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September 3, 2011

Three Photos: “The Losing Side.”

One man alone can not bend the arc of history. Each of us has to get up off of our proverbial (or literal, these days) couch and help our leaders to bend it, if only a little bit.

So while many of us complain about President Obama, how many of us have helped give him the popular support to get anything done?

The Tea Party, on the other hand, has been wildly active and noisy—against unions, the EPA, health care, gay marriage rights…and now Obama’s reelection.

So we must ask ourselves: what have we done lately to bend it upwards? ~ ed.

Photo: “The Losing Side,” via Reddit.

Still, one generation’s victims are too often the next gen’s losing side—my Jewish grandparents were broadminded and sweet, but many of their peers feared African-Americans. Or, for example:

“And if you like your injustice tinged with a little irony, enjoy! [news clip explaining that 69% support for Proposition 8 among black voters helped it pass] Ah, it appears the oppressee has become the oppressor. What’d that take, about twenty-four hours? Free at last! Free at last! [picture of two men holding hands appears on screen] Whoa, whoa, where are you two going?”

~ Jon Stewart on the Daily Show, November 2008

The key thing is to look at ourselves and decide what our values are. If they include the experience-based notion that all humans are fundamentally aok, and deserve to be happy, then we want to embrace compassion and love and humor instead of fear, hate and pre-judgment…and get on the right side of the arc of history.

“It’s the answer that led those who’ve been told for so long by so many to be cynical and fearful and doubtful about what we can achieve to put their hands on the arc of history and bend it once more toward the hope of a better day.”

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=otA7tjinFX4

From another speech, back in 2007: “It doesn’t bend on its own!”

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JZGqoaWduAk

 

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