we have a long way to go…

This weekend, I went to a conference called the National Asian American Student Conference (NAASCON) (http://www.naascon.org/conferences/emory08/).  The conference is run by a national board of Asian American undergraduate or post-undergraduate students.  The theme for this year was, “From Visions to Actions, Let’s Get our Movement Going.”  The students wanted to work with students to elevate their current level of involvement in social movements to one that is more intricate to their lives and more outwardly lived.  The conference was in Atlanta, GA and it was awesome.  A few folks that I knew from college and I went down and facilitated workshops on working with youth in organizing and police brutality.  Met some amazing amazing people from all over the U.S.  Everything from people working on changing culturally motivated actions to culturally movement building actions to people talking about APIAs (Asian Pacific Islander Americans) being involved with the elections.  Was really good to be around a whole group of APIA activits and to learn from folks.

Then I came back to Milwaukee.  Had dinner with a friend and his parents.  The friend decided that he wanted to order Chinese food take-out, and so we did.  After we ordered the food, the friend asked said to his mother that it might be difficult for him to pay with her card, because the name on the card was a distinctly woman’s name.  The mother replied, “It’ll be fine.  The Chinese people will not know the difference.”

This statement came as a shock to me because my roommate is not the type of person to make an assumption that because a person is of a particular ethnicity that that person, therefore, subscribes to the stereotypes that (white) society has deemed appropriate.  However, it made me pause and think more deeply about the implications of the statement:

1. On a surface level: For whatever reason, I am not ‘the other.’  Although I look Asian, I apparently am not associated, at least in her mind, as ‘an Asian.’  (i.e. White privelege determining for me what my identity is and is not).  The people who run the resturant are Chinese.  And not only are they Chinese they are not born in the United States and do not understand American language.

2. On a deeper level: Chinese (Asian) people are prepetually foreigners.  No matter how long they live in the United States, they will always be ‘the other’ and this country will never be their home.  This statement is tough to swollow, espicially because we know that Chinese people have been in this country for centuries (many came over during the building of the transconntential railroad and gold rush) and that because a person is not born in this country, the person still learns the norms and rules of that particular country.

3. On an identity level: A statement as such, could be a representation of a person’s character and belief system, and therefore, connected to statements such as: “Don’t bother explaining to a deaf person, they can’t understand anyways.” or “Don’t bother voting for a Black man, Black people can’t take care of their neighborhoods so they can’t run a country.” or  “Don’t bother teaching her how to work those machines, she can’t do it anyways.” etc. etc.

The contrast between the weekend and the evening was tremendous, and yet, it was not.  In each situation the people felt ’safe’ to be who and how they are-to the degree that other people’s beliefs and values were not nescessarily at the forefront.  There were certain assumptions made in both situations, as far as what an ‘activist’ is or what an ‘United States citizen’ is.  For me, these experiences served as a reminder of a few things:

1. I have to be open to learning and growing and changing.  If I had been in my college years, my response to her comment would have been anger, resetment, and I would have shut down.  I probably would have responded pretty negatively and harshly to her comment and neither of us would have learned anything.  Now, I know, even more clearly, that I have a long way to go.  I know that I too have stereotypes and am sure that I have spoken and acted out of ignorance, so, although I can feel, disrespected and shocked by the comment, I know that responding solely based off the emotions that were brough out, is not helpful.  I need to learn to speak more gently and be more kind, in this way, I am then able to understand better where others are coming from and hopefully they will do the same for me.

2. Only staying within our bubles of ‘activism’ or bubbles of ‘like-minded’ people is a huge detreiment to our ability to truly create movements that are sustainable and impact not only a shift in policy but a transformation of the heart.  The essence of change comes when I know that I myself need to be re-examined and that I need to change.  Only in the small incremental changes that I make in how I think, how I react, and what I do, will any sort of ’social movement’ that I am involved with change.  We must be open to accepting people who are ‘not like us,’ as being also ‘us.’  Otherwise it is just each of us in our small bubbles proclaiming to ourselves that we are hereos and wizards while everyone else does the same.

3. We have a long way to go.  We have a long way to go.  As we have seen, people really do believe and live by the stereotypes and judgements that are made of others.  There really are people who will not vote for Obama because of his race.  A Japanese American woman was attacked this past weekend by a White American as she was canvassing for Obama (race related hate crime) http://asianamericanvillage.blogspot.com/2008/10/japanese-america-woman-58-beaten-while.html.  This is a life long journey and we must take each step delibertly, no matter how small a step may seem, it is still one step.  No matter how small I may seem to myself sometime, I am still one person.  And so this journey continues.

What has come of this statement by my friend’s parent?  I was not sure how to respond at first, bounced ideas off of some folks.  Decided that I should approach her and ask her what exactly she meant and also explain to her why I was shocked by her comment.  Before approaching her, I asked my friend what was the best way to approach her.  Because as I’m sure you know, when someone is attacked, there is very little good that can come of it.  He said that he felt that she would take it better from him because she is very sensitive and if I approached her, she would feel hurt and upset that she had hurt me.  So I did not talk with her about it.  Because if I had approached her, the chances of her really hearing what I was saying, that I was not upset at her, but was rather asking her to examine herself and also to consider my prespective, would have been lost.  I trust that he understands and that he will talk with her in a manner that she can understand, and so it is.

