Drawing a Line

There are partners of Indy Car drivers at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway today wearing shirts that say "NOT Your Body, NOT Your Choice".  When we look at the abortion debate one of the things that often is said by the people who don't want to have abortion legal at all is that the embryo or fetus is not the woman's body.  They argue that it is a separate human being and thus has the right to live, even if that means a woman must carry it to term.  Recent so-called Heart Beat Bills have this at their center.  They do not exclude the prohibition even in the case of rape or incest.  In some cases it could mean a woman who miscarries has to prove she didn't cause it.  This clearly suggests that the life of the unborn developing embryo or fetus is worth more than the comfort of the woman who carries it, even if that is the result of a non-consensual act.   Despite what some lawmaker said the other day rape is never consensual.  There are provisions for the life of the mother, but that seems to be a difficult thing to adjudicate if someone like a zealous DA decides that he or she are going to second guess a doctor. 

So we have a bit of an issue for me.  Where do we draw the line on this?  Let's take the argument that the fetus is a separate human who is entitled to life, thus the woman who is carrying it must continue to do so, even if against her will, and may put her health at risk though not immediately, for the purpose of the other life.  This would be true if the sex act that produced the fetus was consensual or not. 

So let's look at a person whose kidneys have stop functioning.  Chances are you know someone in this situation or someone who has a family member.  They need a transplant as dialysis is no longer working.  You are a young, healthy person, who has two kidneys and you match perfectly with the person in need.  You only need one kidney to survive so the right thing to do is to give your kidney to that person so they can live.  Many people do this, even for strangers and it is a wonderful thing as a life is saved.  But you are reluctant to give up a kidney.  What might happen in the future?  It involves surgery, that will cost you time at work, maybe a promotion.  You had a trip to Europe planned and now it is on hold if you save this person.  Can the government compel you to put your life on hold to save the life of another person?  If not then why should a woman, pregnant, have to do the same?  You could argue she is responsible for getting pregnant but there are many factors that excuse her from the responsibility.  Rape and incest are the most common and recent laws don't seem to care about that.  But there is also a partner who removes a condom without telling the woman.  Failed birth control, be that pills, IUD or other form.  Failed sterilization method which sometimes happens with vasectomies.  Why should the life of the fetus be more important than the life of someone needing a kidney? 

That is the real issue here.  We can debate about when abortion is appropriate or not.  I have never felt we should view abortion as a simple means of birth control. But as a man I don't think that I should have the right to tell a woman what to do with her body.  I do think that I have a responsibility to speak out on what I think might benefit us all. 

We can have fewer abortions if we approached teaching about sexuality with the importance and dignity it deserves. I believe in comprehensive sexuality education, easy access to birth control and education on how it works, and a sense of body responsibility which includes helping both young woman and men understand consent.  We know this by studies that a good long-term sexuality education program, based on facts and reality, can delay first intercourse, help young men and women act responsibility when they do have sex, and can make the idea of abortion less important and necessary.  If only we would try it. 

But in the end the issue is still who can tell you that you must save a life?  An 11 year old girl, who was raped by her father, pregnant and scared should be able to terminate that pregnancy using the same moral judgement that allows a 23 year old man, healthy and strong, to ignore the call to donate a kidney, or part of a liver or even bone marrow (which he will grow back) or blood for that matter. If you demonize one, you must be ready to demonize the other.  And if you do that, I have to ask, when can we come over to get your kidney?
  

The Idiots are Coming

There are members of state legislatures around the country are making law about abortion from a remarkable wellspring of ignorance.  In Ohio a law was written to suggest the ectopic pregnancy (a implantation of zygote outside the uterus) can simply be plucked out and moved to the uterus for further development.  This is something that simply can't be done.  There is no medical technology to do that. But this ignorance is part of the thought process that leads to dangerous law. Another member of a western state house suggested that a woman could swallow a pill camera to take pictures of the developing fetus.  A right-wing noise machine voice said that if a father rapes his 12 year old and takes her for an abortion then the evidence goes away, but if she has the baby then there is something to convict the father about.  I am not sure how that makes sense but maybe he believes like the Alabama sponsor of the new Alabama law that basically makes all abortions criminal and all miscarriages suspect.  He said that you can still get an abortion BEFORE you know you are pregnant, in part because it takes time for the chromosomes to get together. There are also people making laws that think abortions require cutting open the uterus.   This level of ignorance that is driving some of the features of these laws is stunning.  I am reminded of little blue and pink groups in elementary school that showed us how the body works.  I then taught this at the university level and the in utero development section was quite simple and I wish these guys had taken my class.  I really can't get by the fact that there are people who think you can exam a developing fetus by swallowing a camera pill or that you can pluck a zygote that has implanted outside of the uterus and just re-implant it like a Lego.  I really can't understand how we have laws developed outside of facts and reality.  It would be like passing laws to make it illegal to own unicorns in the city or allowing your dragon to breath fire around children.  While there have been times in history where abortion debates were based on attempts to understand human develop and the cost/benefit analysis on how to restrict access while embracing life, today I feel the lawmakers who are trying to overturn the right to an abortion from the Roe v. Wade case care so little about facts and reality and that is dangerous.  This ignorance will lead to women dying, to women after the trauma of miscarriage having to prove it wasn't intentional, and to the rise is dangerous back alleys again.  This is wrong.  If you live in a state doing this tell them it is wrong.  If you want to debate abortion get an education and if you think these new laws are about sanctity of life you are being fooled. 

