The Values We Profess
The hypocrisy of America’s Founding Fathers — let’s go with the traditional gendered version here — is self-evident. All men weren’t created equal. The rights they were born with were totally alienable, especially at birth. Life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness — “property” in the original Lockean — were only conditionally available.
Yet those are the words they wrote, and signed their names below, large enough for the King to see it, in one case.
Those are the ideals of our nation, however much our nation has failed them in the centuries since. And some of us are damnfool enough to take them seriously.
You live under a monarch, you’re a subject. You live under a republic, you’re a citizen. And as a citizen, well, you rule. Not by yourself, not as a crank in the wilderness, but collectively, among other citizens, a majority of whom can make the rules.
Within limits, of course. You can’t rule away other citizens. You can’t restrict their citizenship. You can boss them around a good deal, as long as you don’t change the nature of who they are as citizens.
That’s the idea, anyway. That’s the ideal. And, last we checked, that’s still the ideal our nation aspires to, even when it’s just lip-service.
Kind of like touching the stump at the Apollo.
You may not know about that tradition. When you go on stage to perform at Harlem’s Apollo Theater, you rub a shellacked tree stump off to the side. It’s from the Tree of Hope, which grew outside another theater six blocks away. Performers used to touch the tree itself, until it died. There’s a plaque there now. It was placed by Bill Robinson — Mister Bojangles.
His signature’s on it. We sign what we believe in.
The genius of the civil-rights movement was that it held up a mirror to us, to our values as a nation, to our self-evident truths — to our beliefs. The mirror revealed our failures, the hollowness of our beautiful words. It was a national guilt trip.
It worked because it shamed us. It worked because we were capable of being shamed. We still — collectively, enough of us anyway — bought into the language of the Declaration, never mind the flawed men who wrote it. If we’re all created equal, what the hell are those guys doing with firehoses?
John Lewis lived that moment. He lived those values — our values, the values we profess. His life was a monument to those values, his very visage living granite. He never gave up on our values, never gave up holding a mirror to the rest of us. John Lewis was an exemplar of what makes our country great, often despite ourselves.
John Lewis lived for a simple principle: That any citizen, as a citizen, should have the same rights and privileges as any other citizen.
It’s amazing how hard it is for us to get there, as a nation. You’d almost think a lot of us don’t believe in that shit.
/the Onion(?)/
Fox News Announces Entire Channel Taking Preplanned Vacation In Wake Of Sexual Assault Lawsuit
@¡Andrew!:
I’m shocked that a news network based on the political and sexual fantasies of swinging Jabba The Hutt would turn out to be a toxic place to work for women (and minorities.)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bigZ1fmwD-Q
Mel Brooks captured the Faux Newz Zeitgeist in 1974.
@ManchuCandidate: One may as well roofie oneself, drop one’s trousers, then bend over the sofa upon accepting employment at dumFux Nooz.
If you’re surprised by Ghislaine Maxwell’s imminent “suicide,” imagine how surprised she will be.
@ManchuCandidate: I see that the opposition and the media already have found another silly non ‘scandal’ to hang around JTru’s neck, something about weewee?
Congratulations on life returning to normal : )
On the one hand, I was looking forward to a future where this was the distant past. But now that we’re back, I’m glad I glad I left some breadcrumbs to find our way out again.
Anyway, this was the one I needed. Sets my head straight for the storms ahead. Besides, I suck at tending gardens.
@nojo: Have you spoken with your Ukrainian Friend? I’ve been thinking about him and his mom.
@UAW/MF!: Art’s why I moved here, so I can be more useful. (He also recommended Bay Ridge as relatively cheap and livable.) Gets me out of the house, too — he’s on the Upper West Side. He’s doing fine, and his mom’s been in Poland since he went to college there ten years ago, so she’s doing fine, too.
@nojo: Post election I mean.
@UAW/MF!: Ah. He’s fine. Grew up near the Russian border, so while the election was disappointing, by comparison it was far from catastrophic for him. He’s dealt with worse. You learn resilience.
