alexis in the city

#Occupy Festivus

I’ve been avoiding this Occupy stuff because I knew that if I looked into it, I’d just get angry. I know myself pretty well so I was, of course, right - but I decided to at least get familiar with the list of demands from the protestors. What I found was a list of a couple dozen grievances covering just about every ill known to (American) humanity. There’s the stuff you would expect about corporate pensions and salaries and those responsible for the economic meltdown, but there’s just about every other issue on there as well. From repealing the death penalty, to stopping the war on drugs, to enacting a better environmental policy, to passing health care reform, and so on and so on. Even if some sort of meeting were to occur between the two sides, how could they begin to make headway at all with such a Festivus-like airing of grievances? The possibility seems laughable.

So what seems to have happened is everyone who has some sort of complaint - or just likes a good rage against The Man - has thrown their hat in the ring. There’s no need to atone for any financial missteps you may have taken when you can just blame someone else. It’s much more fun to march around with friends than to hustle and get creative and work - and at the end of it all, pay a huge portion of what you earned in taxes.

I’m not that old, but I feel so far removed from the current ethos when I talk about how Ryan used his time in the military as a way to (mostly) put himself through school (going double full-time at two different colleges). Or how we kept paying our mortgage even though we were naive and signed off on an adjustable rate loan. Or how when I got laid off, I booked up freelance work too fast to qualify for unemployment. Or how I’ll work my way through grad school instead of taking out loans.

On the one hand I’m mad at the people who are using this as a way to shift the blame of their less-than-ideal financial or economic circumstances. On the other hand, I’m mad that the movement couldn’t pick one or two core principles to focus on. People are clearly upset. They clearly have an audience. Reform of some kind arguably needs to occur. But they’ve seemingly wasted an opportunity for that to actually happen by airing every possible grievance and expecting something to be done about it.

I know there are people who have a singleminded reason for participating in these demonstrations. For them it’s not part of a blame game or a bandwagon. But I fear their efforts for targeted, peaceful reform is being drowned out by everyone else - you may know them as the 99%.

Yes, I have more than enough … but don’t tax me

There seems to be a sentiment pervading American thought that top earners deserve to be taxed more. The thought spreads from the rich and influential like Warren Buffet, to random people on the street with cardboard signs. Apparently, the theory is that the rich have enough to shoulder the burden of those who do not, and so should have to give more to the government.

My first problem with that statement is its complete subjectivity. Who decides what “enough” is? By a global standard, probably 99.99% of people in America have “enough.” Do we cut people off after they’ve had a single meal for the day? After they’ve invested in a single pair of shoes? After they’ve bought their first house? After they have a closet full of furs? After they start driving a Hummer? I’m not saying there should be no taxes, and for the purpose of this post I don’t want to quibble over exactly what that amount should be - but rather point out a flaw in the logic of “enough.”

My second problem with the above statement - and the crux of my argument - hinges on the second half of the sentence: the idea that we should have to give more to the government. Yes, I have more than enough but I believe *I* am the best allocator of my resources - not my family, not my church and certainly not my government. I believe that as I allocate my resources according to my decisions, not only do I provide a bigger benefit to the people and organizations to whom I give charitably, but I also provide a bigger benefit to the economy as a whole.

So yes, I suppose I stand with the 99% … but I do so through a desire for personal benevolence, not forced “charity.”

Patriotism, 9/11 and Guantanamo Bay

I get perhaps disproportionately defensive when people question two things about me that I hold sacred: my faith and my patriotism. I wrote this post last year in response to a comment I saw that people who wanted to close Guantanamo Bay prison had forgotten 9/11. The Gitmo debate has faded from the headlines but as we near the ninth anniversary of 9/11, I think the points still stand.

I do not wish this post to be a delineation of why I support closing Gitmo or how I feel about torture. I’ve already explained all that here and elsewhere. I do wish to point out how absurd and offensive this conclusion is in general, and to me specifically. In general, it shouldn’t take much common sense to determine that remembering and mourning 9/11 is not mutually exclusive with wanting to shut down a detainment camp.