We Have Become Uncomfortably Numb

Last week I began writing this in light of the shooting at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte and the fact that as I was learning about the shooting from Twitter, major news organizations were simply ignoring it for the most part in favor of another story about Washington.  While that was important, the fact that 2 people were killed and 4 injured on a college campus seemed to be relegated to a crawl on the screen.  Within a few days of that April 30th incident, here in Indianapolis on May 4th, four people were injured in a night that found many victims of gun fire.  Then yesterday, in Highland Ranch, Colorado.  A Denver suburb only 7 miles from Columbine High School, two young people entered the school and started shooting.  One student was fatally shot and eight others were injured; two suspects were taken into custody by police.  The dead student like on of those in Charlotte, ran toward the gun to save others.  A child in 2nd grade said she heard gun fire and knew what to do because she has been trained since Kindergarten.

What is amazing is that these stories come and go and we move on. There have been 105 events where guns have injured or killed more than 4 people in a single event.  How many do you remember hearing about?  Did any happen near where you live?  They happen everywhere.  What is amazing is that while some are criminals killing criminals during criminal behavior or acts of passion fueled by drugs or alcohol, some are clearly premeditated acts of terror.  We have grown used to them being part of the background noise that is our culture.  As I woke this morning to find out more about the Colorado shooting it was easier to find articles being critical of the Met Gala and the misunderstanding of the concept of Camp and virtually dozens of predictions on the Game of Thrones finale.  Not to mention the special report on a baby in England who the vast majority of people will never meet. 

The media will pick at the bones of survivors, doing interviews with family and friends, but rarely do they maintain the story as the public health crisis it is.  When the ratings fall the news will move on and it will be another story people will only slightly remember.

I understand that it is hard to keep hearing stories of horror in the real world and retreat to the fictional one, or the pablum of human interest, I am so often struck by the lack of care so many have when it doesn't directly touch them.  But children dying in school settings should not be the price we pay for freedom.  Kevlar jackets, blankets and backpacks should not be lauded as important innovations in the growing security industrial complex but met with sadness.  Children as young as 5 should not have to learn sing-sing lessons about what to do if the shooter is in the school.  We cant' grow numb to this.  It is a national crisis.

Beefing up security, armed guards, armed teachers, metal detectors, etc. are band-aids on a gaping wound and while we might find the aesthetic more pleasant it doesn't address the issue.   We must find a way to keep violence as an easy answer to a problem and we must not resign ourselves to this being the way it has to be.

We also don't have to give up our freedoms to do it.  There is space for providing road blocks for people who shouldn't have weapons to get them as well as change the culture we live in so that gun violence is not seen as a regular solution.  It has happened in other places.  We can move forward to make the country safer.  To do that we must recognize the problem.  After Sandy Hook and the death of all those 5 year olds I thought we would change.  What we did was get numb to the deaths.  For me that is uncomfortable.  

What Game of Thrones Teaches about Diversity

There will be spoilers here but seriously...catch up and watch the episodes we can't all wait for you.  



The Last of the Starks, the fourth episode of the eighth and final season of HBO’s Game of Thrones, was another shift for the series as we come to the final two episodes.  In it there was a lot of post-Night King threat set ups for the coming end.  For many the show has already jumped the shark as the build up to the attack of the dead ended with such an abrupt event (Arya killing the Night King and the dead just crumbling) that people feel everything else will be anti-climactic.  I will note here that many rushed to attack the show runners for having Arya kill the Night King calling her a Mary Sue, a term I had to look up.  It refers to a female character who suddenly becomes a hero without flaws.  This is often an attack on a competent woman who acts in a way that seems to grow out of no-where.  (Rey's talent with a lightsaber for example).  However Arya was a well-trained assassin who had already managed to kill and entire house so........  But to my point.  



