I won’t bother defining the word “racism.” No matter what I say there are too many who will castigate me from any one of several sides on this issue. What? You didn’t know there could be more than two? The biggest failure of American culture is dividing everything into two parts, and only two parts. We are a living Hegelian Dialectic, and we have gone down the tubes faster than any previous empire in human history. Long live the false dichotomy, which rhymes meaningfully with lobotomy.
So let’s use the proxy word meant by those who hurl the epithet “racist” — evil. Supposedly this allows everyone to jump off the actual subject at hand and start attacking each other in every way imaginable, because … well, the other side is evil.
It’s not evil to notice every human is a complete package of many, many things. Indeed, our biggest problem is not false characterizations, but that so many people strive so hard to live down to those assumptions. That is something truly non-racial, because I see it all over the US in all colors of the rainbow. Nobody wants to be real, to be an individual. But in spite of their best efforts, folks do slip outside their comfort zone and are forced upon their own resources in a setting where the familiar rules don’t work, and they have to dig up just who and what they are without the usual external and artificial reference points. Most of us are used to just moving from one familiar matrix to another, and we have our various sets of sockets by which we plug into each setting, and run on auto-pilot.
Having a world so vastly rich in different settings is good, we are told. The more different kinds of settings we have to confront, the better and bigger it makes us, as persons. True. I’ve been half-way around the world, having been raised in Alaska, and having visited as far east Austria, south to Panama, but sadly not much else. Fortunately, people tend to bring their world with them, so I’ve hung out with small communities of Africans from various different countries and gotten just a taste of each, as well as a couple of different Asian enclaves. Real people in their own homes, not just a tourist trap. Not a substitute for the real thing, but enough to wake you up to a wider awareness.
At the same time, I notice each eye-opening encounter simply serves to define my internal geography. Not in the sense of geography I taught as a school teacher, but the geography of our own self-discovery. The more varied our experiences, the more we can know about our selves and what makes us tick. It changes how we deal with all the old things we would still know had we never gone anywhere or done anything, but it doesn’t really change us, just exposes what’s there. It only looks like change.
We can be a lot more patient with others who are different, because we can afford the luxury of resting on a much broader base of identity. I’m not a bigger man, in that sense, but I know more about myself. You realize your personal inclinations don’t belong smack in the big middle of every experience, but you are just one tiny part. The biggest thing you can do for the rest of the world is move yourself off center stage, and put yourself in the broader perspective. We call it gaining a little humility; many call it “growing up.” You learn your way around the more fundamental rules of civilization and civility, in stead of the narrow slice of interpretations which work in your tiny little cocoon. You demand less of the world, and more of yourself — that “self-reliance” thing.
Then it’s no longer evil when you realize you’ve run into someone who doesn’t have that broad base. But you can be patient with them. Yet patience doesn’t stretch to letting them threaten your very existence, because they somehow decide you aren’t allowed to be different from them. In our perverted and upside down world, we who have seen the wider world are somehow wrong for daring to fend off the literal assaults from those who don’t have that wider experience. Perversely, being civilized is wrong.
Don’t tell me I don’t understand other civilizations. The very meaning of the word is quite clear, and well established with little debate: The collection of customs necessary for people in great numbers to live together without violence. So violence is itself uncivilized. It’s not always wrong, because God has Himself explained repeatedly what He considers justified violence. He proposed certain universal Laws which apply to all mankind, regardless of ethnic identity, location, color, etc. Nor does it come from my cultural background, but a different one I had to learn. Since He is the Creator, I figure He has the right to do that. And I’m not Him, and you aren’t Him. We both have to listen.
It’s not evil if I implement His Laws and protect myself from unjustified attacks. On another level, I am permitted by God to decide by the Spirit if my property, health and life should be defended or let it go, in order to bless His name and raise awareness of His revelation. It is up to me to decide what I have to do for my own obedience to Him, not you. I can’t get too upset when you do that same, even if it brings us into conflict. I’m not angry with you on those terms, just determined to obey my own calling. If I fail at my attempts, that’s God’s problem. But it’s not evil to do what His Spirit demands of me, so the angry calls of “racist” are wasted. It only says to me you are evil in heart because you have rejected His Word.
And if everyone around me suffers from the same mass delusion, it’s not a sin to withdraw and play it safe. The degree of withdrawal depends on how much it takes to cling to my divine calling. If I need peace and solitude, I’ll go a long way off. I’ll gladly pay the price, and leave you in peace to do what you do. If I simply need a small safety room, that’s what I’ll have. It’s not wrong to take the resources God has granted me to use for His glory and to preserve His trust in my hands. You don’t have to like it, and I don’t have to listen when you complain because I don’t make myself easy prey for you. Your delusions about whether I am part of any system which preys on you is your problem. You want a share of my stewardship from God? Learn to play by the rules of the steward, because they are part of the package of stewardship. I’ll do what it takes to guard that stewardship.
And if I don’t stay and play in your little world, it’s not because I’m evil, but because God has other business for me to attend. Argue with Him. I’m glad to leave you the part you occupy, and I have no complaint with you getting your fair share of what society offers, but I refuse to consider it important. I live in poverty because I’m willing to accept that as the price for obeying God in a fallen evil world. It would be all too easy to accept the wealth, but on terms which don’t match my calling. Part of those terms I accept is my willingness to give stuff away. That I do so for specific reasons within my stewardship is not evil, not racism, and has nothing to do with your wild imaginations. I’m profligate where my Lord says He wants me to be so, and tight-fisted where He requires it of me. You don’t get to choose unless He puts that stuff in your hands.
If stuff matters so much to you, it’s you who are evil — so says my God. Call it what you like.
I’m not attempting to correct anything in this world. People will continue on as if I had not written. But a few folks will read this and find their own clarity, a conscious expression of things they knew instinctively, and perhaps an answer for someone who actually wants to know what’s going on in this crazy world.
