reverse threading

the path back is the path forward

Tag Archives: prejudice


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the kind of diversity. [kerri’s blog on flawed wednesday]

if the milwaukee, denver and reno airports are any indication, there is a heck of a lot of diversity in our country.

diversity: the state of being diverse; variety. / involving people from a range of different social and ethnic backgrounds and of different genders, sexual orientations, etc.

you wouldn’t expect this beautiful country to look the same from sea to shining sea or you would not travel. you wouldn’t wish to see the beaches, the inland lakes, the mountains and canyonlands, the deserts and deep forests, the farmland and rich meadows. you would merely stay at home, knowing that it looked exactly the same in every other place. you would, of course, be delusional, but you would live in your little bubble, safe from the diversity of the land.

if that is how you felt, then you also wouldn’t expect to travel the country and see anyone who did not look like you, act like you, dress like you, speak like you. and, because you do not wish to accept anyone different than you, you would merely stay at home, believing that because you want it this way – the way of sameness – that it should be that way, that it is that way. you would, of course, be delusional, but you would sit tidily – and smugly – in your bubble of delusion and prejudice and you would ignore the vast lessons you might learn from people who are different than you, safe and sound from the diversity of the people.

there was a person at the denver airport who was most definitely different than me. i had put on a mask to head into a shuttle train that would take us to a different terminal. the man headed directly toward me and, as he passed by right next to me, turned his head and coughed multiple times loudly into my face. i was stunned. yes, this person was most definitely different than me. this person – as opposed to all the other thousands of people i encountered in two days of traveling – the only person who i would consider different. every other person – regardless of race or ethnicity or size or shape or gender or freaking anything – was kind.

because – really – it isn’t that hard to be kind. it isn’t that hard to make kind decisions about kind behavior toward other equally kind people in what could be a kind world.

but instead, the new administration of hideousness has ostensibly raised the bar on meanness – no, not just meanness…let’s make that downright malicious cruelty – and has made it perfectly ok to be an asshole whenever you wish, wherever you wish, and to whomever you wish. wowza. what a legacy that will be.

if you are one of the people who actually think that is ok, i would – in my sweetest voice – suggest staying home in your righteous, pretentious bubble steeped in denialism. because this world needs more kindness and if you agree with this destructive and venomous agenda, i don’t think kindness is something of which you are truly capable.

keep your homogeneously-bigoted, unkind self out of the mainstream of society. there are a lot of children out there. and children need better examples than you.

just sayin’.

pass it on.

kindness, that is.

*****

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where are they headed? [d.r. thursday]

the crane’s footprints left no doubt that it knew where it was headed. solid and in a straight line, looking deliberate and measured, directly across the trail’s walkway toward the pond, looking for life-affirming nutrition. it had found itself in illinois – perhaps by choice, perhaps by instinct. there was a mate’s footprints as well.

i read the other day that a school in wisconsin – waukesha, to be specific – has prohibited a class of elementary school first grade students from singing the song “rainbowland“. this song was a collaboration between miley cyrus and dolly parton. the superintendent stated that, “it was determined that ‘rainbowland’ could be perceived as controversial.” one of the teachers involved said she heard “through the grapevine” that the song was vetoed because of the artist miley cyrus. she asked, “how would you sing any song?” (if you concerned yourself with the potential of controversial past of any artist – or any person, for that matter.) dolly parton, back in 2017 when the song was released, said that the song is “really about if we could love one another a little better or be a little kinder, be a little sweeter, we could live in a rainbow land.” she added, “it’s really just about dreaming and hoping that we could all do better. it’s a good song for the times right now.” according to usa today, “the teacher says themes in ‘rainbowland’ are about embracing differences in each other” and the teacher presses on, it’s “like the core of what we teach at school or what anybody teaches.” but “rainbowland” and rainbow lanyards are both banned.

it is astounding that waukesha – a town where – horrifically – a person literally drove into a christmas parade themed “comfort and joy”, killed six people and injured sixty-two – would want to veto a song about diversity and acceptance and peace and kindness and making a difference – universal themes of positivity. i wonder how many of those little first graders may have known someone who was injured or killed – or watched the sheer horror from the parade sidelines. i wonder what their little zealous hearts and minds thought when they were told they couldn’t sing the song they had learned for their spring concert.