In this episode we see Sansa Stark, the lady of Winterfell, tell the Hound that she would still be the meek little girl of season one if she hadn't been, traded like chattel in two marriages, one from a family that caused the death of her father, her dire wolf, her brothers and mother.  Been manipulated by a man who claimed to love her but killed her aunt, sold her to a sadist and basically used her for his own purposes.  And of course that she was brutally raped and tortured by the Ramsey Bolton, who she was forced to marry.  She said that is what made her strong.  



Well, Twitter had none of that.  Women all over Twitter, in real time were outraged.  How could this be a line that Sansa would utter?  Yes we are all the culmination of our experiences but survivors of rape have told us that we have to stop pretending that rape and abuse make women stronger.  They are survivors because they were already strong and endured.  



The point is that in the writers' room a woman could have pointed this out.  (That and the fact that a couple times in bed with Jaime turned Brianne into a puddle when he was leaving).  And this is an argument for diversity in many places.  You see a perspective of a woman, who can see that her strength doesn't come from what men do to her but from her ability to endure and conquer could change the narrative.  That doesn't mean experience doesn't play a role, it is just not a total external thing.  This simple change could be a big difference.  



Too often we here that diversity is about political correctness.  If a white man is best for the job then he should get it.  What is missing is asking what "best for the job" truly means.  Having a voice who sees the world with different eyes can in the long run be better than a more educated person who thinks exactly as everyone else.  Once in her past, Supreme Court Justice Sonya Sotomayor said ""I would hope that a wise Latina woman with the richness of her experiences would more often than not reach a better conclusion than a white male who hasn't lived that life,".  She was trying to inspire young students but the point is that life experience does influence how you see the world.  That is true in court cases, boards of directors and of course television writing.  Letting someone in whose background is radically or even slightly different than your own can easily help you see the things you can't see.  It isn't that you choose not to, but that you don't focus on what you see as important.  To be truly honest here I didn't see Sansa's speech as problematic until the first rape survivor tweet said something about it.  When the 10th came through I realized I needed to rewatch what she said and rethink my own biases.  It is a difficult thing to look beyond your own bias and so we seek others to point them out.  If Game of Thrones, a college campus, a corporate board or Presidential cabinet want to see more of the world in front of them, engaging people who are different in a lot ways, but especially experiences, is important.   So when someone tells you it is unfair, politically correct, or somehow racist, sexist etc. to engage diversity tell them simply, we only have a limited way to see the world, diversity brings in colors we don't normally see, shows them to us and helps us find a way to understand them.  Diversity gives us a super power and we are all worthy of that.  

Not One of Us???????????

One week ago today a man, driven by ignorance and hate, radicalized by the din of the irresponsible, and possessed with the will of a zealot, killed 50 people and injured many more at to mosques in Christ's Church New Zealand.    His reasoning was the often cited idea that immigrants, especially those of color and non-Christian religions, are on a mission to destroy the so-called White Race.  He felt a sense of duty to attack, terrorize and kill as many of the others he could. 

A foreign body

And a foreign mind

Never welcome

In the land of the blind

We see the ideology that permeated this man's thinking daily, coming from the talking heads on the news and even from leaders in our own country.  They call for a wall to keep out the invaders from south, a term that the killer used as well when describing his victims.  This sets up a real sense of US and THEM and makes the THEM an evil force destine to destroy the US. 

There's safety in numbers

When you learn to divide

How can we be in

If there is no outside

The fear that is being developed in the onslaught of rhetoric is driving a rise in white nationalist hate and we are now in the business of exporting it.  The New Zealand attacker cited Americans including our President as people who are to be emulated.   When one speaks for the identified other in this separation of people they too become the enemy.  So often the language of some has risen to inspire terror against the upstanders in politics and the media.

You may look like we do

Talk like we do

But you know how it is

You're not one of us'

But there is hope.  Today I stood with dozens of Jews at a mosque in Indianapolis as the prayed their Jumu'ah.  We held signs in solidarity and shared stories and frankly learned about each other.  The interesting thing is that this mosque, established by Black Muslims in the 1970s now draws from a diverse group of Muslims from many countries.  I met people from East Africa, Afghanistan, Iraq and Europe.  All Muslims coming to pray.  As Jews we were honored to stand up for them, to show the world we accept them as our human family while their path to the Divine is different. 

