Trump isn’t the only one afraid of Anne Coulter, Limbaugh, Fox and Friends, etc. And these people will ensure that these kids will not have a teachable moment.
“One reason this experience has been so uncomfortable is that many of us see ourselves in that face. There’s no use pretending I don’t. I grew up in this kind of environment, at this kind of school. That face is me at that age, joining in the abuse of the gayest kid in class, on the days when I managed to work my way to second-gayest. It’s me when I didn’t stop the handful of my high school classmates from chanting, “It’s alright, it’s okay, you’re gonna work for us someday,” at the kids from a poorer high school when they were beating us in basketball.
I’ve made this face, I’ve laughed at someone the way these kids laughed at Nathan Phillips, and I have the restless sleep to prove it.
If my classmates and I are any better at being people now, it’s because we became adults and we listened and we learned. And here’s a scary thought: those kids are becoming adults, listening to and learning from this world. They are coming of age right now, when gleeful sadism is celebrated and rewarded. Right now, when the president of the United States can’t pull it together to condemn Nazis.
I’m old enough to remember when the kind of ignoble behavior we see in those videos was something you’d have to at least pretend to be ashamed of, and I’m paying enough attention to know that that’s not the case anymore. The world is getting meaner, you and I both know it. The seeds are just beginning to sprout.
On that note, here is a thing that should not need to be said, but apparently does: It is possible to think that these kids behaved shamefully, and to not want their lives to be destroyed. You can want them to feel some shame for their conduct, and for that shame to inspire growth. You can try to make it a teachable moment for these kids: if we tell young black men that wearing a hoodie at night can get you executed, surely we can gently suggest to our young white men that wearing a MAGA hat and laughing at a person of color might get you roasted on Twitter.
You can do that without publishing anyone’s phone number, without issuing the death threats that social media seemingly runs on.
I hope this kid learns something, but the worst part of the story is that he doesn’t have to. He can be a martyr, a promising young life derailed by the decadence of political correctness. He can dig in and make a career out of trying to trigger people. Can’t you name a half-dozen cable-news and YouTube celebrities off the top of your head who’ve done exactly that?
In the time since I began writing this piece, NBC has announced that Savannah Guthrie will sit down with him for an interview on Today. And then later in the week, if Laura Ingraham’s Twitter feed is to be trusted, the whole Covington Catholic gang will have an audience with the president in the White House. Because while their behavior toward a Native American Vietnam veteran was disrespectful at best, at least they were wearing the right logo.
So as clearly as you saw what did happen, you can see what will. He’ll lightly brush up against consequences, soothe the burn with a 20-piece McNugget in the West Wing, and then get right on back to a life where he’s on top and everyone underneath is just a little bit ridiculous. If someday, far off in the future, his sleep is ever troubled, it will be to wonder what the big deal was.”
I know that once you saw that face, heard of the PR firm the family hired, started to read the comments of how a sixty-something year old Native American sought him out, scared him with his chants, etc.; I know you had to realize this was going to breakdown into a well Phillips should not have done this or that and could have done something else. A Senegalese was a coach for my younger son’s soccer team. A black man who spoke three languages, a national player, and more than intelligent. It was a pleasure to have him with us. One players said something to him which received a response from Mamadou Kone who answered the 14 year old directly; “In my village, you would not talk to me in such a manner.” The young man’s mom asked how we could have the coach stay at our home along with another player from Kenya, and a third American Black player. If baffles me the heretics amongst us who would just as sure chastise them for just being a different color skin. The Kenya’s player’s father was a doctorate who was chased out of Kenya and had a 6 inch scar on his face. The American black player’s father was college educated too. This was the eighties.
Today in a new century, it has worsened like the author said. And we have people putting up signs in support of a 15 year old who would not step aside to let an adult, an elder of a tribe, and a Marine veteran pass by. Alone, the 15 year old would have moved as there was not a gang behind him. Fifty years ago a uniformed Nathan Phillips might have thrown the 15 year old to the side. It is not hard to understand White America expects people of color to defer to their whiteness.
Trump isn’t the only one afraid of Anne Coulter, Limbaugh, Fox and Friends, etc. And these people will ensure that these kids will not have a teachable moment.