living in a rainbowland
the skies are blue and things are grand
wouldn’t it be nice to live in paradise
where we’re free to be exactly who we are
let’s all dig down deep inside
brush the judgment and fear aside
make wrong things right
and end the fight
’cause i promise ain’t nobody gonna win

living in a rainbowland
where you and i go hand in hand
oh, i’d be lying if i said this was fine
all the hurt and the hate going on here
we are rainbows, me and you
every color, every hue
let’s shine on through
together, we can start living in a rainbowland

(rainbowland – miley cyrus, dolly parton, oren yoel kleinman)

rainbowland was replaced by the rainbow connection from the muppet movie. but then, that song, too, was banned. after a bit of time, the rainbow connection was reinstated and is part of the concert. the muppets passed muster. but that roygbiv thing seems to be the item of contention for that school district. wow. and wow. headed backwards. the opposite of the cranes.

division and hatred and judgement and fear are worming their way throughout wisconsin, through all the gerrymandered lines.

there are those in this state that seem to know where they are headed. in a solid and straight line, deliberately and measured, their efforts are undermining freedoms of individuals, leading with discriminatory heavy hands and zilcho heart. their voices are everywhere, including in school boards and in school districts. their voices are silencing first graders.

a rainbowland this is not.

*****

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one way. not really. [flawed wednesday]

not really.

there is not really one way.

well, maybe i can make one exception: when driving and faced with a dead-end corner and a one-way street. one way.

otherwise? not so much.

the headline read, “florida isn’t the only state pushing legislation that could be harmful to LGBTQ students.” there’s also idaho, georgia, iowa, tennessee and oklahoma. not to forget texas and whatever other states have jumped on the bigotwagon since this headline. what?! apparently, these are states in which leadership has decided there’s just one way. and it’s theirs.

as the proud mother of a gay man, i have to wholeheartedly disagree with these folks. any idea of “normal” that they have conjured up is a warped righteous positioning of power and control, some sort of strange arc into absolutism. it does make one wonder about the possibility of people who need to compensate for something in their own lives. it is astonishingly arrogant, haughtily heartless, cruelly uncaring, blindingly bigoted, disgustingly discriminatory, and sickeningly small-minded in the most prejudiced of ways.

i’m guessing, then, that these same huffy lawmakin’ folks are sittin’ around makin’ it their business to raise questions about people, ponder others’ sexuality or gender, disparage people who identify differently than they do. they are wringing their hands and plotting how to silence them, to marginalize them. because their one-way is the only way and lives that may be richly influential, steeped in open-mindedness and the embrace and love of all humankind should be silenced and marginalized.

this is not the way.

there is not one way.

for that, indeed, would signal a dead end.

*****

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way, way past time. [d.r. thursday]

“whenever you see a successful woman, look out for three men who are going out of their way to try to block her.” (yulia tymoshenko)

i read this quote on instagram. i hesitated to use it and then wondered why. it stated truth. it is a fact of life. i have lived it – exactly it – just as many other women have. so why hesitate?

the answer seems obvious. because that kind of blocking still exists, that kind of dominance is still valued, that kind of discrimination still squelches lives and careers, that kind of smothering effort – particularly with leading roles by older white men – is still not – really – questioned, nonetheless challenged in a big, broad way. it’s asphyxiating and it’s way past its time. way, way past time.

“it’s 2021 and we are talking about THIS!” they rolled their eyes and so did i. it is beyond the scope of reasonableness that we are – still – dealing with the devastating blows that those who lean into … or out-and-out embrace … the prejudice of white supremacy, suffocating gender bias, ruinous economic inequity, insufficient healthcare, deficient educational options, the loss of multitudes of innocent lives at the barrel of unnecessary weapons, exclusive immigration…

but here we are. 2021.

we came upon the hot-pink lighted ball of yarn in the garden and laughed. then we followed the string, the yarn that was unrolled over the tree branches, under the bushes, along the sidewalk edge, up the fence, down off the fence, and ultimately, to the end of it, the frayed edges.

it occurs to me we can trace the strings back and back. we can see the frayed edges of injustices, the repeating pattern of silencing, of stifling, of deliberate lack, of unacceptable levels of violence, of obstructive intention.

what now?

we need be stewards of worth, of mending, of healing, of forward-movement, of equal opportunity. we need to find ways – now – to weave an inclusive, equitable, generous, safe, egalitarian story for all. ungrudgingly and with abundant kindness and good will. it is indeed way, way past time.

2021. what are we doing?

*****

read DAVID’S thoughts this D.R. THURSDAY