Minneapolis, And The Normalization Of Hate

The Murder of the Innocents in Minneapolis wasn't about gun control or trans people.

It was about hate, and how our culture has normalized it.

Who hasn't laughed at an Internet troll? I certainly have.

But it goes so much further.

From Jew-free zones tolerated by college officials at public universities (yes, UCLA, that's you) to planting spies in Catholic and evangelical congregations (Joe Biden, take a bow!) to blanket bans on travellers from Muslim countries (hey, The Donald, are you here?), we've accepted and embraced hatred.

During President Trump's first term (as the 45th president), the governor of Michigan, Gretchen Whitmer, had a sign on her desk: "8645".

To 86 something means to get rid of it, and the definition includes killing 

The former director of the FBI, James Comey, posted seashells arranged to say 8647...Donald Trump now being the 47th president.

The closest thing I remember from Joe Biden's term was a chant from a NASCAR race, " Let's go, Brandon!", being turned into "F*** Joe Biden!". It's maybe not as inducing of violence, but it's still wrong. (And it may be that the insult to Biden came first...it was first heard when the when the winner of a race at Talladega, Brandon Brown, was being interviewed and the sportscaster interpreted it as "Let's go Brandon!".)

The temptation is to say it has to stop, NOW, but that's just virtue-signalling.

It has to stop at the root, and the root is deep.

And when you get to the deepest part of the root, don't judge, 'cause in God's eyes, you're there too, as am I.

Yesterday there was a child

ready for the coming day,

clothes in order, hair well-styled,

set for learning and for play.

Today there is a varnished box

with a picture set on top,

and it's closed-casket, so there's locks,

and we just weep for time to stop,

and for another universe 

in which the good do not die young,

that awful true and holy curse 

for us, condemned to live among

the idols of permissive hate

that we set up as our fate.

The Five Minute Friday prompt this week is BEHIND.

Look behind you, in the mirror.

Look, be sure and clear your eye

that you see them, ever clearer.

Look, and wave the dead goodbye.

See the children that we failed,

see the holes in feet and hands.

See how hatred has prevailed 

in this most highly blessed of lands

whose graces we have cast aside

to embrace a shallow wrath,

leaving these words, full of pride.

to be our grizzly epitaph:

"We are no babe, lost in a wood;

leave us! to find our greatest good!"

Sylvia will share her ice cream, because ice cream is THE antidote to hate.