Day 85 Reactivity, Too Much, Too Little; and, The Dramatics of Scale

The Gates, Central Park, New York City, 1979-2005 Photo: Wolfgang Volz, © 2005 Christo and Jeanne-Claude

Nicholas Kristof’s column this morning was entitled, “Trump Uses the Military to Prove His Manhood: The president’s response to the coronavirus that killed more than 100,000 people was lethargic and ineffective. But when it came to anti-racism protesters, it was time to call in the troops.”

What is it about America that consistently provokes one or the other of two entirely inappropriate responses to everything? Either we pussy-foot around, and do nothing or not-quite-enough to solve a problem. Or, we pathologize whatever the issue is and hit it hard with an over-the-top reaction.

Where’s moderation? Where’s the middle ground? Where’s considered, thoughtful, logical response?

The president has had a public affair with all things military since he took office. It’s a one-two punch, really. His enthusiasm is two-edged. First, it throws the weight of the office he holds behind the most trusted institution in the country. A lot of mamas have children in the military. Second, it distracts us from his shameful, repeated evasion of the draft to serve in Vietnam.

“In a scathing statement published in The Atlantic, former Defense Secretary Jim Mattis wrote: ‘When I joined the military, some 50 years ago, I swore an oath to support and defend the Constitution. Never did I dream that troops taking that same oath would be ordered under any circumstance to violate the constitutional rights of their fellow citizens—much less to provide a bizarre photo op for the elected commander in chief, with military leadership standing alongside.”

Follow along with this account from the George Floyd news aggregator: “It was 8:45 p.m., almost an hour past curfew, when the group marched to Cadman Plaza. A single line of riot police confronted the crowd, which numbered in the hundreds, at Cadman and Tillary Street. The protesters stood peacefully, their hands up, chanting for justice.

“Behind them, police cars swarmed in and hundreds of officers in riot gear poured onto the plaza. By the time organizers tried to turn the protesters around to leave, they were surrounded. At around 9 p.m., officers holding shields and batons moved in from all sides. The protesters, tense but composed, held up their hands. ‘Don’t shoot,’ they chanted.”

They were surrounded. The protesters were surrounded by police officers in riot gear who insisted they disband and go home.

BUT DID NOT LEAVE THEM AN EGRESS TO DO SO.

Mayor de Blasio siad, “We went to a much more aggressive strategy. It worked much better last night.”

Is this America?

“When asked what he thought of President Trump’s call for military action against American protesters and the tear gassing of peaceful demonstrators to make way for a photo-op, [Canadian] Prime Minister Justin Trudeau paused at his podium for 21 uncomfortable, televised seconds. He opened his mouth, then shut it—twice. He softly groaned. Finally, in a scene on Tuesday that has now spread wildly around the internet, Mr. Trudeau said: ‘We all watch in horror and consternation what’s going on in the United States.’”

Mr. de Blasio’s own biracial daughter was among those arrested a few nights ago. The police union, in direct conflict with the law, reported her arrest on social media.

Where is Mr. de Blasio’s heart? Where is his logic? Why is he over-reacting just like the Toy-Soldier-in-Chief? It’s beyond my ability to understand it. And I’m usually pretty good at seeing motives behind people’s actions since I’ve spent more than half my life talking to people about their patterns, choices, and actions.

The Editorial Board of The New York Times wrote, “Some protesters crossed the line into violence. Some people took advantage of the chaos to loot. But all too often, facing peaceful demonstrations against police violence, the police responded with more violence—against protesters, journalists and bystanders.”

When has violence ever prevented violence? When? Adrenaline notwithstanding. Testostrone notwithstanding. Violence in response to violence begets only more violence, and worse, escalating violence. If I know that, then surely governmental advisers know that. Where is the reason? The sanity? The brake pedal?

The Editorial Board again, “President Trump, who tends to see only political opportunity in public fear and anger, is in his customary manner contributing heat rather than light to the confrontations between protesters and authority.”

I’ll say. And for what? To rile up a faceless base predicated on the notion that all people are not created equal? That white males have a right to grievance over and above all others?

“Most of [Canada]’s horror has been focused on President Trump. Even the country’s conservative newspapers were filled with columns like one by Gary Mason stating, ‘There couldn’t be a scarier person inhabiting the White House at this very moment.’”

Thomas Friedman is lamenting that Abraham Lincoln is no longer president. “Instead, we have Donald Trump, a man whose first instinct, when the country is being ripped apart, was to have peaceful protesters tear-gassed and shoved aside so that he could walk to a nearby church just for a photo op outside holding a Bible. He did not open that Bible to read a healing passage. He did not enter the church to host a healing dialogue. He posed for a photo op to drive up his support among white evangelicals. Trump was holding the Bible upside down.” Some other outlets maintained it was backward as well.

There have been all sorts of warnings about the imposition of martial law over these United States. How bad it would be. How we wouldn’t know what hit us. How our country would be turned into one huge Falluja.

Once again, the Editorial Board, “The police have imposed arbitrary limits on protests, creating excuses for confrontation. They have fired countless rounds of tear gas and rubber bullets into unarmed crowds, sometimes without warning. They have attacked with fists, truncheons, shields—and cars. They have behaved as if determined to prevent peaceful protest by introducing violence. In some of the most troubling attacks, police officers have singled out those who spoke up, wading into crowds of protesters and silencing the loudest voices.”

There are whispers on Facebook and other social media platforms that organizers are disappearing. Their families can’t find them. The U.S. doesn’t feel anymore like the home of the brave. Not to me. It feels like the home of the weak, the fearful, the terrorized.