All shades of opinion

Feed an open mind

But your values are twisted

Let us help you unwind

Yesterday I went to the Indiana State House as clergy leaders from across a variety of faith traditions shared words of consolation, hope and yearning, and even words of demand that the state lawmakers take Indiana off the short list of 5 states without a bias crime bill.  As each person rose to express their traditions vision of the issue of hate in our community they all cited when another had been attacked for being different.  The goal was to show our elected officials that religious communities see you and we will take care of the praying, it is time for them to act.  If only they would. 

It's only water

In a stranger's tear

Looks are deceptive

But distinctions are clear

We all cry the same tears when sad.  We are share the same emotions, regardless of the color of our skin, the words we choose to call on the Divine or how we dress, wear our hair or cover ourselves up.  We should be and always will be a country and a world of distinct differences.  Differences of thought and tastes.  But in that vast difference we should all strive to not only see the beauty of diversity but point it out to others.  We must also challenge those whose words and actions try to make the distinctions something to fear, not something to embrace.  While every group will have bad actors, we cannot define an entire people by the actions of a few.  We are at a dangerous time, those who hate seem to have found a new and louder voice, here in our own country and across the world.  So we must focus on the actions of those that stand in the breach.  We must educate those who spread the vitriol and when that is not possible, be ready to respond to their rancor.  The time is now to squash the nonsense and replace it with a possibility of growth and even love.  We are better when we all come together as people, from many paths but with the same journey.  To create a brighter world for those who come later, our children, our grandchildren and beyond.  Don't let those who see the world as better when monochromatic win.  Our progeny will never forgive us.

*Words in italics are from Peter Gabriel's Not One Of Us  

Vaccines and the World of Social Media

I just saw a report that there are an army of anti-vaccination believers have made death-threats to doctors who support vaccinating children, causing a recent Centers for Disease Control program to require high levels of security.  Imagine that, a group of doctors reporting on disease spreads and the solution that is proposed required armed security with automatic weapons.  This is where we are today as people seem to not be able to trust, in some cases, long established science, often using debunked research that asserted as fact things that were not found. 

This is not a partisan issue.  Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is a Democrat and a loud voice in the so-called anti-vax movement.  He often speaks out against government requiring vaccines and citing nonsense opinions about the link between vaccines and autism.  However so are many on the right.  The current President has been a vocal supporter of this debunked idea going back many years.  He has stated publicly and linked to alternative websites that continue to say there is a link.  Besides politicians there are tons of celebrities and just ordinary people who live in a place where they are more likely to believe these false ideas and put their children at risk than really research the history of vaccines. 

Vaccines can cause harm, to an extremely small percentage of the population.  It is a terrible thing when attempts to help cause harm, but medicine is still an art, there are no perfect solutions.  But children who have been harmed by vaccines are being exploited by the anti-vax crowd, up to and including lying about how they have been harmed. 

The mass distribution of vaccines like the Measles, Mumps and Rubella vaccine (MMR) have only been around since the 1960s and world-wide distribution since the 80s.  In that time deaths from these disease have dropped from more than 2 million a year to less the 200,000 and most of those are in the developing world.  Millions have received these vaccinations and most have no ill effects.  While there is a rise in diagnosis of Autism Spectrum Disorders in the last few decades but I am certain that it isn't the result of vaccinations and probably, in part, due to recognizing it more. 

I personally welcome science to explore any questions about vaccines or aspect of our public health experiences but this has been done.  People who have published stories about vaccines and autism, for example, have been found to be faking the data.  While the medical profession that is supposed to be in on some kind of vaccine conspiracy openly acknowledge that sometimes vaccines cause harm.  But like many things the benefits outweigh the risks.  A car seat can save your child's life in an accident, but it can also trap them if the accident causes a car fire.  But you are more likely to be in an accident that can throw your baby from the car than one where they are burned, so using a car seat is a good idea even though there are risks.  Same with vaccines, there is a chance of causing a form of harm but it is so tiny the benefits are far more important.

But the worst of the anti-vax crowd are those that attack parents who have children who died even if receiving a vaccine.  When a two-year old died of the flu the anti-vax crowd attacked.  The crowd even suggested that the mom murdered her child.  This is disgusting.  The woman vaccinated her child against the flu, but it didn't work and her son died.  We should simply be sad that science isn't perfect but that is not what science is meant to be.  In fact the idea that we continue to make vaccines and other ways of helping are always being revisited.  Science doesn't settle on it laurels, it probes further, it looks for more connections.  People are alive today because of the vaccines that took a long time to develop and be successful.   The polio vaccine made it so I have never met anyone who had to use an Iron lung, and my guess is that there is an entire generation in college today that would have to google Iron Lung to know what it is.  But that might not be true in 20 years.  We are seeing measles outbreaks around the country.  We are seeing other diseases make a come back after huge declines in the last 50.  Some say they are harmless childhood diseases but we know people have died or have suffered significant side-effects because of the disease.  Even vaccinated people are at risk as vaccines are not 100% effective and thus rely on diseases not getting a stronghold in a community especially a tight knit one.  So while some anti-vax people feel that it is their choice, they are putting others in danger. 