Perhaps it shouldn’t, but it upsets me GREATLY that someone would infer that a political and/or humanitarian stance would remove any and all sympathy, empathy, pain and suffering in regards to that tragic day.

Perhaps I shouldn’t, but I take it personally. 9/11 hit close to home for me, in a sense. I don’t mean to put myself on the same par at all with 9/11 survivors or people who lost friends and family - I’m not at all trying to equate my experience with theirs. But it was none the less traumatic for me in a way it probably wasn’t for many people: my dad was deployed when we engaged in operation Iraqi freedom. He was sent to Saudi Arabia to help command the satellite/space aspects and operations of the war, so he wasn’t on the front lines and in terms of war it was probably the safest place he could be. But I was 18, away from family at college, and I was scared. We didn’t know when he was coming home and there was that frightening nagging thought that none of us wanted to articulate: “what if he’s NOT coming home.” I remember that thought. I remember scrounging through magazines and newspapers looking for references to my dad’s base and his operations. I remember getting emails from him - and hoping I would continue to get them.

I remember all that - even now my hands are shaky, my heart is beating fast - I will NEVER forget. To say that I ever could, simply because of a political position I’ve decided to hold, makes me angry. It reduces the fright and the memories to nothing, based simply on partisanship. It infuriates me that my dad’s - and my family’s - sacrifice and uncertainty during those times could be so easily written off.

To say that I have forgotten just because I support closing a prison is completely unfair - and completely inaccurate.

Separation of Church and Self: why we need to keep personal political agendas out of our churches

Let me preface this by saying: I’m Christian. I emphasize this fact because what I’m about to espouse (like many of my beliefs) is not the predominant thinking within mainstream Christianity. So here’s the crux of my argument ~ I’ve stated it before but it bears repeating: America is not a Christian nation, therefore it is not the Church’s responsibility to foist its beliefs upon the nation’s citizenry, nor is it one church’s responsibility to foist its individual political convictions (should it have any) on its members. This is a commonly-held sentiment OUTSIDE of the religious community, yet for some reason too many people within it want to equate America with Israel: the chosen nation, a theocracy, a place where the laws of the Bible (or more correctly, someone’s INTERPRETATION of the laws of the Bible) should be the law of the land.

Of course, this is all common knowledge ~ one has to look no further than the nomenclature “the religious right” to see that we’ve accepted this religious infiltration into our politics and policy. (Check out “The Family” if you want a chilling look into just how inter-connected Evangelical leaders like Dr. Dobson and Pat Robertson are with the political underground.) I grew up in churches where it was no more strange to sign an anti-abortion petition in the foyer of the building than it was to sing choruses at the start of each service. And to many people within Christian circles, I would guess this idea is somewhat innocuous. But here’s the thing: IT’S NOT. By veritably preaching politics from the pulpit, the church is alienating anyone who might believe differently by essentially saying: “We are the authority on this subject, this is the correct thing to believe, and here is the correct way to vote.”

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“jesus for president” and a reconstruction of faith

“I like your Christ, I do not like your Christians. Your Christians are so unlike your Christ.”

~mahatma gandhi

i mentioned earlier that my computer meltdown ate the lengthy post i was composing on my latest read, “jesus for president” by shane claiborne and chris haw. while that quelled my desire to re-hash my thoughts for quite a while, it may have had a beneficial effect in that it gave me more time to mull things over, think about my opinions, talk with people, and dissect the book. in the comments of my last related post, my friend curtis pointed out that it seems that shane supposes the premise that christians should be pacificsts. and he does in a way, but the book is also devoted in large part to investigating the reasons WHY this should be our conclusion. but let me start at the beginning, in as much as i’m able. i knew i was going to like the book - at least a little! - when it started like this:

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