During the pain and turmoil of Baltimore, the site that I’m blogging on, Patheos, saw fit to feature on its main Facebook page four articles out of several published on the incident from its 500 blogs. Three of them — one by a nun discussing her witnessing of racism among her students, another written by a Baltimore native, and a third with extensive Martin Luther King, Jr. quotes — provided interesting perspectives. But an article written by Kathy Schiffer entitled “Where is America’s Black President While Baltimore Burns?” also made the main Patheos Facebook page.
I felt a bit embarrassed, to be honest with you, when I read the contents. Normally I wouldn’t see such an article fit to respond to. But this was chosen, for some reason, to grace the Facebook Page for Patheos at a time when many were in the most pain from the incident, and as this Facebook page has become more of the public face, in ways, of Patheos than its website’s home page, I thought it best to respond to it directly.
Neither am I the only one, for that matter. Michael Stone, from The Progressive Humanist Examiner, commented: “Reads like propaganda from the KKK.”
Other comments were also damning. One commentator stated, “Because Obama is responsible for the actions of every black person everywhere, duh. I can’t remember the last Patheos article that wasn’t horseshit. Time to unlike and move on…”
Another stated, “I don’t trust this blogger and have little respect for the article.”
Still another remarked, “Patheos becomes more of a joke everyday. If he speaks out he is an opportunist using the race card, if he doesn’t he is ignoring the situation. Do you people remember when he spoke out on the illegal arrest of a college professor for breaking into his own house? The press hounded him. Patheos has become a joke. Where is the old page admin?”
And so on. And normally I wouldn’t really care — except I genuinely care about what’s happening in Baltimore, because I’m a black man who wants to walk the streets safely and who feels solidarity with other individuals who have the same desire. Featuring articles like this — especially when Baltimore was at its most intense — radiates from a site I write on a fairly disturbing message. If people blamed Kathy Schiffer alone for the article, that would be one thing. But when they see it as reflective of a site I write on…try as I might, I can’t keep my mouth shut.
First, there’s the problem of the title. Why does the fact that Obama is black need to have anything to do with him, in particular, responding in a certain way? No one said during Bush’s presidency, “Where is America’s white President in the Boston ruins?” back in 2004 when thousands of fans rioted after Boston won the World Series. And if anyone had said that, it would have clearly been seen as racist; those riots were not seen as Bush’s fault. And Bush put no policies in place, that I’m aware of, to stop this kind of thing. He didn’t come out and condemn them, and if he had, people would have probably been pissed at him, because sports. They would have been more upset if he saw himself as responsible for this because he was white, because it’s not white people’s fault when other people riot.
“Racism” is the reason the pattern of holding all black people responsible for the worst things a small group of black people do has no analogy among white people. And not only that — we have to be held responsible for things, it seems, that white people do, as well. When someone commits injustice against a black person based on race, it’s up to us to march respectully. If #alllivesmatter, why aren’t white people in the streets as much as black people? I’ll believe that all lives matter when those who toss that hashtag around demand justice loudly for Freddie Gray instead of just looking at us black individuals to do it, and stop sitting in distant judgment when we choose to give the shit they should be giving themselves.
Second, Kathy Schiffer blatantly and jaw-droppingly ignores what the President, like, actually said. Schiffer said:
Do you hear his plea for the criminal activity to stop, for arsonists and thieves and bullies to go home, or to pray to God that law and order will prevail, that justice will be served? I didn’t hear it, either. What I heard was more fuel for the fire–another black politician agreeing that yes, there is good reason for citizen revolt.
This couldn’t be further from the truth. In the speech she referenced (which actually appears to be an off the cuff answer to a question) Obama said:
Second, my thoughts are with the police officers who were injured in last night’s disturbances. It underscores that that’s a tough job and we have to keep that in mind, and my hope is that they can heal and get back to work as soon as possible.
Point number three, there’s no excuse for the kind of violence that we saw yesterday. It is counterproductive. When individuals get crowbars and start prying open doors to loot, they’re not protesting, they’re not making a statement — they’re stealing. When they burn down a building, they’re committing arson. And they’re destroying and undermining businesses and opportunities in their own communities that rob jobs and opportunity from people in that area.