Social media has made it easy for people to portray themselves as experts and promote all manner of things.  In the 90s, when the internet was just getting to a majority of people I showed how easy it was to my students to find websites that said the earth was flat and that lizard people controlled major governments (Bill Clinton apparently is a lizard person).  They looked like well researched websites with images and details that looked legit.  Things really haven't changed and with social media you don't even need a website, just a link to RFK, President Trump or any number of famous people who promote anti-vax nonsense and you look like you have done research.  So I will say to you what I said to those students.  Don't believe everything you read, including this blog.  Do your own research, but remember, when doing so, look for facts.  Oh and if you are under 60 years old, chances are you are here and well in part because of a vaccine. 

See The Other.......

At a recent town hall Howard Schultz, the Starbucks founder who is thinking of running for President, uttered the nonsensical phrase, "I don't see color".  This kind of faux-liberal idea that we can have a color-blind society has been problematic for decades.  The reason is that when you say you don't see color, first you are lying, second you filter everyone through a white European lens.   You look for a flat cultural and social expression that you see as a standard.  It erases the diversity of experience of people of color and other minority visions that are part of our country.  We saw this laid bare when Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor was nominated.  Early in her career Justice Sotomayor gave a speech in which she included the line "I would hope that a wise Latina woman with the richness of her experiences would more often than not reach a better conclusion than a white male who hasn't lived that life."  Her quote, taken out of context, was attacked as suggesting she was saying Latina women were smarter than men.  What she was doing was pointing out in some cases people of color and she included women have a different vantage point to understand a situation, specifically she was talking about from the bench, but it is true in the board room, the campus and the factory floor.  Justice Sotomayor, in the speech, said:

"Let us not forget that wise men like Oliver Wendell Holmes and Justice [Benjamin] Cardozo voted on cases which upheld both sex and race discrimination in our society. Until 1972, no Supreme Court case ever upheld the claim of a woman in a gender discrimination case. I, like professor [Steven] Carter, believe that we should not be so myopic as to believe that others of different experiences or backgrounds are incapable of understanding the values and needs of people from a different group. Many are so capable. As Judge [Miriam] Cedarbaum pointed out to me, nine white men on the Supreme Court in the past have done so on many occasions and on many issues including Brown .




We can see that what she is saying that one's experience is not necessary but history teaches us that the different perspective of a person of color can move our understanding along faster and with more justice. 



We have always been a country that valued and accepted diversity.  In the 1780s when the United States was recently established there was an idea that the new country would be a melting (some said smelting) pot.  The idea that we would welcome people from around the world and with each new culture they would add their distinction to what it means to be an American and being American would change.  But it didn't take long until people wanted the immigrants to give up who they were and become the Western European standard which was white and Protestant.  America became like the Borg of Star Trek, we wanted full assimilation and that our culture would somehow just use what we wanted from each wave of immigrant culture.   This is seen in the "speak English in America" crowd who still go out and get drunk on Cinco De Mayo.  Color blind ideology wants to people to be the same and that is never going to happen.   


But what is more insidious is the way some people blame the problems of race on the victims of racism.  Earlier this week when Michael Cohen was testifying about his role in the actions of President Trump, things he will go to prison for, he called the President a racist.  Let's be clear, the President has shown clear signs of racism over the many decades he has been in the public eye.  But Representative Mark Meadows decided to parade out a black woman who works for the Executive Branch (a woman that used to be the Trump party planner and is now at HUD) to suggest the President can't be racist.  He was challenged by Rep  Rashida Tlaib.  She called what he did a racist act.  Meadows, who has been connected with racist acts in the past like his fervent birtherism, was appalled.  Since the exchange (again she called what he did racist and not him racist, a distinction that is important) she has been attacked for playing the race card.  Again the idea that we shouldn't see color comes up.  But this is an example of why seeing color is important.  Let's assume the Rep. Meadows did this without trying to cover for the President.  Maybe he truly believes that if you hire people of color in position of authority you can't be racist.  So for him just bringing her out as a prop is a fine thing.  Except the vast majority of people of color don't see it that way.  They see the tokenism that it represents, something Meadows never has to deal with.  There was a joke at the universities I have been associated with that a black woman professor is the hardest working person on campus.  She is asked to serve on every committee and be in as many campus photos as possible.  The reason Meadow's act struck a cord is because that kind of tokenism often is specifically designed to cover up a failure to embrace real diversity or out-and-out racism.  Rep Tlaib may have been trying to educate Meadows and by extension the American people on how not to do it.  But in the end it continues to shine a light on the ignorance of so many, that in the last month (Black History month no less) has seen Democratic politicians who admit to black face, use the n-word and not understand how to respond to a black woman running for President simply being black. 


