Saturday, January 8, 2011. Is it destined to become one of those dates that is horrifyingly burned into our collective memory? JFK, MLK, RFK, Reagan, Challenger, Oklahoma City, 9-11. Tucson. Where were you? What were you doing? These are the question we will ask other people. But what we really mean and will never ask is, “How did it make you feel?” And that’s the one question we should ask.
How we all feel about the attempted assassination of Congresswoman Giffords will determine the future course of our country. This is a linchpin moment. Do we, finally, pull the linchpin on the over-heated, hate-filled, eliminationist rhetoric on the right before irrevocable damage is done to our society as a whole? Frankly, I’m scared.
I don’t call for a quashing of honest political debate. Nor a curtailment of free speech. I don’t live under an illusion that someday everyone will wake up and magically be in agreement about everything and there will be rainbows and unicorns and all will be right with the world. The republicans disagree with the democrats, the tea-partiers disagree with everyone (you kids get off my lawn!), the libertarians can’t even agree inside their own heads, and the greens or whatever they call themselves these days can’t stop agreeing with each other long enough to get anything done.
Contentiousness is built into the American character. We are a nation built on weirdos and malcontents and pie-in-the-sky dreamers, jumped-up wannabe blue-bloods, ornery cusses, outlaws, puritans and the kind of people that get kicked out of more civilized countries. But we are also a nation of the Nations that were here long before the pilgrims arrived, people robbed of their birthrights by greed and malice. My Nation, my ancestors, my blood. We are also a nation literally built on the backs of people of color. Brought here against their will to be slaves to jumped-up wannabe blue-bloods. We cannot forget that we are also a nation of refugees, people with nowhere else to go, people escaping grinding poverty in their home countries, people escaping real persecution for the color of their skin or their religious beliefs or ethnic background.
Our differences make us stronger, but.
We, the diverse American people, have to demand that our politicians, pundits, and preachers start behaving like decent people again. I’m looking at you Sarah, Glen, and Rush. And Ann, Sean, Fred, Michelle and lots of other righties that I’m forgetting because whatever. If you noticed that I didn’t include liberals in my list, it was on purpose. While left-leaning voices can sometimes be strident and strong, we don’t call for “2nd Amendment remedies,” or to “reload,” or put people in cross-hairs. I’m not saying there aren’t violent individuals in our camp, but they are totally fringe and are treated as such, not hailed as heroes.
There are no talk shows hosted by ELF members regularly calling for new housing additions to be torched or trees to be spiked. And left-wing violence would absolutely not be condoned in word, deed, or silence by our elected officials. Left-wing fringe violence would be condemned and not recast as really-they-weren’t-liberal-they-were-somethingelse, or deflected, or blamed on the victims. That shit’s right-wing tactics.
Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords is a democrat (though a conservative one) in a heavily republic state. She is Jewish, she is a highly-visible woman in the traditional male-stronghold of government, and she made herself accessible to her constituents. Any of these factors could be the motivation behind her assassination attempt.
In the end, based on the shooter’s muddled internet ramblings and bizarre beliefs, it may be that her very accessibility lead to her being targeted.
Even if that is the case, we must not lose sight of the fact that right-wing eliminationist rhetoric loaded the gun. And a madman pulled the trigger. An already troubled mind cannot steep long in the noxious tea a-brewing in this country, without breaking in some fashion.
I’ll tell you how I feel about Congresswoman Giffords’ shooting. I feel sick about it. Sick and disgusted. And I’m tired of being told that both sides need to be more civil. Democrats are always the ones that have to be civil, and play nice, and walk on eggshells, and make sure we don’t offend the delicate sensibilities of the poor, privileged whiny babies on the right. Republicans need to clean up their collective, public act and democrats need to quit worrying about being fair and start standing up for what is right.
I come from a long line of plain-spoken country women and I believe in calling a spade a spade. It’s not fertilizer, it’s bullshit and the right-wing needs to start minding their manners and stop tracking it into the house.