Words DO Mean Something

Words mean everything to me. They have to, I'm attempting a Ph.D. in English. And even though some may call me melodramatic, the recent shooting of a United States Congresswoman should prove that there's something behind my bombast.

I'm not trying to be too cold here, but Saturday's shooting was no surprise to me. With today's gun rhetoric and political labeling, I'm only surprised that it didn't happen sooner. I'm not playing the blame game here. As a student of history, violence can come from the Left and the Right. Indeed, there was a time in this counry when most of the violence came from the Left via war protests and bombings.

However, with 95% of talk radio time being consumed by the Right, it is safe to say that most of the gun talk and revolutionary rhetoric comes from the Right. Just listen to the hate-filled speech of Rush Limbaugh and the gun play of Palin. To some, what they say is just red meat for the base. To them, I personally believe that their talk is just a way to make $12 million in one quarter. To some psychopathic fringe elements, their words are God-sent gifts. Their words give them a way to dehumanize people who don't agree with them. Crosshairs on a map become real political targets. People become enemies. Enemies that must be snuffed out by any violent means necessary.

Ironically, Right-Wing Conservatives play down the importance of words. Some even advocate the eradication of English departments across America; afterall, we don't DO anything productive for our societies. We only deal with the words of dead men and the bitter ones of living minorities. Thereby, we poison the minds of the youth of America, with words.

What then, after this horrible tragedy has occurred, do we call the hate-filled, fear-inducing rhetoric of someone like Glenn Beck? Even more dangerous, gun lobbyists, with words, successfully lobbied Congress to let the assault weapons bans to expire. What words, following this horrific act, will convince our conservative public servants to place a stricter ban on assault weapons that could more than likely harm or kill them?

Uninformed in an Age of Information

What's going on in Israel? What about Brazil? What goes on in Brazil on a day-to-day basis? As far as the healthcare bill is concerned, is the one recently passed only a starting point for improvements? Will there be more amendments? What about the relatively weak financial reform bill? Will it be strengthened as the months pass? What is the President doing daily to stop the Gulf Spill? Have the families of the 11 TransOcean explosion been financially compensated?

I don't know. I haven't heard. I watch at least two hours of news and two hours of news commentary every day, and I don't know. Headlines from the Washington Post are inboxed to every day. My homepage is MSN.com, and CNN.com is bookmarked. With all of this, I still don't know. Could it be possible that even in the age of information, when people want to know everything about everything, the most informed of us are still uninformed? What does this say about the state of our media, and the types of information we crave most?

I'll give one example. For the past two weeks, straight news and liberal/conservative news commentators have criticized President Obama for now "showing enough emotion" concerning the Gulf Oil Spill. Hours have spent on this with talking heads analyzing the man's every facial expression and comment. However, we don't know how much money fishermen stand to receive. What kinds of cleaners have been used to clean the wildlife? What is actually in that dispersant? What happened to the less-harmful dispersant? Is it still in Texas? What are the plans to replenish the wetlands that are being choked off by the oil? What would the military do if they were involved? What could they do that BP is not doing if they don't have the equipment? We don't know any of these things because our media has been wasting time asking why the 6'0+ Black man who runs a country that many see as a white man's country hadn't blown his top or started crying. We already know the damn answer to that. If you are reading this post, and you don't know, see Jonathan Capehart's June 8 column at washingtonpost.com. I'm more into action, not posturing. Sarah Palin, Glenn Beck, and Rush Limbaugh can show emotions. Would we want them in charge of this catastrophe?

Don't buy my implication that our national media is keeping us ignorant of important policy while focusing on mind-numbing fluff? Remember the year of Bennifer? That very public affair of Ben Affleck and Jennifer Lopez? While our news and our minds were following the couple around as they made out in public and purchased a gun permit, our country was embroilled in two foreign wars. Servicemen and women were dying daily, and we couldn't get enough of what the powercouple -two individual adults with their own lives and damn it, their own prerogatives -garnered more of our attention and news space than two wars.

By now I know you want to ask, "Why should we even care about what goes on in those other countries?" I'm glad you asked. Our national deficit is reaching epic proportions, and Republicans are correct to be concerned -lest America become Greece. Spending has to stop at some point. Something needs to be cut. I find it strange, though, that none of these Republican (or Democratic) lawmakers ever speak of reducing American aid to Israel. And I'm not saying this because of any political standpoint I have concerning Israel and Palestine. As pointed out earlier, I don't know enough about the on-going conflict to make a judgment call one way or the other. I say this because Israel receives tens of billions of dollars of American aid, and America gets what in return? While Republicans focus on cutting social welfare funding and education here at home, what of Israel and our lack of return for the investments we have there? What social welfare programs are American citizens bankrolling in Israel? What benefit does giving tens of billions of dollars hold for the average American citizen? Why does America continue to give Israel aid when the country deliberately disrespects our leader?