We are all ignorant and one of the reasons is that we can't see the world through someone else's eyes if we haven't lived their life.  Rep Tlaib learned that when she used an anti-Semitic tome recently.  We all have something to learn and one thing is not to try to white wash society.  I hope Tlaib and Meadows learned something.  Hope is something t

Why Hate Crimes Laws Are the Right Thing To Do

Indiana is one of a handful of states without a hate crimes (or bias crimes) law.  For many legislative cycles a bill was killed by the Republican leadership and some far right members.  But with the rise of hate crimes both nationally and events in Indiana have pushed some in the GOP to move closer to a law that many can live with.  In fact after a graffiti attack on a synagogue in Carmel, there was a real sense that the debate was over.  But for some on the right the debate isn't.  Some Republican members recently sent a letter to the Indianapolis Star calling the proposed bill would be a thought crime.  But they were completely out of touch with what the law would do.  Here is an example from their letter:  

For example, imagine an individual enjoying a meal at an Indiana restaurant when his “Bernie 2016” t-shirt or her red “MAGA.” hat agitates another of the restaurant’s patrons. If an argument breaks out and the police are called, the t-shirt or hat might label the individual as someone who evidently hates others.

The dangerous legislation being proposed in Indiana would make it possible for prosecutors and judges to prosecute and sentence as a thought crime, which could be based on the personal political or religious beliefs of the accused.

This is nonsense because this is not how the 45 states that have these laws use them.  In fact the t-shirt or hat is not a measure of hate but support.  If they were attempted to be used to show hate that would be laughed out of the court room.  But it is this type of fear mongering that makes it difficult to get people to understand what these laws can do.

Here is an example that can highlight how and why these laws are used and are important.  Let's say you have a neighbor who plays music loudly late into the night.  You try to get him to stop but he ignores you.  You are mad, you hate him because of the music.  You go over and spray paint "Move out you jerk" on his garage door.

Now you have a neighbor who moves in.  He and his family are Jewish. They are quiet and you only see them when they come and go or are in their yard.  But you hate them because they are Jewish.  So you spray paint "Move out you Kike" on their garage.  Is this really the same crime?

One is about responding to the action of terrible neighbor and the other is an attempt to keep people you hate out of your neighborhood.  While both are property crimes and will involve both criminal and civil action, the attack on the Jews is an attack on a community.  That is why bias crime laws are needed.  We already have many laws that there are enhancements to the consequences of a crime because of the nature of the crime and sometimes the status of the victim.  Bias crimes do not create a special status for individual victims, nor does it make thoughts illegal.  But if you target a particular group with the intent of attacking their civil rights, such as trying to scare them out of a community you don't want them to live in, your sentence should be more severe than a simple graffiti charge.  I understand with all the noise from right wing noise makers that people might not understand the way bias crimes work, but if these elected officials are going to spread such nonsense they should be sanctioned by their party.

We are living in a post truth society now.  The President of the United States lies about objective facts multiple times a day.  This isn't just the "all politicians lie" kind of thing.  We must be careful to not allow the propaganda replace debate.  There may be a clear conservative argument against bias crimes.  I haven't heard it yet.  I think because it is hard to hear of the noise of nonsense that exists.  But in the end it is simple.  Indiana needs a bias crime law to allow the justice system to provide real justice for targeted communities.  Intent is part of a lot of crimes, let's be a state that says attacking people for who they are is wrong.  

