I fear for our country, with the exceptional circumstances of the pandemic, and the outbreak of riots, I am concerned that many millions of jobs and family livelihoods will be lost. I also fear that the horrible death of George Floyd may not become an opportunity for positive social change, and could end up being wasted.
The truly tragic thing is that there is universal condemnation of Mr. Floyd’s death. His cruel treatment is another grim reminder that the pernicious injustice of racism and minority exploitation and bashing remain macabre capabilities.
So much progress has been made since 1776; since the Civil War; the evils of Jim Crow and segregation; since the Civil Rights movements of the 1960, ’70s, and the deaths of Emmett Till, Travon Martin, George Floyd, and many others.
Liberals, conservatives, whites, blacks, majorities and minorities, are in complete agreement—things cannot continue this way. Mr. Floyd’s death is a rallying cry to find the mettle to deal with racial injustice since everyone is in agreement it seems lasting change is finally possible.
However, a small number of evil trouble makers are using legitimate, peaceful protests as cover; some of these ulterior forces want to destroy civil society as we know it. It’s more than sad and shameful.
Destroying small businesses and neighborhoods only serve to hurt people and make their lives that much more difficult. It also puts additional strain on overwrought budgets.
The Congressional Budget Office projects that the virus alone could reduce US economic output by up to 3 percent through 2030, a loss of $7.9 trillion. I truly fear for our country.
Nefarious forces cannot be allowed to move in and exploit protests, this threatens to destroy the good that the protests are trying to achieve — antisocial elements include the rioter looking for a cause, the looter, the anarchist, the narcissist, the supremacist, the foreign plot, all that would use the cover of valid protest for selfish, antisocial, anti-US ends.
Peaceful protesters are squarely rooted in law and sanctioned in the Constitution. All good people must be mindful of the destructive tangents and must speak out against in the clearest and strongest possible terms.
We face unprecedented economic, social, and cultural problems. Just as the pandemic is a natural disease, long-standing social injustices can be viewed as diseases precisely because of the negative impacts inflicted on people and society.
We face the disease of race and hatred; the disease of misogyny; the disease of homophobia; of religious intolerance; polarization and divisiveness; the disease of not caring about humanity or the victims of supremacy and ethnic cleansing, or for the victims of our own ignorance, blindness, and neglect.
This is the good fight, but as often happens it cannot be allowed to slip away.
Stephen Hawking said, “My expectations were reduced to zero when I was 21. Everything since then has been a bonus.”
I used to think spot on, there’s a grand truth and that’s the simple end of things. I was younger then, I am so much older now. Understanding must lead to effective positive action. Let me end with two great American leaders.
Lincoln in our nation’s darkest most destructive, divisive years, dug deep within him to find the wellspring of words and actions that makes America great, going back to the founding principles of the nation.
He expressed broad encompassing values throughout his adult life. Lincoln said the evil of slavery was the can kicked down the road every 20 years since the founding of the nation—he wanted to do something about it. Who can forget the Gettysburg Address when he said: “Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure…” and “that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain—that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom—and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.” He also said these healing words, “with malice toward none, with charity for all… let us strive on to finish the work we are in” and establish “a just and lasting peace among ourselves and with all nations.”
Dr. Martin Luther King is of course the recent positive, powerful, champion of effective social change. Their words and actions combined make the foundation of a house that we can truly live in, 1776 is a long enough time to build.
Stephen Cipot
Garden City Park