So it is entirely appropriate that the mayor of Baltimore, who I spoke to yesterday, and the governor, who I spoke to yesterday, work to stop that kind of senseless violence and destruction. That is not a protest. That is not a statement. It’s people — a handful of people taking advantage of a situation for their own purposes, and they need to be treated as criminals.
Point number four, the violence that happened yesterday distracted from the fact that you had seen multiple days of peaceful protests that were focused on entirely legitimate concerns of these communities in Baltimore, led by clergy and community leaders. And they were constructive and they were thoughtful, and frankly, didn’t get that much attention. And one burning building will be looped on television over and over and over again, and the thousands of demonstrators who did it the right way I think have been lost in the discussion.
The overwhelming majority of the community in Baltimore I think have handled this appropriately, expressing real concern and outrage over the possibility that our laws were not applied evenly in the case of Mr. Gray, and that accountability needs to exist. And I think we have to give them credit. My understanding is, is you’ve got some of the same organizers now going back into these communities to try to clean up in the aftermath of a handful of criminals and thugs who tore up the place. What they were doing, what those community leaders and clergy and others were doing, that is a statement. That’s the kind of organizing that needs to take place if we’re going to tackle this problem. And they deserve credit for it, and we should be lifting them up.
These are three points that Kathy Schiffer completely and totally ignored that came from Obama’s mouth. And there were only six points — of the six points, three were about nonviolence.
That seems dishonest. At a time when Baltimore is in mourning…we need to make greater strides towards honesty. We need to look at ourselves and diagnose what, exactly, the problem is, and to have people walk away from Patheos with the impression that this, out of all the views presented at that time, was the one we most represent was deeply embarrassing.
I hate giving more time to do this, but Kathy Schiffer, as if the former wasn’t enough, went on with this load of bull:
“I have consistently preached,” Dr. King said, “that nonviolence demands that the means we use must be as pure as the ends we seek.” The National Endowment for the Humanities explains that King appealed to the local black population to use the courts and not the streets to secure civil rights. He counseled “law and order and common sense,” not demonstrations that “incite to hatred and violence,” as the most prudent means to promote justice.
If you follow the link in that quote, you’ll realize quickly that this is, perhaps, the worst possible thing she could have said, because the phrase “law and order and common sense” was actually a statement made by white clergymembers against the actions of Martin Luther King, Jr. In 1963, they wrote a letter in reaction to the sit-ins and demonstrations that, at the time, had landed MLK in prison. The relevant parts stated (emphasis added):
Just as we formerly pointed out that “hatred and violence have no sanction in our religious and political traditions,” we also point out that such actions as incite to hatred and violence, however, technically peaceful those actions may be, have not contributed the resolution of our local problems. We do not believe that these days of new hope are days when extreme measures are justified in Birmingham….
We further strongly urge our own Negro community to withdraw support from these demonstrations, and to unite locally in working peacefully for a better Birmingham. When rights are consistently denied, a cause should be pressed in the courts and in negotiations among local leaders, and not in the streets. We appeal to both our white and Negro citizenry to observe the principles of law and order and common sense.
Those bolded quotes were written in critique of MLK’s actions. They were the discussion that MLK was fighting against. They were the words MLK was speaking against when he responded to them in his Letter From A Birmingham Jail, which criticizes Schiffer’s attitude far better than I could myself when he says here:
I must make two honest confessions to you, my Christian and Jewish brothers. First, I must confess that over the past few years I have been gravely disappointed with the white moderate. I have almost reached the regrettable conclusion that the Negro’s great stumbling block in his stride toward freedom is not the White Citizen’s Counciler or the Ku Klux Klanner, but the white moderate, who is more devoted to “order” than to justice; who prefers a negative peace, which is the absence of tension, to a positive peace, which is the presence of justice; who constantly says, “I agree with you in the goal you seek, but I cannot agree with your methods of direct action”; who paternalistically believes he can set the timetable for another man’s freedom; who lives by a mythical concept of time and who constantly advises the Negro to wait for a “more convenient season.” Shallow understanding from people of good will is more frustrating than absolute misunderstanding from people of ill will. Lukewarm acceptance is much more bewildering than outright rejection.