I Don't Wear My Kippah at WalMart

Several years ago I was sitting in a cafe with someone who suggested I take off my kippah.  The neighborhood we were in was a predominantly Catholic and so she thought it might make people uncomfortable and could result in a response.  I normally wear my kippah when I am doing something related to my work so I tend to have it on a lot.  Her request seemed odd but I realized I do take it off in some places, so I wrote an essay that I don't wear my kippah at WalMart.  I am not a frequent WalMart shopper but at the time it was a place I went for certain items.  I found wearing my kippah that was not something that put me in a form of danger, quite the opposite.  What it did was create a chance for people to talk to me about Judaism.  Total strangers would either ask me questions, tell me they loved the Jewish people or worse ask try to preach to me.  While I am always up for a good theological discussion, that was not the place.  It seemed that it was the only place that this happened here in Indianapolis.  When I lived in the south however, a kippah was like Lucy's psychology stand in Peanuts.  I didn't wear it nearly as much as I do now but when I did I could expect a conversation.  Only once did I feel threatened wearing it.  One day I came back to town from shul and forgot I had my kippah on, I went to the post office in downtown Milledgeville.  As I crossed the street I heard someone yell from a pick-up "Christ Killer".  It reminded me that there are people who still feel that they can shout out hateful things.  That was 20 years ago, now there is a feeling in the air that simply yelling isn't going to be enough for some.  The recent attack on the Tree of Life synagogue in Pittsburgh is the worst of what has become a significant increase in antisemitic attacks in the US.  White Nationalist groups are coming out into the daylight and seem to feel they have a friend in power.  Some have even run and received the nomination of a major political party.  So today public Jewish expression can be an act of bravery and defiance. 

A recent Facebook post from a friend, a young woman living in a major US city, a city with a large Jewish population and a high level diversity, put today's world into perspective.  Since Pittsburgh she has stopped wearing her Hebrew name necklace.  She, like many Jews, feel that it is important to be careful when in public.  The rise of comfort with antisemitic voices scares many people and the results of that are clear.  So recently in Philadelphia the Proud Boys, a white supremacist group, rallied near the center of town, the cradle of freedom and near the American Museum of Jewish History.  I was planning to walk there as I was in Philly for a convention.  Several friends were nervous about me walking down there and I had to promise not to wear anything that identified me as a Jew.  Again, in an large American city being Jewish in public is seen as dangerous.  We should not have to live like this.  Nor should Muslims, Sheikhs. or any other group whose appearance identifies them to a particular group.  Our country was founded in diversity and has struggled for decades to make more room at the table, we must push back at those wanting to take away the chairs.  I am not sure the answer.  Around the world nationalists and authoritarian leaders are gaining power and influence.  As one of the world's strongest liberal democracies the people must stand up for what American values are and fight to keep us at least where we have grown to today.  Wearing religious or cultural clothing or symbols should never have to be an act of bravery in a country that has valued equality, even if it took some groups decades of fighting to achieve a taste of that.  Let's all call out hate where we see it.  Be it in a small group of men and women who are angered that the world is changing too fast for them, or if your political party nominates someone who feels that humanity has a pecking order based solely on genetics.  We don't and should agree on everything.  Diversity of thought is a value and strength.  But one thing we can all agree on is that hate and fear have no place in our society and kippah, a hijab, a turban or mere Hebrew letters can be worn proudly in public.  

Did You Buy a Monkey's Paw

A story by W W Jacobs called the Monkey's Paw tells the story of a couple who are in need of money and come into possession of a monkey's paw, brought to England from India.  Told there is a curse on the paw though it will grant three wishes. After thinking about the curse and fretting over what might happen they wish for money to pay off his mortgage.  That afternoon their son is killed in a horrible accident and to compensate the family they are given the exact amount they wished for earlier.  Later, the boys mother wishes their son to return and as there is a knock at the door, but before the door could be opened, the father, knowing that destruction the body had suffered and the decay the week since his death would have on body makes a final wish and when the door is opened there is no one there.  Another version of the story known as Button Button  has a couple who are in difficult financial straits visited by a stranger who gives them a box with a button on top and says "If you push the button you will receive enough wealth to live comfortably but someone you don't know will die"  After a similar discussion of the morality they push the button.  The stranger returns the next day to get the box and gives them a briefcase of money that will solve all their problems.  When he is asked by the couple what will happen to the box, he assures them he will now give it to someone that they don't know. 

For many I feel like they were handed a monkey's paw or the button box in 2016 and they gleefully pushed the button for President Trump.  A President who has given then a very conservative Federal judiciary, deregulation of industry, tax cuts that seem to be helping many in the upper middle class and of course has kept the economy growing, evidenced by recent jobs and wage numbers.  But in the end the consequences:  giving voice to white nationalism, openly racist activity including from elected officials, the collapse of the United States as the moral standard bearer worldwide, and the most incompetent and corrupt cabinet of my lifetime.  Future consequences on the horizon seems to be the destruction of health care and financial safety nets for many of Trump voters (so much so Republicans are lying about their history on health care) and a ballooning national debt. 

The old adage that all politics is local has seen people voting for their own personal interests but what the last election cycle showed some of that personal interest was purely emotional.  We see it in the midterms as ads are not about accomplishments of the last two years but trying to gin up fear of immigrants.  When you go to the polls in this election cycle remember that you have been given a box to push a button.  Think about the consequences of what you may get short term.  Educate yourself as to what you want this country to be, for yourself, for your neighbors and for all Americans.  Ignore the ads and look to the reality that is out there.  Because someone else has a box and they don't know you. 

