Who’s Fart Is it? AKA: Chain of Fools
A popular comedian once told a story of a young boy’s
baseball team. It seems one of the boys was no longer permitted to play on the
team since his parents moved the family into a different school district. His comrades were upset to lose him since he
was such a good player. The coach tried
to explain to them about how districts “work,” and attempted to reassure them
that it was not the boy’s fault; however, the coach spoke with an
impediment so it came out, “It just wasn’t his fart. It wasn’t anybody’s fart. Sometimes things happen. It wasn’t anybody’s fart.” And you can only imagine the howling and
caterwauling the boys did at this unfortunate pronunciation. They laid down on the ground, rolling and
crying, and the coach misinterpreted this to be grief. He kept reassuring, “It wasn’t anybody’s
fart.”
It seems no matter what age we are, we are always asking the
question: “Who’s FAULT was it?”
A couple get’s divorced – it was his fault. It was her fault. It was the in-law’s fault.
A kid didn’t make the team.
If it was his grades, was it his teacher’s fault? Was it his parents’ fault? Was it HIS fault?
A worker does not get a promotion or a raise. Was it her fault? Was it her supervisor’s fault? Was it the System’s fault?
A lamp gets broken.
Was it the baby’s fault? Was it
the husband’s fault? Was it the dog’s
fault?
So here we are, all sitting around our stupid televisions
and ipads and laptops and desktops and smart watches. We have 24/7 access to the media. We have 24/7 access to the News – “all news,
all the time.” And yet the wise king
Solomon said in the Old Testament (4,000 years ago) there is NOTHING NEW UNDER
THE SUN. And he was right. News is just the same broken story told over
and over again in different forms. One
team against another. A glimmer of hope
in the form of a personal interest story where one human acts selflessly. Then we are back to the teams again. Sports teams.
Cultural teams. Gender
teams. Political teams. Religious teams. If there was no conflict, we would have no
reason to watch news.
And then we, as individuals in a modern society, are told
the same thing Eve and Adam were told by the serpent: “You shall be like gods, knowing good and
knowing evil.” He doesn’t mean “figuring
it out,” knowing. He means “experiencing
it” knowing. Why they thought that was
the deal of a lifetime, I cannot fathom.
So here we sit 6000 years later in front of our electronics thinking we
can understand the evil of conflict. We
cannot see through it to the core, but we don’t realize it. We think we are brilliant when we declare
whose “Fault” it was. We just blame the
other guy. We think we understand, but
all we are really doing is “knowing/experiencing” it. And that is hellacious.
Ben Shapiro came close yesterday to identifying it. He said he uses the SAME criteria no matter
who the players are: (that’s called
equitable judging) if the person said something incendiary, but did not directly
call for violence, then he is guilty of turning the fire up or as I call it
“stirring the pot.” (Let’s be honest,
isn’t that what rallies are all about?!
Turning the heat up, garnering support as a team?) The next step is action. But each individual person has to take
responsibility for his/her action. He
further states that if it is violence, if they have broken the law (arson,
destruction of property, breaking & entering, etc.) then they should GO TO
JAIL. I would add: Do not pass “Go,” Do not collect 2000 dollars. (extra zero with intent). We cannot place the blame for rioting on a
person who never said, point-blank: “go assault the capitol police and break
the door down.”
And a word about rallies…. In case you have never been to
one. I used to participate in an annual
rally at the capitol. But the name was
changed to “pilgrimage,” to more accurately reflect what happened there. It was NOT a demonstration because no
violence was committed. It was a
peaceful prayer march attended mostly by, oh, thousands of parents, children,
nuns, priests and youth groups. It was
amazing. Praying. Singing. A lot of joy.
It was an awesome thing to be a part of.
The year I stopped going was when Barak Obama was president and he sent,
instead of capitol police, security in riot gear with semi-automatic weapons
and mean faces. That set a tone that was
menacing and never a part of that kind of experience before. Once an event ramps-up to that level of
tension, it no longer is “safe” in my book.
I will tell you the only time there was conflict that I
experienced at that event: I was with my
group of students and we were walking and talking as we made our way to capitol
hill. From the sidelines there was a
small group of two or three harassers that appeared out of nowhere. They began yelling AT the kids who were with
me. One of my boys shouted something
back – and I stopped him immediately. I
said, “That’s not what we are here for.
We are here to pray, not to engage hecklers.” We continued on and the situation deflated
like a tired balloon. Later when a
newspaper interviewed my kids, that young man said what a good experience it
was, and how he learned from that momentary interchange that you don’t “have
to” engage someone like that.
There are other types of groups that have rallied at the
capitol over the years. They scream. They shout.
They wave insulting or harassing signage. Expressing approval and dissent is not just
an American privilege – it is integral to the dignity of being a human being
with thoughts, feelings, opinions.
However, in other countries with less freedom, the people learn to shut
up and put up or be snuffed-out by their dictatorial regimes. And, at rallies or demonstrations, when the
atmosphere ramps-up, there is always the possibility of wingnuts flying off and
creating an untoward event. That is
evil. And it is what broken or
frustrated people do.
We are all – the red and the blue – asking the question,
“Where the hell were the capitol police and security duty?” We are all wishing we could just blame one
person and be done with it. And the two
men that either parties blame in alternating fashion are cut from completely
different cloth so it is more complicated assessing the situation: which, if
either, is altruistic and wants the best for our country? I wonder if being on all the restrictions
from the international health crisis has contributed to the social unrest? There are questions we may never know the
answer to. But we have ALL been
horrified. It is increasingly more
difficult to keep national peace when there is One Force that continues to
INCITE social unrest.
If you do not know how you feel, look again, and they will
TELL you how to feel. If you do not know
who to blame, listen and they will TELL you who to blame. If you have doubts we can find the path back
to national peace and security, ask the question and then flip on the screen in
front of you. They have been here all
along: showing us what THEY want us to
see, telling us what they want us to THINK, directing us forward to anarchy and
chaos. And then, when we are sitting in
the rubble, they will raise up a Darling, like a phoenix from the ashes, to
propose as The Solution to the problems.
History has had many names for him because he is an archetype of what is
behind it all. But I will let you ponder
that. For now, do not be part of their
chain-chain-chain …. Chain-of-fools.
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