Bridging the Hate Gap in DC: A rabbi and attorney speak out

Rabbi Brad Bloom (pictured above) was the spiritual leader of Congregation B'nai Israel in Sacramento, Calif. when it was one of three local synagogues set ablaze [1] in a single night of hatred in June 1999. Now rabbi of Congregation Beth Yam in Hilton Head Island, SC, he is a longtime friend of Not In Our Town and one of our national advisors.

A recent CNN news program polled its viewers with the question, “Is religion a force for good in the world today?” It is a fair question. Religion too often is at the center of controversy and animosity stirring up political passions instead of bringing people together for greater understanding and peace.

The aftermath of the recent health care legislation provides an excellent opportunity for clergy in our nation to temper those passions on all sides of the political spectrum. It is time for religious leaders to remind the American public that the great debate about health care could become the great divide in American life if we do not pause for greater reflection upon our words and deeds.

No matter what we believe about health care reform, we must not let emotions propel us to acts of violence against our nation’s elected leaders nor against any resident of our country. In addition, hate speech contributes nothing to the legitimate public debate on health care reform or any other issue. These two toxins poison the moral and spiritual body of America.

Reports of throwing bricks or shooting through the offices of our elected representatives or spitting upon them betrays everything that our country stands for, and it violates a sacred biblical principle. Human beings are created in the image of God.

Hate speech reminds us that words can be used as weapons of mass destruction. We watched with great sadness and embarrassment as certain individuals used the “n” word against African American congressmen, and directed homophobic epithets at a gay congressman.

This kind of baseless hatred sets in motion a chain reaction of hatred throughout the country. The words, like sparks, ricochet off every internet web site, radio talk show and newspaper article. The hatred itself becomes the center of attention and the issue of health care itself is overshadowed. All that remains is the bitterness.

Clergy have a responsibility to preach and teach morals and ethics. We cannot cover our eyes from the world knocking on the doors of the houses of worship. We have a duty to teach the way of holiness in our daily lives. In Leviticus 19, we read, “God said to the children of Israel, You shall be holy for I the Lord your God am holy.” Are we to ignore this verse of Scripture?

There is a fine line between passionate political debate on the issues of our society and regressing to verbal terrorism against our fellow citizens. This is a line we must not cross if we are to preserve our cherished democracy that generations of Americans have fought and died for. We must resist the rhetoric and hate speech that brings us down into the valley of the profane. Our children are watching us. What will they learn?

We are better than this. Yes, we can argue for our political views, protest in the name of our beliefs, and vote those we disagree with out of office. But let's take a step back and take a deep breath before we answer our political adversaries with words that attack others for their race, creed, religion or sexual orientation.

We need religious leaders to speak out against this hatred from their pulpits, now. We need them to state clearly and firmly, in the name of the faiths that guide them, that America stands for an abiding mutual respect between all its peoples.

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Attorney Jim Hennigan (above) is a national advisor to Not In Our Town, and a former Republican columnist for a South Carolina newspaper. Writing from his current home in France, he urges members of both political parties to speak out against hate violence masquerading as political discourse.

"The best lack all conviction, while the worst / Are full of passionate intensity."
-- William Butler Yeats, "The Second Coming"

I have wanted to connect Yeats' verse with current events since I first encountered it in high school, but this is the first time I've succumbed to the temptation. In my adult life, there has not been a “better” time than now to witness the direct connection between silent leaders and the violence of rogues who interpret that silence as an affirmation of their most repulsive behavior.

Make no mistake; this is a recurring theme in history. When I was a child, America witnessed firsthand how silent leaders inform the worst of the lot that it's okay, if not heroic, to bomb a Baptist church in Birmingham or bring bricks to a schoolyard in Little Rock or wield crowbars inside a bus station in Montgomery. It actually happens every day, everywhere. On school playgrounds or in poorly policed neighborhoods, we can see how bullying and other less sensational offenses against people and property increase in incidence and magnitude when there’s no visible will on the part of recognized leaders to face up to problematic behaviors when they first arise.

What sets this moment apart from all others is that the violence we witness today is occurring directly on the doorstep of America’s top elected officials, who seem to lack the courage and conviction to end it.

The Republicans’ recalcitrance in confronting this violence is presumably driven by the same political gamesmanship that makes their Democratic counterparts quick to connect the ideological cause to the violent activity. These violent rogues are as much a political threat to the causes and people that they associate with as they are a political opportunity for those who stand in opposition to them.

The opportunism of Democratic leaders, casting a taint on Republicans and the Tea Party movement as a whole, is just as problematic in stopping the violence as is the Republican failure to act. Both groups are acting to gain political capital. And in making that their primary motivation, neither group is acting effectively – with conviction, in Yeats’ terms – to stop the violent and reprehensible acts perpetrated before their eyes.

In the case of Republican leaders who dismiss the violence as “isolated” or “not indicative of the group as a whole,” there’s much more they can do. And though it may require courage and sacrifice on their part, it is not nearly the kind of courage or sacrifice that these same leaders ask their fellow Americans to make. At the very least, a united front in forceful opposition to the rogue elements would be helpful.

There is nothing that is stopping Republican Members of Congress from staunchly fighting to alter the Democratic Party's version of health care reform while also throwing the most extreme Tea Party actors under the proverbial bus. And the onus is on Republicans, because they are the leaders and intended beneficiaries of the causes that the rogue individuals are putatively supporting with their assaults, vandalism, epithets, threats and spittle.

The failure of Congressional Republicans to engage in meaningful efforts to oppose violent intimidation is a lesson. Instead of pointing fingers at broad movements and causes, we should first commit ourselves to service as sentinels on the lookout for wrongs committed by our own purported “allies,” as their actions – not our adversaries’ actions – are the ones that will reflect on our own character. By being most vigilant about correcting the wrongdoers we are aligned with – politically, socially, culturally, etc. – we can be our most effective at thwarting violence and hate.

What America – not to mention the Tea Party and the GOP – needs now are more ordinary citizens of uncommon conviction who have a passionate intensity to stand in opposition to the violence and foul actions that are on the rise. From among those who are sympathetic to the Tea Party, there should be a clamoring against the radical, violent and repulsive characters who will continue to discredit and marginalize it. From among those who aren’t aligned with Tea Party thinking, there needs to be the conviction to support well-meaning Tea Party activists who exhibit the kind of courage their Congressional allies cannot muster – without miscasting those who stand against violence as apologists for their political principles.

On these terms the citizens of the nation should be able to come together, without waiting for our elected officials to sacrifice their political stratagems or demonstrate their personal dignity.

In:

clergy [2]

Republican [3]

Rabbi Brad Bloom [4]

Jim Hennigan [5]