I had hoped that the white moderate would understand that law and order exist for the purpose of establishing justice and that when they fail in this purpose they become the dangerously structured dams that block the flow of social progress. I had hoped that the white moderate would understand that the present tension in the South is a necessary phase of the transition from an obnoxious negative peace, in which the Negro passively accepted his unjust plight, to a substantive and positive peace, in which all men will respect the dignity and worth of human personality. Actually, we who engage in nonviolent direct action are not the creators of tension. We merely bring to the surface the hidden tension that is already alive. We bring it out in the open, where it can be seen and dealt with. Like a boil that can never be cured so long as it is covered up but must be opened with all its ugliness to the natural medicines of air and light, injustice must be exposed, with all the tension its exposure creates, to the light of human conscience and the air of national opinion before it can be cured.
In your statement you assert that our actions, even though peaceful, must be condemned because they precipitate violence. But is this a logical assertion? Isn’t this like condemning a robbed man because his possession of money precipitated the evil act of robbery? Isn’t this like condemning Socrates because his unswerving commitment to truth and his philosophical inquiries precipitated the act by the misguided populace in which they made him drink hemlock? Isn’t this like condemning Jesus because his unique God consciousness and never ceasing devotion to God’s will precipitated the evil act of crucifixion? We must come to see that, as the federal courts have consistently affirmed, it is wrong to urge an individual to cease his efforts to gain his basic constitutional rights because the quest may precipitate violence. Society must protect the robbed and punish the robber.
And, famously, although King said that riots were a destructive course of action, he emphasized that, “a riot is the voice of the unheard” and encouraged us to listen.
It is difficult to realize that Kathy Schiffer cares so little, it seems, for the actual stance of MLK that she will take the very words he gave his life to fighting against, put them in his mouth, and turn them against the cause and concern of those protesting in Baltimore. It’s a terrible, offensive decision that perpetuates racism. The last time Baltimore rioted was in response to MLK’s death, and it looks like this article is trying to kill his viewpoint all over again.
At one of the most sensitive times of black experience with racism in this country.
And then, to add insult to injury, she continues:
[President Barack Obama’s] job is not to give voice to the “wounded blacks” and to increase sensitivity to perceived “racial inequities,” continually harping and thus encouraging further division. He was elected by the entire United States, and his job is to represent all Americans and to work toward greater unity.
No — encouraging division is letting it stay there, grow, and fester, not bringing light to division that exists so we can deal with it. And furthemore — regardless of your skin tone, if racism exists, if people are wounded, it makes sense to highlight that. The thought that, by doing so, you are endorsing riots is fairly offensive. If black individuals in this country are wounded, and if racial inequities exist, then it is the job of a unifier to encourage equality and heal the wounds, instead of allowing the division to worsen and the wounds to fester.
Finally, she ends:
I am not–I repeat, NOT–advocating that we turn a blind eye to police injustice, if and where it exists. If mistakes were made, then extensive reeducation and training must ensure that mistakes are not repeated. If crimes were committed, the criminals (even if they are police officers) must be brought to justice. But it is more than time for the American President to quit bitching about racism and to be the leader this nation needs.
If police injustice exists against black individuals — and places like the DOJ report for Ferguson and an article on Baltimore written in September of 2014 are among many indications they exist in spades — then, um, “bitching about racism” is inseparable from engaging in “extensive reeducation and training.” As for the declaration that Obama should be “the leader this nation needs” — it is hardly worth rebutting, seeing as how she ran roughshod over what the President stated.
In fact, the entire article is hardly worth rebutting, and I would not even bother, except, again, it was on Patheos’s main Facebook page — which, again, I wouldn’t care about, but it is, more or less, the most visible face of the overall Patheos site, it seems. Hopefully this post serves to distance myself from those sentiments as much and as directly as I can.
Thanks for reading.