Jews for Jesus and the Struggle of Multi-Faith Work

A liberal Jew and an Evangelical Christian walk into a Franciscan bar in Bethlehem.   That is not the start of a joke but a decade long friendship.  Some people think this is an unusual friendship but in fact I believe there are many such friendships in the world.  How is it possible?  We both respect each others vision of the Divine and how we practice that vision.  Do we clash at times?  Sure, but we work through them and acknowledge our own shortcomings.  This is what living in a multi-faith world.  My friend has reached into the interfaith community of Indianapolis, bringing a much needed evangelical voice to the diversity of faiths seeking a better world.  So when confronted with someone who mocks true multi-faith expressions things become difficult.

Earlier this week a Michigan rally for a House Election invited the Vice-President to speak.  In the wake of the anti-semitic attack in a Pittsburgh synagogue that left 11 dead they wanted a Jewish voice to share prayer.  They sought a man who calls himself Rabbi but is a Christian.  A Jewish man who converted to a form of Christianity called Messianic Judaism.  When Noah was little he asked about a congregation of messianic Jews we would drive by daily, I said they are Christians who pretend to be Jewish.  That is how I feel about them.  They are clearly Christian, celebrating Jesus as not only the messiah of the Jewish people but as part of the trilogy of the Christian God.  But their practice uses Jewish ritual and language in services.  Which wouldn't bother me so much if they didn't also include in their approach a rejection of classic Jewish understanding of text, call traditional Jews incomplete and wrong minded, and pretend to be a Jewish congregation to young people and in many reports tricking them into their sphere of influence with the idea of converting them.  They look at people like me in a negative fashion and as less than them.  So when trying to dialogue with people who see me as second-class it is difficult.

I have worked in multicultural and multi-faith communities my entire adult life.  I have had people put me on prayer lists at churches for my very soul.  I had a friend tell me that her preacher preached that Jews were going to hell and it hurt her so much that I am going to hell that she couldn't be my friend anymore.  I understand that people look at the world differently, but when it comes to their worldview including looking down on me inviting them to the table means there is someone there who wants me or what makes me me gone.

The reason that the man who gave the prayer and spoke along side Vice-President Pence is a problem also goes beyond just what group he associates himself with in his religious faith.  In fact he was defrocked by the messianic movement over some libel and apparently theological issues.  He didn't really pray to the healing of the survivors and the souls of the dead, he prayed the Republicans win in the midterms.  He appeared more a costumed prop than a man of faith.  The candidate and the Vice-President could have easily found a thoughtful Rabbi to do a prayer and a moment of ministry for those reeling from horror.  They didn't and the criticism is warranted.  I would have also been critical if they had brought in the Orthodox Rabbi who didn't see Tree of Life as a synagogue or the one who said  the shooter was God's retribution for the fact a brit milah was happening for the child of a same-sex couple. This is not about being anti-Christian or anti-messianic.  It is about how you act for people who are in pain.

And thus the series of questions that always come up when you reach across faiths, cultures and nations.  How to you sit down with someone so different?  So here is what I say.  Meet people, not their faith tradition.  Just because someone comes from a particular branch of a particular faith doesn't mean you know anything more about them than where they go to get fed spiritually.  On any given day of the week, rooms in houses of worship are filled with people, all singing from the same hymnal but hearing the words differently.  Don't let the stereotypes block you from adding someone wonderful to your life.  Simply having a meal with someone might change the way you see them.  Might change you whole world view.

But in the same token, if you do encounter someone who is hurtful to what and who you are, it is okay to reject them.  I am always struck by people who question my tolerance when I speak out against bigotry, lies and hate.  The goal in life is not to tolerate differences, I tolerate the fact that I can't get buy decent kosher meat in Indianapolis, that doesn't mean I like it nor do I order from St. Louis.  I embrace who, even if they are different, find God in places I can't and read the poetry of scripture with a different tune can acknowledge that their view is theirs and my view is mine and neither is better or worse.  That is how you be a human being.  That is how you approach the vast and wonderful diversity that is our nation, one of the highest and most important values that we share.

Tonight, synagogues across the country will be filled with people coming from a variety of faith traditions to stand in solidarity with Jewish communities.  As they hear the words of psalms we sing as we invite Shabbat into our homes they may see God differently in the words or not at all there.  But that is not the point.  The point is, they share a human connection to their neighbors, and that is Godly in any language.