Lady Liberty has laid aside her torch of freedom. She stumbles unsteadily toward a new guiding light, the torch of racial equality. It will not be easily reached. Her progress is hindered by Mother Nature, herself, who decrees inequality.
Every snowflake is unlike any other snowflake. Each blade of grass proclaims its individuality. No two leaves on the same tree are identical. And every human being is a universe unto himself; a one-of-a-kind specimen never to be repeated.
But followers of America's new icon of militant equality see all disparities between the races as evidence of racism. The militants block traffic, close bridges, and trample underfoot the rights of others. Or they hurl bottles, stones, or Molotov cocktails at police officers. Or trash patrol cars, loot stores, and incite violence, all in self-righteous anger against white racism.
The trial jury's verdict of not guilty for George Zimmerman in the death of Travyon Martin, or the grand jury's decision not to indict Officer Darren Wilson in the death of Michael Brown, or the grand jury's determination not to indict Officer Daniel Pantaleo in the death of Eric Garner, are to them yet more injustices.
The jury trial and the grand juries' judgments are not just wrong, they are prima facie evidence of "deep rooted prejudice," as President Obama put it. The facts and the decisions of the juries of their peers do not cause them to rethink their convictions, rather they fuel their rage.
How, then, does one communicate with others when rational thinking is shoved aside by heated rhetoric, when appeals to reason are met by unreasoned responses, and when facts don't matter? Researchers call this the “backfire effect.” In other words, communication is not only impossible it is counterproductive; dispassionate dialog backfires and only entrenches misguided ideas.
The three cases, Zimmerman, Wilson, and Pantaleo, involve a confrontation between the white and the black races. They serve as lightning rods for a significant minority of the public and many on Capitol Hill who feel that white privilege, or white advantage, or white racism, is responsible for racial inequalities. And this despite decades of trying to eliminate racial distinctions.
In spite of these efforts, there is backfire. The races are by every measure only further apart than they were in 1954 when the Supreme Court ruled that segregation in schools was unconstitutional. The goal of obtaining social and economic parity through legislative integration is proving to be as conflict ridden as enforced segregation.
But what about the hundreds of billions of dollars spent in government programs aimed at helping the “disadvantaged “? They are worse than failures. These programs have created an underclass, a group utterly dependent upon government subsidies instead of themselves. Is there, then, any solution to the growing rift between whites and blacks?
Indeed there is. Enter the third lady, Lady Justice.
The personification of justice is pictured as a woman wearing a blindfold. All who stand before her are equal. The prince and the pauper stand shoulder to shoulder. The balance scale and the sword that Justice holds are applied irrespective of the circumstances of birth, position, or wealth.
But with the best of intentions, Justice's blindfold has been removed to address the problem of disproportionately high black crime. The intent was to explain, the result was to excuse.
A good starting point to putting things aright would be for President Obama and his titular race ambassador, Al Sharpton, to stop blaming whites for the problems of blacks. And for Secretary of “Just-us” Eric Holder to enforce justice irrespective of color and not in accord with his sense of racial proportionality.
And last, for that die-heart group of doctrinaires, the liberals, to stop fighting under the false flag of white racism. They have succeeded only in constructing the cult of victimization which blames others for one's failings and denies individual responsibility.
Unless we want racial friction to become racial strife, we must abandon a compromised judicial system. Lady Justice must once again don her blindfold and dispense justice, without interference from the street or intervention from the government.
Sincerely,
Bob Scroggins
New Milford, PA