“One reason this experience has been so uncomfortable is that many of us see ourselves in that face. There’s no use pretending I don’t. I grew up in this kind of environment, at this kind of school. That face is me at that age, joining in the abuse of the gayest kid in class, on the days when I managed to work my way to second-gayest. It’s me when I didn’t stop the handful of my high school classmates from chanting, “It’s alright, it’s okay, you’re gonna work for us someday,” at the kids from a poorer high school when they were beating us in basketball.
I’ve made this face, I’ve laughed at someone the way these kids laughed at Nathan Phillips, and I have the restless sleep to prove it.
If my classmates and I are any better at being people now, it’s because we became adults and we listened and we learned. And here’s a scary thought: those kids are becoming adults, listening to and learning from this world. They are coming of age right now, when gleeful sadism is celebrated and rewarded. Right now, when the president of the United States can’t pull it together to condemn Nazis.
I’m old enough to remember when the kind of ignoble behavior we see in those videos was something you’d have to at least pretend to be ashamed of, and I’m paying enough attention to know that that’s not the case anymore. The world is getting meaner, you and I both know it. The seeds are just beginning to sprout.
On that note, here is a thing that should not need to be said, but apparently does: It is possible to think that these kids behaved shamefully, and to not want their lives to be destroyed. You can want them to feel some shame for their conduct, and for that shame to inspire growth. You can try to make it a teachable moment for these kids: if we tell young black men that wearing a hoodie at night can get you executed, surely we can gently suggest to our young white men that wearing a MAGA hat and laughing at a person of color might get you roasted on Twitter.
You can do that without publishing anyone’s phone number, without issuing the death threats that social media seemingly runs on.
I hope this kid learns something, but the worst part of the story is that he doesn’t have to. He can be a martyr, a promising young life derailed by the decadence of political correctness. He can dig in and make a career out of trying to trigger people. Can’t you name a half-dozen cable-news and YouTube celebrities off the top of your head who’ve done exactly that?
In the time since I began writing this piece, NBC has announced that Savannah Guthrie will sit down with him for an interview on Today. And then later in the week, if Laura Ingraham’s Twitter feed is to be trusted, the whole Covington Catholic gang will have an audience with the president in the White House. Because while their behavior toward a Native American Vietnam veteran was disrespectful at best, at least they were wearing the right logo.
So as clearly as you saw what did happen, you can see what will. He’ll lightly brush up against consequences, soothe the burn with a 20-piece McNugget in the West Wing, and then get right on back to a life where he’s on top and everyone underneath is just a little bit ridiculous. If someday, far off in the future, his sleep is ever troubled, it will be to wonder what the big deal was.”
https://www.esquire.com/news-politics/a25966711/nick-sandmann-smirk/
EM:
I know that once you saw that face, heard of the PR firm the family hired, started to read the comments of how a sixty-something year old Native American sought him out, scared him with his chants, etc.; I know you had to realize this was going to breakdown into a well Phillips should not have done this or that and could have done something else. A Senegalese was a coach for my younger son’s soccer team. A black man who spoke three languages, a national player, and more than intelligent. It was a pleasure to have him with us. One players said something to him which received a response from Mamadou Kone who answered the 14 year old directly; “In my village, you would not talk to me in such a manner.” The young man’s mom asked how we could have the coach stay at our home along with another player from Kenya, and a third American Black player. If baffles me the heretics amongst us who would just as sure chastise them for just being a different color skin. The Kenya’s player’s father was a doctorate who was chased out of Kenya and had a 6 inch scar on his face. The American black player’s father was college educated too. This was the eighties.
Today in a new century, it has worsened like the author said. And we have people putting up signs in support of a 15 year old who would not step aside to let an adult, an elder of a tribe, and a Marine veteran pass by. Alone, the 15 year old would have moved as there was not a gang behind him. Fifty years ago a uniformed Nathan Phillips might have thrown the 15 year old to the side. It is not hard to understand White America expects people of color to defer to their whiteness.
You do realize those people had Ashkenazi descent don’t you? You could see it clear as day on the “kid”.
Bert:
The Nazis’s had a neat little book which had caricatures of Jews. Enough . . .
run
Who is Nathan Phillips?
The veteran the white, catholic, MAGA hatted youth accosted went in to the marines in 1972, and did not deploy to southeast Asia.
“It is not hard to understand White America expects people of color to defer to their whiteness.”
A very mass media anti MAGA statement.
When did the insurgency become so concerned for veterans?