The Power of Love and Hearing
My dad’s business was vandalized and looted in the Cincinnati
riots of 1967-68, yet what concerned him was not his losses, but the injustices
and racism that sparked the riots. He
empathized with the people who were suffering so much. I don’t know if he had heard the Rev. Dr.
Martin Luther King, Jr., say that the riot is the language of the unheard,[1]
but my dad certainly understood that truth.
I was just an adolescent at the time, but my dad’s words and sentiment
about the people who were protesting, and his valuing these people’s yearning
for basic human rights and fairness made an impression on me. I will never forget it.
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| My dad, Winfield Wayne "Whit" White, 1923-2011 |
So after I listened to the audio stream of the Sanibel City
Council meeting on June 2, I had to write these words in Facebook:
“It troubles me that the
discussion at the beginning of today's Sanibel city council meeting seemed to
focus on the council members' concerns about the rioting in cities across the
country, and not on the racism and injustices that sparked those riots. This
troubles me a lot. The racism and injustices break my heart. Vandalism and
looting are wrong but it is racism and injustice that break my heart.”
I would have been
present in city hall and would have spoken these words into the record at the
podium had I not been in self isolation, at home with my husband due to his
underlying medical condition and the Covid epidemic.
The city council members
are good people who have good intentions; they are community-minded volunteers
who are dedicated to serving the people of Sanibel. But as one friend commented, “You can tell a lot about a person by what
they focus on.”
Another friend
responded, “We live in a homogeneous community. As sad as it is, the council’s
tone deafness, while probably not intentional, does not surprise me one bit.
Disconnects often happen when we’re not exposed to other cultures, creeds,
colors and orientations on a regular basis. I love Sanibel but we live in a
bubble. One of the things I miss most about living in Miami was the mix of
cultures living and mingling side by side. We have a lot going for us on the
island but diversity isn’t on that list.”
No, diversity is not on
that list.
After the Rev. Dr. King
said that the riot is the language of the unheard, he stated what it is that
America has failed to hear. “It has
failed to hear that the promises of freedom and justice have not been met,” he
said. “And it has failed to hear that large segments of white society are more
concerned about tranquility and the status quo than about justice and humanity.” Those failures to hear are still with us
today.
The heartbreak caused by
words not spoken on Tuesday started to turn into depression, but then I
remembered the mantra that I turn to in troubled times, “The power of love is
greater than anything, even death itself.”
The power of love is
being shown by police across the country who have been kneeling in front of
demonstrators in order to show respect for them and an understanding of their
grievances. Would these city council
members ever do something like that? I
do not know. But I know they can open their
hearts and minds to try to love and understand the unheard, even if those
people live miles away. The world is
small, after all, and love can conquer it.
Or, as the Rev. Dr. King said, “I believe that unarmed truth and
unconditional love will have the final word in reality.”
[1]
"The Other America," speech by Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr., at the
Grosse Pointe High School, March 14, 1968.
https://www.gphistorical.org/mlk/mlkspeech/index.htm
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