Pragmatism versus morality

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Trump: The Choice We Face, another insightful and important essay from Masha Gessen.

We cannot know what political strategy, if any, can be effective in containing, rather than abetting, the threat that a Trump administration now poses to some of our most fundamental democratic principles. But we can know what is right. What separates Americans in 2016 from Europeans in the 1940s and 1950s is a little bit of historical time but a whole lot of historical knowledge. We know what my great-grandfather did not know: that the people who wanted to keep the people fed ended up compiling lists of their neighbors to be killed. That they had a rationale for doing so. And also, that one of the greatest thinkers of their age judged their actions as harshly as they could be judged.

Armed with that knowledge, or burdened with that legacy, we have a slight chance of making better choices. As Trump torpedoes into the presidency, we need to shift from realist to moral reasoning. That would mean, at minimum, thinking about the right thing to do, now and in the imaginable future. It is also a good idea to have a trusted friend capable of reminding you when you are about to lose your sense of right and wrong.

Trump: The Choice We Face | by Masha Gessen | NYR Daily | The New York Review of Books

Go, Durm!

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I’m incredibly proud to be a Durhamite. Most recently because of this powerful Letter to the People of the City of Durham from the Durham City Council.

The Durham City Council (1) condemns all hateful speech and violent action directed at Muslims, those perceived to be Muslims, immigrants and people of color; (2) categorically rejects any politician’s anti-Muslim rhetoric used as a tactic to influence voters or inflame hostilities; (3) commits to pursuing a policy agenda that affirms civil and human rights, and ensures that those targeted on the basis of race, religion or immigration status can turn to government without fear of recrimination; (4) reaffirms the value of a pluralistic society, the beauty of a culture composed of multiple cultures, and the inalienable right of every person to live and practice their faith without fear; and (5) pledges to work to make Durham a city that reflects those values in word and deed.

These are the values of the city of Durham. They are as true today as they were before the election of Donald Trump as President of the United States, and they will be just as true on the day he vacates that high office. Regardless of the policy agenda that our new president-elect decides to pursue, the city of Durham will remain as committed as ever to combatting hatred and bigotry in all forms, and to protecting and advancing the civil and human rights of all of the people of this city.

Gratitude and mindfulness

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So thankful to have a mindfulness practice and to receive this insightful and badly-needed Buddhist perspective from a senior disciple of Thich Nhat Hanh. A Buddhist monk explains mindfulness for times of conflict: “Compassion is not sitting in your room; it’s actually very active and engaging”

Also appreciating the wise tweets of Buddhist teacher and author Ethan Nichtern right now. Among all the fake Buddhist ideas, the idea of maintaining “neutrality” is the most damaging now. It’s about being truthful, not neutral.

Proposed ‘Economic Terrorism’ law is straight up fascism

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I really hate to use the word UnAmerican, so let’s just say I can hardly imagine anything more unconstitutional and unpatriotic. Public dissent is essential to the functioning of democracy. For example, no-one would have noticed Dr. King and the civil rights movement if they hadn’t disrupted businesses.

A Republican Washington state senator who supported Donald Trump is proposing a bill that would slap an “economic terrorism” label on protest activities already prohibited by law and dramatically intensify their penalties.
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The proposed bill would allow police to charge protesters who “block transportation and commerce, cause property damage, threaten jobs and put public safety at risk” with a class C felony. Ericksen said strikes and picketing would still be permitted.

Source: Washington GOPer Proposes Charging Protesters With ‘Economic Terrorism’

Links of the day – If you’re not outraged, you’re not paying attention

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Here is some good stuff I posted on social media recently:

For Strong Women by Marge Piercy (1980)

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A strong woman is a woman who is straining.
A strong woman is a woman standing
on tip toe and lifting a barbell
while trying to sing Boris Godunov.
A strong woman is a woman at work
cleaning out the cesspool of the ages,
and while she shovels, she talks about
how she doesn’t mind crying, it opens
the ducts of her eyes, and throwing up
develops the stomach muscles, and
she goes on shoveling with tears in her nose.

A strong woman is a woman in whose head
a voice is repeating, I told you so,
ugly, bad girl, bitch, nag, shrill, witch,
ballbuster, nobody will ever love you back,
why aren’t you feminine, why aren’t
you soft, why aren’t you quiet, why
aren’t you dead?

A strong woman is a woman determined
to do something others are determined
not to be done. She is pushing up on the bottom
of a lead coffin lid. She is trying to raise
a manhole cover with her head, she is trying
to butt her way though a steel wall.
Her head hurts. People waiting for the hole
to be made say, hurry, you’re so strong.

A strong woman is a woman bleeding
inside. A strong woman is a woman making
herself strong every morning while her teeth
loosen and her back throbs. Every baby,
a tooth, midwives used to say, and now
every battle a scar. A strong woman
is a mass of scar tissue that aches
when it rains and wounds that bleed
when you bump them and memories that get up
in the night and pace in boots to and fro.

A strong woman is a woman who craves love
like oxygen or she turns blue choking.
A strong woman is a woman who loves
strongly and weeps strongly and is strongly
terrified and has strong needs. A strong woman is strong
in words, in action, in connection, in feeling;
she is not strong as a stone but as a wolf
sucking her young. Strength is not in her, but she
enacts it as the wind fills a sail.

What comforts her is other’s loving
her equally for the strength and for the weakness
from which it issues, lightning from a cloud.
Lightning stuns. In rain, the clouds disperse.
Only water of connection remains,
flowing through us. Strong is what we make together,
a strong woman is a woman strongly afraid.

Defiance

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This weekend I attended a wonderful gathering of people who are not OK with letting ignorance and hate infect our community and our state. Before Durham in Defiance, some people complained that we should be demonstrating in the streets rather than standing around talking. We have been in the streets for many years, and we will turn out again (and again, and again). But what made this event really important was that it was organized for the long haul.

Continue reading “Defiance” →