Hate harvests hate: the innocent get lost in the confusion and rage

My daughter's faith and core human decency makes me feel proud, and humble. A bitter irony exposed here is that racism, hatred and misunderstanding seem to plague all human beings -- white, black, brown, almond, whatever. We fear the "Other."

Hate harvests hate. Violence begets violence. The innocent get lost in the confusion and rage.

This is what she posted about an incident in Baltimore:

"My heart is grieved. The protests and violence erupting from so much oppression and evil leaves me speechless. I talk often with my husband on how to raise our children in a godly way, being kind, respectful, loving and merciful. But now it's time to pollute their innocence in explaining racism.

"God gave me a heart for diversity and empathy for marginalized communities...yet, I am scared to speak out. I want to join the protests, calling out social injustice everywhere for my black brothers, sisters and family members, my many friends with different shades of brown and yet, as a mother of 3 biracial children and a handsome and God fearing black husband, I fear that doing so may put a bullseye target on their heads.

"I went to clear my head on a walk with Lilly. As I was heading home I saw two police cars and a firetruck in the middle of the road. Some neighbors were out on the porch watching. I slowed down to look. There was a single African American man across the road going back and forth between the sidewalk and median yelling at the police.

"My first thought was l, "I hope no one is hurt and I hope the police are respecting his rights."

"As he yelled at them about someone calling the police for walking in his own neighborhood, he zeroed in on me. Pointing with a cell phone in his hand, he said something about me. He returned to the other side of the road and shouted, "I'm gonna kill you. Yeah, you with the white dog. You love that dog more than you love a human being!"

I called back, "I'm so sorry for your pain. God bless you brother." He kept screaming "Black Lives Matter!" All I could say was "yes".

"Maybe he thought I called the police, maybe I was just an easy target being the only other white person on the street besides the police and maybe there was some mental illness as well.

"Nonetheless, as I walked around the corner to enter my home the back way, I realized I was not scared nor did I feel threatened, but seeing one police car remained to observe him leaving as the other squad car and fire truck left, I was reassured. I had just lived my white privilege.

"My heart sank when I returned home. My husband, daughter and I joined hands and prayed for the man, the police and our family. I know our God is a just God but allows the testing of our faith to build perseverance. This situation is truly senseless.

"My daughter was recently called "mixed breed" by an old white woman. She has endured discrimination in school simply for being biracial. She was accused of stealing on a bus when she found a purse left behind and took it to the bus driver. The school principal didn't ask any questions, just assumed her guilt because she was angry at being falsely accused.

"My husband has told me how his father prepared him to survive by having "the talk" about staying under the radar, not jogging on the street, carrying his lab coat or Army uniform in the car and learning how to stand his ground without retaliating. As he explained that our 5 and 6 year old sons need to learn that our society will not view them as anything more than third class citizens, I cried.

"My prayer for this world is to repent, humble ourselves to God and that the Lord will return quickly."

Our faux peace: Whether in protests and flames, or parks and flowers, the hate lurks

Just got back from a morning walk in Murray Park, getting in my steps before the heat of the day.

While winding through paths alongside snowmelt-filled streams, flower beds, and enjoying the breeze and sunlight streaming through elms, maples, and evergreen trees, my faux peace was shattered by a drama playing out about 50 feet away on the street leading into the park.

Amid the past few days of riots and destruction nationwide, including in nearby Salt Lake City, it was the kind of scene that makes you stop: Police officers were slowing closing in on an agitated black man in his early 20s. The officers approached with their hands out, seeking to reassure the youth, even as they obviously feared the situation could go awry at any moment.

Another young black man, jogging shirtless, came to a halt next to me and we both watched. Nearby, a middle-aged Latina pulled out her smart phone and began taking video. An ambulance and squad car came to a halt nearby.

The tension was thick. Please, God, not another George Floyd incident, was the unspoken thought and prayer.

"What's going on here?" I mumbled to myself. The jogger answered that he knew.

Turned out he had called 911 because the person of interest, by now talking quietly but still visibly distraught, was being calmed by a paramedic, and two police officers. The jogger said that other man had approached him earlier, saying he "had to do something" about police brutality, and saying he was seeing too many white people in the park.

