Fight for accountability
We cannot allow ourselves to turn away from the systematic use of threats, images, and actions of violence.
Dear friends: For many of us, this week holds a holiday focused on gratitude, thanksgiving for a harvest that will sustain us through the winter. As we make our preparations, we also bear witness to ongoing turmoil and injustice.
Through the years of the previous administration, many voices brought our attention to the dangers of becoming numb to minor violations of ethical, interpersonal, and institutional norms. They argued this could be a slippery slope to acceptance of larger, more violent acts.
The attack on Congress on January 6 proved their point. Since the initial shock, many powerful people have pushed narratives that minimize the violence of the acts conducted that day. Even the nomenclature - referring to the events as “January 6,” an abstract and bloodless date, instead of an insurrection, an attack, an act of violence - drains our memories of the brutal assaults, the fears, the fanaticism.
We witness similar escalations of words and images of violence more frequently, and having the desired effect. Local folk resign from, or choose not to serve on, school boards, offices that oversee elections, city and county councils. They do not want to deal with the threats of violence hurled at them and their families. Sitting members of Congress are able to share animated acts of violence focused on their political opponents, unapologetically, and without much concern about being held accountable. Their targets are left to decide whether to continue their work in an unsafe environment, or step out of public life. The leadership of one of our two major parties cynically turns the very language of bullying against the victims, all while threatening revenge politics if their party regains power. And young white men hide behind twisted concepts of self-defense, and are celebrated by people in the halls of power for their acts of vigilante violence in the name of “law and order.”
Historically, escalations of vigilante-type violence in words, images, and actions are used deliberately to dehumanize, paving the way for takeovers of power. Create chaos; dehumanize a group in order to scapegoat them; claim that violence is the only way to restore order; use violence to take power. It’s a recipe that has been around for as long as humanity has organized ourselves into political entities.
We cannot allow ourselves to turn away from the systematic use of threats, images, and actions of violence as it is more and more publicly embraced by one of our major political parties. We cannot rest assured that democracy will take care of itself.
Hold the people and organizations that use violence and dehumanization as strategies to account. Insist that we are all created equal, with inviolable human rights. Never stop fighting for inclusion, dignity, and justice for all.
I am, as always, grateful for your company on this often difficult, always worthwhile journey.