What Greater Honor...
...Than to allow Rosa Parks' mortal remains to lie in state in the Rotunda at this nation's Capitol? President Clinton presented her with the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1996, and in 1999 she was awarded a Congressional Gold Medal. What higher honor can this nation give to a woman who refused to move to the back of the bus?
Let her lie in state within the Rotunda...
She's more than earned it.
from the mind of... Eric | 8:13 PM
11 Comments:
A higher honor, might be to accept the truths that her actions demonstrated to the country. That 40 years later after her moment of courage, some people in this country are still treated as second-class citizens. That because of a person's skin color, or religion, or sexual preference, one may be denied the right to pursue, life liberty and happiness.
You are truly outrageous tonight! Parroting the race-baiters and fomenting class-warfare! No one is denied the pursuit of Life, Liberty and Happiness. Everyone has the opportunity to work toward their dreams. No one class of people are asked to drink from separate water fountains. No one class of people are denied access to social services like welfare, foodstamps, student loans. No one class of people are asked to give up their seat on the bus to another.
Good Grief, Ben! If America, this very minute, gave every African American a million bucks in reparations for their Ancestors sufferings under the yoke of slavery, you'd still find something to bad-mouth this nation about. I know your heart is in the right place, but you're twisted by this need to hate America and all she stands for. You can't even let a simple post praising this country's elected officials for extending the last honor possible to a woman who has served her country better than anyone I can presently think of.
I'm surprised you haven't realized that horse you're beating is dead! It's not going to take you anywhere! Lose the hate, dude. It's unproductive. I know you'll try to twist that around, but you're way out in left field on this.
You're saying an awful lot without having walked in some people's shoes. Friends of mine who are gay, lesbian, black, and hispanic quite clearly do have their pursuit of life, liberty, and happiness hindered by prejudice. I can cite plenty of examples I have myself on a regular basis.
Nobody's asking you to feel guilty about it- just to be aware of it and help where you can.
Ben is clearly right on this one. I see no hate- only love- in his post. He is carrying on the American dream and helping to make sure it is extended to everyone.
As to shoes... You don't know me, or the shoes I've walked in. Neither do I know you. But only I can hinder my pursuit of Life, Liberty and Happiness. It is my choice to be denied, as it is yours. If you allow it, you have only yourself to blame. In the Jim Crow South blacks had little choice to but to accept how they were treated, but they still had choices. They were not entirely powerless.
Prejudice exists. On that there is no doubt. But prejudice didn't stop Rosa Parks. Prejudice didn't stop Martin Luther King. Prejudice didn't stop Jessie Jackson, or Johnnie Cochran. It didn't stop Muhammed Ali, or George Foreman. Prejudice didn't stop Jackie Robinson, Prejudice hasn't stopped Ellen Degeneres. Prejudice hasn't stopped Gloria Estefan, or Ricky Martin. It hasn't stopped Colin Powell or Condoleeza Rice. As long as a single human draws breath on this planet there will be prejudice. But if you wish to succeed in life, you can't let that, or any other obstacle stop you. Rosa Parks' example should have taught everyone that. No one who has the ability to make a choice is a victim by virtue of birth, class, or sexual preference.
As to seeing only love... You should reconsider you definition of Love. All BenT chose to look at was the dark side of Man's nature, and there is no love there. It's wonderful that he can recognize that nature for what it is, but his problem lies in his inability to see light in the darkness. Light can only be swallowed by Darkness if it chooses to be. Darkness on the other hand cannot abide the Light and must retreat wherever Light goes. In like manner, your pursuit of Life, Liberty, and Happiness can only be swallowed if you allow it. Instead of bitching about the obstacles in our path, how unfair it all is, we should find and make a way over or around them. Success isn't guaranteed, but it's surely guaranteed we'll see no success if we don't at least try.
The whole point of giving Rosa Parks this final honor is to "Honor" her decision to find a way around an obstacle, and the impact her decision had on the rest of this nation. To use the occasion to malign this nation for not solving every problem inherent in human nature, Dishonors her memory. Besides which, it is not the job of Government to save us from all the obstacles in our lives, only to provide us with the tools necessary for our successes.
EL, if you really think that the struggle for equality that Rosa Parks stood for has reached was successful and is done with, then you're the one living in a fantasy world.
You're the one scared of slave reparations, what I'm talking about is the continual everyday, hate, bigotry and racism that minorities in this country face everyday.
No one class of people are denied access to social services like welfare, foodstamps, student loans.
What about gay men and women that can't make medical decisions for their partners? What about immigrants, legal and illegal, who don't receive social services , because they lack proficiancy in english? What about college student prosecuted for minor drug crimes that lose all their student loans as well as the right to vote? What about those of different faiths who have to acknowledge a diety other than their own when they affirm their patriotism?
No EL we don't have slaves in America, but we don't have equality either.
No EL, you're misinterpreting my first post. you asked the question "What greater honor than to allow Rosa Parks' mortal remains to lie in state in the Rotunda at this nation's Capitol?" and I answered with the idea that Rosa Parks rather than being given a state funeral. A greater honor might be to get Texas to finally pass a stringent hate crimes bill. Or maybe Congress could pass a bill creating uniform fair national methods for drawing election districts. These might be greater memorials to the woman who symbolized the struggle for civil rights in America.
Your broader points have merit, I give you that. I do however take issue with the following.
1. "...immigrants, legal and illegal, who don't receive social services..."
Illegal immigrants have no right to social services like welfare, foodstamps, etc. Medical care on the other hand is a different matter.