"I feel for my own people with what's happening," the jogger said. "But I feel for all people right now. He was talking all over the place [and] I thought he was about to hurt people, so I called.”

We shared a bit more, the jogger and I, as we continued to watch the police peacefully (thank God) gently take the young man toward the ambulance, perhaps to get him medical or psychiatric help.

I told my new jogging friend about how I worried for my grandchildren in Baltimore, where someday they may run afoul of a police officer for no reason other than their brown skins.  I had the same concern for their Cameroonian father, a naturalized citizen proud of military service as an Army Reserve Captain in the medical corps. Would my daughter, his wife and mother of my grandsons, likewise be targeted for her paler ancestry?

Here in Utah, where white supremacists have occasionally raised their ugly heads, I also worried for my daughter-in-law and grandson, both of Mexican heritage, amid this plague of mindless hate. 

He nodded. He, too, worried about family. We agreed that such hate made no sense. 

We stood quietly then, a few moments more. It was a snapshot of unity. Finally, we smiled sadly at each other and, after wishing each other safety, walked away.

Faith: A choice, a yearning to be more than an evolutionary dead-end

Take an evangelical, fundamentalist preacher's kid and mix him with a liberal arts education. 

Season him with more than a few decades of living, and you either come up with an agnostic, a metaphysical schizophrenic, or a believer, stripped down the basics of his faith.

I confess to, at times, flying like a confused, sometimes angry or at least disheartened moth, too close to the flames of the first two fates. The journey to faith — my own faith, not necessarily that of my parents — has been occasionally exhilarating, often painful, and all too human.

It has been, philosophically, an eclectic odyssey. That likely was inevitable, considering my History and Journalism double major and a minor in Psychology, followed by a career in journalism (a petri dish for cynicism, as professions go).

Ultimately, it is human nature that convinces me my faith — albeit skinned of what I concluded were doctrinal and theological assertions created not by an infinite God, but by finite human minds — makes more sense than pure secular humanism.

I could (but don't worry, I won't) write reams on why I find this so. Let a couple observations suffice:

— The fact that our species has not ceased warring with itself since it began, committing genocide on ever-larger scales, makes me bitterly laugh at the idea we are the pinnacle of sentient evolution on Earth. 

 

We may boast how much more sophisticated and civilized our high-tech, educated society is now compared to our stick-wielding, tree- and cave-dwelling ancient ancestors, but we continue to produce the same rotten fruit.

It's still about territory and resources, and who has the right — or might — to claim them. And since such brutal calculus always makes our "better angels" wince, we still use politics, religion, culture and racism as excuses and justification for dehumanizing and dismissing the Other.

— Yet, we desire to be more. I would argue that we were created for more, but are broken. Despite all the pain and madness humankind inflicts on itself and its planet, goodness persistently bubbles up within individuals, and reform movements. 

Changes for the better, history teaches us, are as finite as our bodies . . . yet we continue to reach down to the fallen with one hand, even as we bludgeon our enemies with the other.

So, faith. Because without it, without the saving grace of our Maker, we will remain stuck, either as an evolutionary dead end, or a creation to be ultimately redeemed, reborn and perfected.

I prefer to believe the latter.

Nancy Grace: Is she fanning the flames of racial hatred for ratings?

Nancy Grace (CNN/Google)

Nancy Grace continues to repeat the claim -- which her network reported early on concerning ZImmerman's profanity laced 911 call -- that Zimmerman used the term "f'ing coons."

Justifiably, folks were enraged, arguing that was solid evidence of his racial profiling, even hatred.

But what Nancy missed, or chose to ignore as she fanned the flames of outrage over Zimmerman's acquittal (which has plenty of other, legitimate reasons to question, BTW) is that the FBI said that was incorrect, and now CNN has since acknowledged their initial analysis was wrong.

A new, enhanced analysis by CNN shows what was said was "(it's) f'ing cold."

I bring this up NOT to in any way justify what happened with Trayvon Martin and George Zimmerman, at all. I bring it up to show the irresponsibility and arguably lack of professional ethics by Ms. Grace in continuing to fan the hate with claims she knows, or should know, are just plain wrong. 

The FBI report, for what it's worth; I make no judgments based on this one small part of the puzzle. It is what it is (click on the hypertext link to hear for yourself).