Month: May 2010

 

The Parents Perspective

You become anxious. You check the time every few minutes. You look at the phone expecting it to ring.

It is well past the time she should have come home. Where could she be?

As the minutes pass you pace the floor and your mind covers all the bases. She lost track of time, she got caught in traffic, perhaps a flat tire. Why don’t you call me??

It is a long and sleepless night. Perhaps you drove to where she was last known to be, retracing every step. At 3 AM you called her friends, all of them, and none had seen her since she left the party.

Morning finds you looking out the window. The driveway is empty. It’s time to make that call. As the knot in your stomach tightens, you dial the number, 9 – 1 – 1.

When a voice comes from the other end of the line you agonize even to say the words, “My daughter is missing. Please help me find her. She is so young. Please bring her back to me.” The emotions are beyond comparison and tears begin to fall as for the first time you contemplate the worst case scenario.

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In responce to comments on my Jim Crow Article.

Just what does it take to get us talking, thinking, openly communicating.
And why would anyone go to such extremes just to get people to read an article.

The answers are simple. Each one of us has a comfort zone; even in what we will read or what we will talk about.
If the subject line had been any different would you have read it? Only you can answer that. To those who saw past their own feelings and read further, you demonstrate why you are a leader in this movement. It is because you are willing to at least look at the other side of an issue, even if you disagree with it. Really this is the only way we can come up with an answer to our opponents objections.

If we understand this, we can begin to understand what it will take for us to reach the public with our message. We can see that thus far we have had little success in reaching the masses. The why is simple. Our subject offends them so they do not consider it worthy of conversation or thought. So now that I have you thinking please consider the following article with an open mind. And remember I do not write to offend only to open a dialogue of an important subject.

A Fractured Movement

“He that would make his own liberty secure, must guard even his enemy from opposition; for if he violates this duty he establishes a precedent that will reach himself. ~Thomas Paine”

As many of you know I recently wrote an article about Jim Crow laws and how these same types of laws are now being used against former sex offenders. In that article I used the “N” word and directed not towards African Americans but sex offenders. Some took offence, wrongly thinking that I was making a racist statement. That is simply not true. In different contexts the “N” word means different things. If it is being used by one African American towards another it is fine. But if anyone else uses it even in fun it is wrong. Jack Chan found that out in the movie, Shanghai Noon. So I am not going to ponder this too much in this article. It is obvious that if people want to get upset they will, no matter the intent.

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