2. "...college student prosecuted for minor drug crimes that lose all their student loans as well as the right to vote?"
These "students" made a choice to use illegal drugs. I've never heard of a minor drug offence carrying the penalty of losing the right to vote. Selling Crack and Meth, or manufacturing said substances are not minor crimes, they're felonys. This nation has laws, those who choose to break them and get caught must suffer the consequences of their decisions.
3. "...those of different faiths who have to acknowledge a diety other than their own when they affirm their patriotism."
Patriotism is not affirmed by any acknowledgement to diety. Nor is it affirmed by a "Pledge of Allegience". Besides, the phrase "Under God" is not a specific reference to the Christian God. The problem is with Atheism, and its adherents belief that their "lack of belief" negates the rights of every other person in this nation. I don't have to dig up a statistic to know that Atheists in this country are in the minority.
4. "...we don't have slaves in America, but we don't have equality either."
And we never will have equality. No matter how hard we try. Man is an imperfect being. But that's not to say we shouldn't try.
5. "...get Texas to finally pass a stringent hate crimes bill."
Unless I'm mistaken, Texas executes more murderers than any other state. How much more stringent must a state be against Hate Crimes that result in murder, as in the dragging death of James Byrd, Jr. in Jasper Texas? I don't know enough about Texas' current Hate Crimes law to comment.
But it seems to me the term "Stringent" is subjective. Only Texans can decide what that means, and if it turns out their current law is not stringent enough it will require Texans to do something about it.
6. "...Congress could pass a bill creating uniform fair national methods for drawing election districts."
Amen! politicians should not be allowed to gerrymander their districts. It almost sounds as though you advocate what Governor Schwarzenegger has proposed in California.
Also along this line, the system and the number of representatives given to each state were designed for a less populous nation. It might be time to propose a larger representative body in both houses of Congress.
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It's easy to assume one is being attacked here, on line. You and I don't agree on much, ideologically speaking. At work-- face to face --we can see each others eyes, read expressions, interpret tone and inflection, and know better what the other is implying through speech. That is not possible here. We must rely on word choice and usage, and how sentences are structured, but it's inevitable that the written word, in some respects, is inferior to the spoken word. Without all the niceties of speech we surely take for granted, we are left to interpret the written word through our own unique prism of biases.
I'll take your issues point by point so we can keep track of the conversation.
1. Illegal immigrants have no right to social services like welfare, foodstamps, etc. Medical care on the other hand is a different matter.
Don't immigrants have the right to police and fire protection? What about education for their children? People in this country who are not natural Americans get slighted in all sorts of small ways.
2. These "students" made a choice to use illegal drugs. i was only making the point that their are people in this country who do lose federal aid for what might be called minor offenses. Possession of Marijuana. Check Fraud. On all student loan applications it askes if you have been conviceted of a crime. Try checking yes next time you take a course and see if you get any student aid?
3. Patriotism is not affirmed by any acknowledgement to diety. You have it backwards. For me to affirm my patriotism I have to at the same time promote an idea of diety that I very much disagree with. Do you really think most Americans would say that "..under God." in the pledge is not a reference to the Christian diety. a better word choice would have been exactly "diety" which does not have the christian overtones.
4. And we never will have equality. I've seen projections that indicate in 1000 generations we could all be a homogenous genetic mix. Cultures are blending everywhere. You have McDonalds and walmarts in China fergoodnesssake. Yes EL we could have equality one day by all being essentially the same everywhere. Or maybe there could be equality a little sooner if people we take their heads out of the sand. It doesn't mean changing physics to have social equality, it only means changing people. Which is a lot easier t do.
5. Unless I'm mistaken, Texas executes more murderers than any other state. In California when you kill a pregnant woman, the fetus's death may be an option on the murder charge and increases the penalty. In Alabama when they catch you with drugs, possession of drug paraphrenalia is an extra charge that gets thrown in to increase the penalty. It is much the same idea with Hate crimes. I got it wrong though. Texas has a hate crimes bill. The James Byrd Hate Crimes Act was signed into law in 2001, after George W. Bush won the presidency. He had stalled the bill in the state legislature before then.
6. It almost sounds as though you advocate what Governor Schwarzenegger has proposed in California. No EL. I don't like partisan politics. Gov. Schwarzenegger plan only take redistricting power away from the California Legislature and gives it to a panel of retired judges. who would these judges be? Why wasn't this proposal sent to the state legislature instead of a costly referendum? I much prefer the idea of using a standard computer model. The idea was proposed for use in Illinois but was rejected by the legislature. The idea is that you give a computer new census data tell it how many districts you want, and then it will draw the most compact, contiguous, plan possible, keeping population in all district equal. It's an idea that cheap, fair, and democratic. Right now not one state in the country uses a method like this.
As to the idea of expanding Congress. Could you imagine the increase in pork barrel spending if even more Congressmen had to bring the bacon back home? Can you imagine trying to get 1,000 people to come to any decision? No thank you! I think in the near future America will have to start experimenting with direct continual democracy. A channel on TV where you can listen to debate on national issues and then register your vote. Or a website or something.
You are right about strict textual communication being more difficult, but I find it better allows me to think an idea through. Plus I can research a post. I think these are both pluses.
Oh well. At least a conservative is taking time to honor a civil rights activist. I guess that's a sign of progress.
Thank you. She deserves it. But don't expect me to sing Al Sharpton's praises... he does not.
...or Martin Luther King...
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