As with the journeys of our lives, to be continued…

Alinsky’s Rules for Radicals

time to be re-reminded of Alinsky’s rules again.  What are your thoughts on them?  do you think they work, don’t work, are inline with the underlying principles of organizing, etc,.?

RULE 1: “Power is not only what you have, but what the enemy thinks you have.” Power is derived from 2 main sources – money and people. “Have-Nots” must build power from flesh and blood. (These are two things of which there is a plentiful supply. Government and corporations always have a difficult time appealing to people, and usually do so almost exclusively with economic arguments.)

RULE 2: “Never go outside the expertise of your people.” It results in confusion, fear and retreat. Feeling secure adds to the backbone of anyone. (Organizations under attack wonder why radicals don’t address the “real” issues. This is why. They avoid things with which they have no knowledge.)

RULE 3: “Whenever possible, go outside the expertise of the enemy.” Look for ways to increase insecurity, anxiety and uncertainty. (This happens all the time. Watch how many organizations under attack are blind-sided by seemingly irrelevant arguments that they are then forced to address.)

RULE 4: “Make the enemy live up to its own book of rules.” If the rule is that every letter gets a reply, send 30,000 letters. You can kill them with this because no one can possibly obey all of their own rules. (This is a serious rule. The besieged entity’s very credibility and reputation is at stake, because if activists catch it lying or not living up to its commitments, they can continue to chip away at the damage.)

RULE 5: “Ridicule is man’s most potent weapon.” There is no defense. It’s irrational. It’s infuriating. It also works as a key pressure point to force the enemy into concessions. (Pretty crude, rude and mean, huh? They want to create anger and fear.)

RULE 6: “A good tactic is one your people enjoy.” They’ll keep doing it without urging and come back to do more. They’re doing their thing, and will even suggest better ones. (Radical activists, in this sense, are no different that any other human being. We all avoid “un-fun” activities, and but we revel at and enjoy the ones that work and bring results.)

RULE 7: “A tactic that drags on too long becomes a drag.” Don’t become old news. (Even radical activists get bored. So to keep them excited and involved, organizers are constantly coming up with new tactics.)

RULE 8: “Keep the pressure on. Never let up.” Keep trying new things to keep the opposition off balance. As the opposition masters one approach, hit them from the flank with something new. (Attack, attack, attack from all sides, never giving the reeling organization a chance to rest, regroup, recover and re-strategize.)

RULE 9: “The threat is usually more terrifying than the thing itself.” Imagination and ego can dream up many more consequences than any activist. (Perception is reality. Large organizations always prepare a worst-case scenario, something that may be furthest from the activists’ minds. The upshot is that the organization will expend enormous time and energy, creating in its own collective mind the direst of conclusions. The possibilities can easily poison the mind and result in demoralization.)

RULE 10: “If you push a negative hard enough, it will push through and become a positive.” Violence from the other side can win the public to your side because the public sympathizes with the underdog. (Unions used this tactic. Peaceful [albeit loud] demonstrations during the heyday of unions in the early to mid-20th Century incurred management’s wrath, often in the form of violence that eventually brought public sympathy to their side.)

RULE 11: “The price of a successful attack is a constructive alternative.” Never let the enemy score points because you’re caught without a solution to the problem. (Old saw: If you’re not part of the solution, you’re part of the problem. Activist organizations have an agenda, and their strategy is to hold a place at the table, to be given a forum to wield their power. So, they have to have a compromise solution.)

RULE 12: Pick the target, freeze it, personalize it, and polarize it.” Cut off the support network and isolate the target from sympathy. Go after people and not institutions; people hurt faster than institutions. (This is cruel, but very effective. Direct, personalized criticism and ridicule works.)

http://www.geocities.com/WallStreet/8925/alinsky.htm

Prophets of Future Not Our Own

It helps now and then to step back and take a long view.
The Kingdom is not only beyond our efforts,
it is beyond our vision.

We accomplish in our lifetime only a fraction
of the magnificent enterprise that is God’s work.
Nothing we do is complete, which is another way of
saying that the kingdom always lies beyond us.

No statement says all that could be said.
No prayer fully expresses our faith. No confession
brings perfection, no pastoral visit brings wholeness.
No program accomplishes the Church’s mission.
No set of goals and objectives include everything.

This is what we are about. We plant the seeds that one
day will grow. We water the seeds already planted
knowing that they hold future promise.
We lay foundations that will need further development.
We provide yeast that produces effects
far beyond our capabilities.

We cannot do everything, and there is a sense of
liberation in realizing this.
This enables us to do something, and to do it very well.
It may be incomplete, but it is a beginning,
a step along the way, an opportunity for the Lord’s
grace to enter and do the rest.
We may never see the end results, but that is the
difference between the master builder and the worker.

We are workers, not master builders, ministers, not
messiahs. We are prophets of a future not our own.

~attributed to Archbishop Oscar Romero (martyred on March 24th 1980)

Herein lies our responsbility.  If we prophets of a future that is not our own, what type of prophets are we friends?  Are we living in a way that prophesizes a future of abundant possbilities and Hope for the future, or are we living in a way that prophesizes fear and destruction?  With the VP debates yesterday adding to the spectacle of palin, the future-on a large scale level-appears bleak.  There is a lot of hard work and good, honest living that we must do in order to grow the yeast and lay the foundations of a brighter future.  What type of seeds are you planting?