Hoping for a Beloved Community
Did you know that Dr, Martin Luther King and Anne Frank were both born in 1929? Each faced similar hate. I will honor Dr. King today by admitting that I was wrong. The post I was working on today was to be marvelously informative about ICE and how we should perceive events. Instead, because I had the privilege to be at MLK Jr. Day Civic Leaders Breakfast, I had to take a breath and think about building "Beloved Communities".
MLK Jr. Day Civic Leaders Breakfast The annual event honors Dr, King and Keene's civil rights martyr Jonathan Daniels. It is sponsored by the city's human rights committee and the wonderful Community Kitchen. Our speaker was the remarkable Adar Cohen, originally from Keene.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LZu16ZaLgJM
We had an honest, open, and thoughtful discussion dealing with anger, isolation, fear, and sense of powerless given the current polarization and violence. I mistakenly thought I should try to “explain” some of it and the misuse of labels. Instead, I was reminded to engage first. “Conflict loves speed” Adar reminded us. I will slow down.
Listening not Labeling I have taught that labeling people sets up a dangerous dynamic. I have seen it as a way to retrench an opponent into a defensive position. Of course, it also retrenches me. Yes, we want to identify unjust actions but how we do it matters. Rather than attempting to justify or articulate my position I have learned to listen. Listening, in respectful humility (I continue to learn so much), allows me to grow and also listen to and actually hear why others are doing what they are doing. This is not to "explain it away" but to understand someone else's reality and culture. Really, I have found that listening (not judging or evaluating) creates a common space for growth and discussion. It's the teacher in me. (Shout out to our educators!) Not everyone is like me (thankfully) and although I may disagree with them or their actions, a better future – and present – cannot be built without respect.
As a Holocaust educator I listen to stories and experiences that are not mine. Listening allows me to grow and also recognize that it is not my reality to claim but to be informed by. This will be a focus of the book I am currently working on. There is much anger, fear, and violence occurring in our polarized society. It is not the first time. We had a Civil War and the Civil Rights movement. Democracy gives us a way of perceiving the dangers and create safe spaces to wrestle with and mitigate it. Hearing others' questions is a big step forward.
Revealing Questions I remember being at Yad Vashem in Jerusalem with an angry colleague seeking answers to justify his grievances. We were talking to Anne Frank’s friend Hannah Pick (“Lies Goosens” in Anne’s diary). As I listened to his query about “how did you get your revenge” I saw someone's pain and need to reach out to find answers. I could not expect the answer that was given. Hannah responded, kindly, calmly, and with a smile, “I had children”. This assertion that revenge is to choose life and love and not victimhood still shapes my life. Admittedly, I do enjoy it when my hidden child friend Kati Preston puts it a little differently, “Every time I had a child it was like giving the finger to Hitler.” The connection is to choose, to assert, life itself. It also points out the necessity of taking care of ourselves and letting go of things you have no control over.
I have often talked about the student who tried to silence my presentation by yelling “Proud Boys Rule” and my instinctive response (helped by listening to an FBI hostage negotiator the night before) to listen, rather than to label and condemn. He was angry, fearful, and wondering about his future. And yet, he and I, because of mutual respect that developed by listening to each other, came to a different and better place. I must be genuinely curious about that other person. We must listen first, connect to things that are outside of our comfort zone, and trust that we have more in common than that which obviously separates us. Often, the common things are about safety, dignity, and the ability to express oneself to someone who will listen. If we hear statements as questions we can be less defensive, pause, and learn from the possibilities the question opened up.
In one conversation with a student, he prefaced his comments by saying, “Are you going to cancel me?” if I speak. I reassured him that I don’t do that. But my response was defensive and judgmental. Luckily, it was also curious. I asked him why he felt that way, rather than trying to convince him he was wrong. We had a wonderful talk. If we want to build Dr, King’s vision of a “Beloved Community” we have to listen more and judge less. Nonviolence is not just being nice, it is a strategy to illuminate how destructive and self-destructive violence is.
Hope of Nonviolence and Limits of Optimism The Civil Rights movement succeeded because it choose nonviolence as both a tactical and strategic approach. One cannot fight hate and power with either. We can identify expressions of violence as rooted in hate and fear but we must avoid asserting that our way is better through expressions of hate and fear. We must offer hope. I used to teach AP European History and Voltaire's Candide. In it, Pangloss (windbag) is the optimist who continues to assert his optimistic view that everything is great and that we live in the "best of all possible worlds". This, despite religious bigotry, violence, and even the destruction of Lisbon through an earthquake. It is vapid. Instead, we can choose hope. Hope identifies the problems and recognizes that we can fix them.
In our democratic life we must choose dignity. It is not, as Adar stated, simply about smiling or giving out flowers. However nice that may be, we need to do more and act strategically with our convictions. If we listen, engage eye to eye with curiosity, and accept that the work is not easy, then we can build a common ground, a space where education, not self-defensiveness, can happen. Teachers instinctively know this. Rather than ask, why are you doing this? We can ask, what is important to you? What is one thing you’d like to tell me about yourself?
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My Turn I recently returned from our annual meeting of the Association of Holocaust Organizations at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, DC. Like this morning, these people sustain me and help me get beyond myself. Dare yourself to find a group that offers you growth and support. In humility I made my way to the MLK monument in DC. There, I recognized that I am in his shadow. That I cannot hesitate from the work. That his vision of active nonviolence points us in the direction of hope. I am a person of great hope but little optimism.