I’m not alone. “A 92-year-old Italian, fondly recalling the G.I.s who parachuted in to liberate his country from fascism, says he now sees the ghost of Mussolini in TV clips from the United States. In Iraq, people are sharing photos that compare President Trump holding up a Bible with Saddam Hussein clutching a Quran. In Mexico, no stranger to mayhem, a 36-year-old author worries about her relatives in New York.”

“Former Defense Secretary Jim Mattis, breaking months of public silence on President Trump since resigning in protest in December 2018, on Wednesday offered a withering critique of the president’s leadership amid growing protests across the country.

“‘Donald Trump is the first president in my lifetime who does not try to unite the American people—does not even pretend to try,’ Mr. Mattis wrote in a statement issued late Wednesday. ‘Instead he tries to divide us. We are witnessing the consequences of three years of this deliberate effort. We are witnessing the consequences of three years without mature leadership.’”

Every check and balance I learned about in seventh grade Social Studies—which used to be called Civics—has been over-burdened, over-run, and over-turned. Where does it end?

“Dozens of journalists covering the nationwide protests against racism and police brutality have said they were attacked, arrested, intimidated with weapons or shot with nonlethal projectiles while doing their jobs. In response, the American Civil Liberties Union of Minnesota on Tuesday filed what is believed to be the first lawsuit accusing a city of abridging the constitutionally mandated freedom of the press.”

The A.C.L.U. is doing what they always do. That, at least, is comforting to me.

Gail Collins actually got a giggle out of me this morning with her column called “The Magic Word.” Ms. Collins maintains that the Mousie-in-Chief’s favorite word is “dominate.” I’ll bet. Over and over again, he’s cited as needing to “dominate the streets,” and “Domination—it’s a beautiful thing.” It is, I guess, if you’re into that sort of thing.

Ms. Collins, “Now, some people believe that when men go overboard with weaponry issues it may be linked to insecurity about their sexuality. Certainly it isn’t always true, but here you’ve got a guy who talks compulsively both about the Second Amendment and his need to dominate. This could be a great protest theme. Fill the street with banners saying, ‘Mr. President, we’re not really questioning your masculinity.’ [A v]ery positive message that’ll drive him completely nuts.”

Police brutality. Systemic racism. Haves and Have-nots. And now a wannabe military dictator is running the country with sycophants for a cabinet and no oversight.

Oy.

There was a video on social media of Mr. [Rahul] Dubey, the Washington homeowner who let upwards of 70 protesters shelter in his home three nights ago, “on the steps of his home on Tuesday morning[. It] showed him receiving a round of applause from protesters and onlookers.”

Listen carefully to what he said that morning, Beloved.

“‘It’s not something that should be celebrated,” Mr. Dubey said. “I shouldn’t be getting attention.’ Asked whether he would do it all over again, Mr. Dubey said of course. ‘I don’t think what I did was anything special. If it is, we have a ton of work to do in this country.”

Mr. Dubey, I agree. In fact, I am entirely comfortable saying that any thinking person would agree.

We do have a ton of work to do. But how? Where to start? With what? Doing what? What’ll work? Barring the surgical excision of the toxic administration running our prized government.

Thomas Friedman was born in the Northside area of Minneapolis. He wrote, “No one there is doing more today to make sure that disadvantaged families in that neighborhood have the tools to succeed than my friend Sondra Samuels, the C.E.O. and president of the Northside Achievement Zone. NAZ is working with parents, students and local partners to drive a culture shift in predominantly black North Minneapolis to end multigenerational poverty through education and building family stability.

“Sondra told me the right response to the killing of Floyd has to be ‘both/and’ not ‘either/or.’”

Let’s pause right here for a moment. Because this is an extremely good rubric. It’s simple. It’s elegant. It holds the proper tension to keep the middle in line with the extremes of opposites that have so characterized our government’s response to what Nicholas Kristof named as this “annus horribilis,” this horrible year.

Both/and holds the perfect dramatics of scale.

Ms. Samuels continued, “We need both an immediate end to the looting, burning and infiltration of white supremacist groups that is destroying the homes and businesses of good people in cities all over the country and we need deeper civil rights, voting rights, education, environmental and policing reforms for this generation.”

No one knew the dramatics of scale better than the recently deceased artist Christo, and his collaborator, Jeanne-Claude. Their work was always public, always temporary, always provocative, art. From the time they emigrated to New York, they wanted to create a work to honor their love of New York City. This they did, in 2005, with The Gates of Central Park.

They wrote, “The installation of The Gates in New York's Central Park was completed in February 2005. The 7,503 gates with their free-hanging saffron colored fabric panels seemed like a golden river appearing and disappearing through the bare branches of the trees.”

The gates traced the Central Park 58 miles of pedestrian paths, 4.5 miles of bridle trail, 6.5 miles of Park Drive, and 7 miles of benches (nearly 9,000). The pathways, the roads, the ways and by-ways that make Central Park what it is—an oasis in the jungle of commerce.

This is what is needed now, Beloved. A dramatics of scale. Our thoughts, our words, our deeds must reflect and answer the police brutality, the violence, the horror of what we are subject to day in and day out right now.

Know that both/and is the only possible choice. Get still, be silent, and open your heart. Listen. When it is time for you to act, Beloved, you will know what to do, where, when, at what scale, and you will undoubtedly make a difference.

Dr. Susan Corso is a metaphysician and medical intuitive with a private counseling practice for more than 35 years. She has written too many books to list here. Her website is www.susancorso.com

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