by law enforcement.  Prison populations reflect that.

As regarding law enforcement, with the disrespect and provocation so many police officers receive at the hands of criminal suspects it is remarkable that so many law-enforcement officers act with the professionalism and restraint that they do show.  Saying this does not imply my approval of excessive force when it does occur by rogue policemen (and there are some) but it does help to explain it.  In many other cases—the great majority, I am sure—lethal response by the police when following protocol is absolutely appropriate to the circumstance for public safety.

With the white population (excluding Hispanics and Latinos) in America at 62.6% and Blacks at only 13.2 % it should be noted (according to FBI Crime Statistics 2012) that young Black men commit 50.8% of the murders in America, 68.6% of the robberies, 35.5% of property crime and 51.5% of all violent crimes—all of which are highly disproportionate to their representation in the general population.  The same statistics show that young white men are not ignored by police because drug violations, ‘suspicion,’ vagrancy, and D.U.I.’s are committed by a higher percentage of them than do Blacks.  The point is that violence in America is committed far more, relatively speaking,  by young Black men than whites and so it is no wonder that there are far more Black men proportionally arrested by police officers for violent crime and incarcerated upon conviction by juries than whites.

 

These are the facts. But as to the causal factors as to why young Blacks fall under the net of law-enforcement more than whites, Latinos, or Asians who live in America I will suggest two possibilities.

Inasmuch as the ancestors of America’s Blacks are the only immigrant population that did not come to America by choice—they came in the 17^th, 18^th and early 19^th centuries as slaves—the shame and blame of this is emblazoned upon the cultural memory of today’s Blacks and is still highly resented.  Slavery was wrong, but it happened.  But it also happened a long time ago. Somehow many African-Americans appear to feel that atonement by white America continues to need to be made—that because of past wrongs Blacks deserve special consideration under the law. When incidents such as the Martin and Brown cases come to public attention and justice, in their minds was not served, this element of the Black community wants to  reject and ‘punish’ the system and somehow thinks that yet more lawless behavior somehow balances the scales.

It does not. The scales have not been balanced; they just have been tipped more. 

Another causal possibility is the more current cultural heritage of many Blacks: of being generational public welfare recipients.  There is an evil being perpetrated by the dole that free food and other government subsidies cannot compensate.  It damages the recipient’s self-respect and a person or group of people with low self-esteem often feel a need to blame someone else for their troubles and to demonstrate what power they do have. 

 

I think that if any minority (and we were all ‘minorities’ at some time in our past) wants to move forward they must shed our past hurts and grievances.  It is an attitudinal thing.  If we are in America and want to stay in America we all need to subscribe to the American ethos, E Pluribus Unum.  

   

Other early immigrants—the Jews, Irish, Italians, Germans, and Scandinavians also had tough and trying pasts.  They fled from famine, war, political and religious persecution and prejudice but became assimilated as Americans through assiduous application to gaining an education and through deprivation and hard work.  They also had to learn English—a difficult language.  One great advantage that all successful minorities seemed to have was a solid family orientation. 

  

It is now the 21^st century and today’s Blacks simply need to let go of the past.  They need to bury the hatchet.  Destroying property, burning police cars, looting businesses, throwing rocks at the police does not and will not improve race relations.  It will once again drive the races apart.

These violent protestors will only hurt their cause if they continue to violate the cause of justice.  I do not believe I am the only person in America who is becoming alienated as to sympathy for any cause they think they may continue to have if their response to due process of law is irresponsible violence. 

In having my wife read the draft of this article her response was, “Well, okay, I agree with your analysis, but what’s your solution?”  My solution is that Americans of all races have a choice.  They can be good citizens of this nation—can obey, defend, and sustain the laws—can be contributors, not just takers or destroyers--or they can do what most of our forefathers before they came to this country did in principle or in fact: our dissidents can secure an exit-visa from U.S. authorities as our forefathers did from the countries that were oppressing them and find a destination that will take them in as a refugee and see if things are any better there. 

 

I am but one of the great majority of all Americans who believe in ‘liberty and justice for all.’ And I believe justice comes in the courts, not in the streets, and that, as depicted in marble on our Supreme Court steps, the female figure ‘Contemplation of Justice’ does indeed wear a blindfold.  Her male counterpart on the other side of the steps is known as the ‘Guardian or Authority of Law.’ These two are critical foundational stones of civil and social stability that must be adhered to by all races, colors, and creeds.