The public mood as of June 2020
How ARE you?
Are you, as I am, torn between sorrow and worry about America, and euphoria, when we see folks in Minneapolis clean up the streets, or a police chief take his hat off respectfully when speaking live with the bereaved family of George Floyd.
I watch with pain a video of African-American parents giving lessons on self-protection to their children: “Be careful that your hands can be seen at all times. Say “My name is … and I have nothing to hurt you.”
But that didn’t seem to help George Floyd. Submission can be fatal, too.
What on earth is society to do with racist, rogue police? Swift action from police leaders and politicians, and from union leadership, I think. Public support for proper recruitment, testing and discipline.
Are we also ready to confront Canadian racism and prejudice? Here in Peterborough, an impressive, well-organized (with masks, distancing and sanitizer), Black Lives Matter rally took place at Millennium Park and on the main streets on June 2. The crowd was nearly 1,000.
Best of all, the speakers were all from the Black community; the mood was respectful, and the crowd was almost entirely young. Peggy and Richard Abbott, Sheila Howlett and I felt like the token elders. Great feeling.
The Examiner featured a picture of our police leadership taking a knee. I walked over to thank Chief Scott Gilbert and Deputy Chief Tim Farquharson.
I had come across a remark which
I put on my sign, drawn for me by my friend, Justin Laurie. It starts with recognition that a white person, even an ally, can never deeply know the feelings of a Black person in a society that has racism lingering in it. It read: “I understand that I can never fully understand. Nonetheless, I stand.”
Events are happening quickly south of the border. It was stunning and shocking to see President Donald Trump and his enablers (how do they sleep at night?) march out of the White House, order troops to clear the street of protesters by using rubber bullets and tear gas, and then walk to the historic 200-year-old Episcopal Church nearby, St. John’s, where Trump posed with a Bible. “A crude photo op,” said commentators. Was it in hopes of attracting his right-wing evangelical followers?
Quick and articulate, the Episcopal bishop, Rev. Mariann Budde, who administers that parish, went on TV to denounce this unscheduled visit and say that Trump’s behaviour is “inimical to the gospel we preach.”
Not to leave the Catholics out of his “outreach,” Trump made an uninvited call next day to the museum of Pope John Paul II. It is run by the Knights of Columbus.
Washington’s first Black Catholic archbishop, Wilton Gregory, told the press it was “baffling and reprehensible” that “any Catholic facility would allow itself to be misused and manipulated in such a fashion that violates our religious principles.”
Take that, newly pious president. There’s more. Rev William Barber, a nationally known Protestant leader, said the Bible stunt was “shameful and heretical, an act of idolatry. When you see people in the streets, that’s democracy trying to breathe.”
There was the scene of our prime minister pausing for 21 seconds before not answering the reporter’s question, “Will Canada denounce?” It went round the world. And he “took a knee” at the Ottawa rally on June 5.
As the weeks wear on, we behave co-operatively when out and about, observing distance, wearing masks and so on. Though not sick, I got myself tested this week at the site at Kinsmen Centre. Good experience.
We are tired, tired, and lonely. We are sadly aware of the Canadian Forces’ report of conditions in our seniors’ homes, and the fact that 80 per cent of COVID-19 deaths have been among this group. So, our moods swing wildly.
Me, I’m taking in another webinar on resilience tonight!