Why should we care about Brazil? Well, it has one of the biggest and fastest-growing economies in the world, and it is almost independent of OPEC. What does that mean for us? Well, nothing right now. Brazil relies mainly on ethanol for fuel. Their government offered to import to the United States some of its very cheaply-made ethanol (the abundance of sugar cane in Brazil makes ethanol production there much cheaper than ethanol made here in the United States from corn). Unfortunately, our then President Bush, in all of his wisdom, placed a 100% tarrif on this fuel, according to the History International Channel, while his MMS office issued more and more drilling permits. You make the connections between Brazil, Bush, and our current crisis. I don't need to spell it out.

Even in this age, most younger citizens, who are part of the soundbyte generation, remain uninformed. With cuts to our education in favor of more foreign aid to our "allies" and millitary spending, the American populace will be even less informed that what we are now. And a population of uninformed taxpayers become....What? I'm too afraid to finish the thought.

Some Things Really Are Priceless

"English? English? Shit, I thought you went to school for something. English ain't nothing."

The above quote is the response I get from people 90% of the time when I tell them that I am a Ph.D. candidate in English. In addition to that quote, I work with a gang of Education professors who look upon my graduate work with condescension because, as one Education professor put it, "You never have to do any quantitative studies. You just read and write, and what you all read and write really aren't pragmatic at all." Well, I can't argue with that. Anybody who has ever tried to read Lacan or Spivak knows that the obfuscate nature of their writing is difficult enough to read, let alone apply them to real situations.

It is true that since the 1980s, when Ronald Reagan and other hardline conservatives painted humanities and social science professors as a bunch of ex-hippies looking to badly influence students with their Communist-inspired ideology, these majors have been on a steady decline. It seems that everyone who was anyone who went to college ran to the MBA programs. Those who really wanted to major in something that mattered took hardline sciences such as Biology, Physics, or Chemistry in order to obtain entrance into medical or nursing schools. Still others who wanted a quick, guaranteed job after college majored in elementary education. For the most part, by the time I enrolled in college in the late 1990s, people only majored in other Humanities/Liberal Arts courses to help them pass their LSATs and enter into Law School.

Thus, at this late date in the year of our Lord, most people ask me, "What in the Hell did you major in English for?" My answer is simply, "I like to read." Most people do not understand the purpose behind a humanities/liberal arts major because they cannot easily translate these majors into six-figure jobs. Most college undergraduates attend college to make money. The formula goes: 4 years of college + self-deprivation of the college life = big bucks, authority, and prestige upon matriculation. Since the 1980s, fewer and fewer jobs have been awaiting Humanities/Liberal Arts majors -even at the Ph.D. level. The degrees are equally difficult to obtain, since theories relating to human culture are never as simple as even the most difficult calculus equations. Humans just aren't that predictable. The purpose of a humanities/liberal arts education is to expose students to other cultures and other times in the human famiy through art/literature/anthropology/music/theatre/dance/philosophy/psychology/history, etc. And hopefully, along the way, we learn something about ourselves. We learn, through an engaging study of history, that it does not have to always repeat itself, and that people do not fit into neat little labels. But most of all, a degree in the humanities/liberal arts teaches us how to think about our world. LIBERAL ARTS AND THE HUMANITIES TEACHES US HOW TO THINK.

And seriously thinking about problems before we try to solve them really is priceless. If I have any criticism of American culture at large is that it is anti-intellectual. We continue to be the dumb jocks of the world -all muscle and no brain. Our current political discourse encourages all emotion and no reason. Other countries laugh at us because they can. Let me provide some prime and contemporary examples of where more liberal arts/humanities course would help our world reputation.

1. During last year's Presidential election, the Right accused Barack Obama of being a "Muslim/Islamic terrorist," and then proceeded to play clips of a very militant sermon from his long-term pastor, Jeremiah Wright. People were calling and twittering in to various political pundit shows saying how they were afraid of this "Muslim terrorist" who sat in church all of those years and listened to hatred from that antiwhite pastor. Sigh. When was the last a Muslim regularly attended your local churches? I've never known a Muslim to attend a Christian church regularly, seeing as how they have mosque sevices to fill their spiritual needs.

