Let Them Call Us Nigger

It's easy, on the eve of sweeping health care reform, to be caught up in this grand idea of "change". But I'm more amazed by those things in our politics that have managed to stay the same.

My parents never really talked about the Civil Rights Movement. My father, at that point in his life, was a grown, working man -- taking care of his family and keeping his job kept him from the front lines. My mother was still living at home with her parents, and even though she lived in Birmingham, AL, she wasn't allowed to march. She told me how her mother and father feared for her safety, and told the occasional story of Blacks in Birmingham being arrested, accosted, and more.

In spite of my parents' general reticence when it came to the Movement, I found out rather quickly growing up that during that tumultuous time of change, being called a "nigger" was commonplace -- it often occurred before or during a beating. But for the most part, I grew up in a world where no bigot would call me that to my face.

Or so I thought. Today, Congressman John Lewis, former Civil Rights activist, was called "nigger" by Tea Party protesters as he walked to the Capitol for final meetings before tomorrow's historic vote. Another Congressman, openly gay Barney Frank, was called a "faggot" by some of the protesters. And several anti-Semitic slurs have been left for Jewish Democrats in the halls of Congress over the last few weeks.

The protesters engaging in this bigotry say they are storming the Capitol to fight against socialized health care.

Let's be honest. A lot of them are just looking for any excuse to to call Black people niggers, gay people fags, and leave notes with swastikas on them for Jews.

Any protester mad enough about health care to act in that manner is mad about more than health care. In the same way "states' rights" activists who fought against extending civil rights weren't just mad about "states' rights". They just really, really didn't like Black people.

While it's harder today to be as openly hateful as the folks who beat and ridiculed Blacks and Civil Rights protesters, some of the same hate my parents witnessed in the 60's and before lingers today.

And I'm convinced, that no matter what the issue, be it health care, or immigration reform, or who knows what else, bigots will find a way to be bigots. They will tell us all otherwise and find some catchy euphemisms to mask their hate, but they really won't be able to hide it. Hate is hate. Hate lingers. Hate mutates. But it never completely goes away. 

One of my favorite Bible verses, and one of the few I still remember, says this:

"The thing that hath been, it is that which shall be; and that which is done is that which shall be done: and there is no new thing under the sun." Ecclesiastes 1:9

Tonight, it's remarkably fitting for the way I feel. I see this hate that lingers, and it upsets me. But I realize that as constant as some hate may be, change is bigger, and better, and it is constant, too.

Those protesters might hold vigil on the Capitol steps a few nights more, but as she always does, America will inch closer and closer towards a more just society with more expansive rights and protections for all of her citizens.

So let them call us niggers. Let them call us fags. Let them call us kikes. Just as there is nothing new under the sun, bigots will always find something to shout about. But change is not new, either. And change always wins.