@nojo: Glad he’s okay and not freaking out. Maybe his mom should come for a visit before the new administration blows up NATO.
I have some GOOD NEWS: WA-3 is still blue!
@JNOV: Yeah, well… Mom’s applied for a visa two or three times, keeps getting denied. But Art has *his* visa (after years of waiting), so he’s been able to see her in Europe a few times. Meanwhile, they talk daily on the phone.
@nojo: Please let him know that strangers like those of us in my house are holding him and his mother in our thoughts and making plans. And not just plans around our own safety.
This morning we’re in Stay and Fight mode, we’re prepared to hang out in Canada for a week or so if this place burns. And while the flags in truck beds and yard signs were nothing like they were in 2020, I mean, they’ve been almost non-existant, we’ve got some white nationalist iconography popping up here and there on Main Street and on vehicles.
So far Jr and I haven’t received text messages to report for slave duty. Jr+ is part Roma and part Jewish and is going through a similar general type of trauma remembering the pogroms their ancestors fled.
Maybe once the country rights itself again, we can work on getting rid of the slavery and involuntary servitude bullshit in the 13th Amendment that allows penal labor. I’d say that’s way overdue.
But of 8:21 am, we’re hanging in there. Numbing ourselves as needed. Sharing stories. Loving each other, chatting with Ramon, the Need Weed Homeless Dude while he plays with our dog, and saving our empties.
@JNOV: He’s a tough, smart kid. Eastern European immigrants come from a different world.
For the rest of us, I think it’s very important to get rest and relief where possible. Gonna be a long slog. Found myself turning to Nina Simone’s Feeling Good this morning.
@JNOV: Speaking of which, I’m heading uptown this afternoon to film some stuff with him, including his annual Christmas Tree decorating with his boyfriend. Christmas is his big season, and while I’m a crank about premature festivities, we all could use a little joy in the world right now.
@nojo: Also, I love saying stuff like “heading uptown”. Brooklyn is fun!
@nojo: We love you! I was thinking, even though we don’t truly celebrate x-mas, some people in Clark County sell live trees (duh, but you know). That’s the county that turned out for our Democratic rep. They did super-hard work down there. Maybe we’ll buy a tree from one of them as a thank you. Sure the cats will just fuck them up, but why not?
Yeah. So. When my kid came back from basically getting frog-marched from a store downtown (the interaction Jr had with the owner was much more colorful than the Yelp review she left), I hugged her and was like, yeah. I want to kill that man.
BUT we have neighbors who know stuff. And after another store on Main St. refused to cater a same-sex wedding a week or two ago, the community turned up for the couple, so we aren’t 100% disheartened.
The question was, do we let this go? We’re not feeling very safe right now. We can let this go…
We’re not letting this go.
JNOV • Hanging by a Thread @nojo: yeah. I had a feeling you’d say that.
NOJO • Hanging by a Thread @JNOV: Haven’t touched a thing — checked it the other day, worked from here. But that’s my…
JNOV • Hanging by a Thread Oh! My edits worked! Praise nojo!
JNOV • Hanging by a Thread Glad you’re feeling sunny. I have my moments which are then squashed by some shitheads’…
NOJO • Hanging by a Thread @nojo: The Long View: 1972: Nixon 61% 1984: Reagan 59% 2004: Bush 51% 2024: Trump 50%…
NOJO • Hanging by a Thread Power is power, but… About 11 million votes remain to be counted. Nate Silver (I know, I know)…
JNOV • The Values We Profess Yeah. So. When my kid came back from basically getting frog-marched from a store downtown (the…
JNOV • The Values We Profess @nojo: We love you! I was thinking, even though we don't truly celebrate x-mas, some people in…
NOJO • The Values We Profess @nojo: Also, I love saying stuff like “heading uptown”. Brooklyn is fun!
NOJO • The Values We Profess @JNOV: Speaking of which, I'm heading uptown this afternoon to film some stuff with him, including…