2. Not simple enough for you? Let's look at the healthcare debate. Why should we listen to people who use government/tax-payer funded healthcare tell us that government/tax-payer funded healthcare is bad? In case you don't know, all government workers/Congressmen use government/tax-payer funded healthcare...including Republicans. I was so embarassed for old people when they said, they don't want government-funded healthcare and the government had better not touch their Medicare. I can hear the French and Canadians laughing even in South Mississippi.

3. It's not American to pay taxes, but it is American to send soldiers to foreign countries to take natural resources. If not for taxes, who pays for wars?

4. Somehow, being gay has become a cardinal sin in America, but we're the fattest country in the world. Do I have the only Bible in the world that lists gluttony, not homosexuality, as one of the seven abominations before the Lord?

5. Celebrating Halloween is fine, but Harry Potter is witchcraft? How are the two different?

6. Wow, here's a good one. Rush Limbaugh and Sarah Palin tell people to watch out for liberal news bias and liberal news agendas. Those poor conservatives are always under threat, even though 91% of all talk radio is conservative talk radio and they have an entire news network devoted to their agenda. I guess the other 9% is REALLY dangerous.

These are just a few examples. I could go on and on. But hey, I'm writing to Americans, and you're tired of reading by now. Thanks for sticking around this long. Think about this, most of our greatest leaders, presidents, and thinkers were liberal arts majors. However, George Bush II had an MBA from an Ivy League school. Bill Clinton, on the other hand, studied in three liberal arts areas before attending law school: Philosophy, Economics, and Political Science. One left a surplus. The other left a deficit. THINK about it.

Could Black Be the New Face of Red

Now that most of the ballots have been counted and recounted, Republicans are finding themselves out of power. For more than eight years, Republicans have been a driving force in Washington, and in 2000, they had the White House, House of Representatives, and the Senate. One can argue that they even had the Supreme Court.

Under Republican guidance, we are finding ourselves in two wars that seem to make no sense, in the midst of the worst financial crisis since 1929, and at a loss in world confidence.
Party leaders and political pundits are asking themselves, and the nation, what happened? Where does the party stand? Political pundits have already put several faces upon the screen as potential leaders of the party. These people include governors Sarah Palin (Alaska) and Bobby Jindal (Louisiana) as potential leaders. There were also several senators included.
What struck me the most about these shows and the potential Republican leaders, was the absence of color. Yes, Virginia, there are some Black Republicans.

For the most part, the Republican Party and the nation have taken these people for granted, often leaving them out of key decisions and debates. In one of the first presidential debates, Allan Keyes angrily pointed out to the moderator that she never allowed him any time to answer questions. African Americans have traditionally labeled these people as Uncle Toms, and threatened to kick their asses (Remember all of the death threats that Black guy got for telling John McCain to go after Obama?).

But wait one hot minute. I think that African Americans and Americans need to give these Republicans of color a deeper look. One of the main reasons that the Republican Party has fallen so low is their pandering to Evangelical and Fundamental Christians. These people, in the guise of Christ, have proved to be the most divisive and exclusivist sects of the American population. They have often embroilled and entangled politicians in pointless social debates, and have used the power of rhetoric to scare people into thinking that their "values" and "morals" were constantly under threats of obliteration. In addition, many Evangelical pastors banked on the fact that most Evangical Christians are both Biblically illiterate, and prone to voting on the heart instead of the purse.

Meanwhile, it was the African American and Latino Republicans who separated themselves from these social arguments and debates. Though I did not agree with their views, I have heard people like Shelby Steele, Bob Parks, Jennifer Carroll, Ward Connerly, Deborah Honeycutt, and others offer real Republican Conservative solutions to things that matter like: health care, equal opportunity schooling and employment, crime prevention and control, and welfare reform. Often, these people were ignored by their own national party, and demonized by the African American communities that they would like to serve.

We should stop demonizing our African American Republican brothers and sisters. They have a right to their own opinions, and thoughts. Anyway, African Americans are traditional social conservatives. We tend to vote Democratically because we often carry our empty purses with us to the voting booth. While we treasure family values as much as the next evangelical Christian, we also know that we need a strong economy with good jobs and opportunities to provide for our families.

African Americans and other minorities also need people with power on both sides of the aisle to agitate for what we want.

The national party should pay attention to these politicians. These politicians offer plausible solutions to very realy problems without becoming entangled in Evangelical Christian rhetoric. Why aren't they held up to be the Republican Standard Bearers? The fact that they are not, is one of the many reasons that African Americans have not voted Republican, and why the party has lost its way. It used to be a party of inclusion. Dr. Martin Luther King was a Republican, and so was Fredrick Douglass. Now it is the party of religious fear, ignorance, and intolerance.