Click the photo to learn more on the series.
(Updated discussion at the bottom of the post)
This year has been a challenging year. Racial tensions, history vs hate, TV series pulled due to a flag but others with racist comments left on air and much more. As a white, christian, straight, male; folks might say I have no right to talk or share. I’m privileged and my voice has less weight. It does not matter that I’ve worked along side folks in Haiti, Kenya and Colombia. It doesn’t matter that I’ve worked along side folks who have more struggles, are under worse race issues, and in deeper poverty than anyone in the U.S. My privilege and “white guilt” cloud my view of reality. Maybe or maybe not.
What I would like is for people in the U.S. to have honest and fair discussions on race and history. Is it possible for people to push away from knee jerk political correctness? Can we have conversations instead of defacing monuments? I don’t know. I would like to say yes. Presidential candidate and retired neurosurgeon, Ben Carson, has said, “…our strength as a nation comes in our unity. We are the United States of America, not the divided states, and those who want to destroy us are trying divide us, and we shouldn’t let them do it.” People have issues with that statement. But that statement got me thinking. I personally think there are world issues and other groups in the world who would love to see the U.S. divided and race is just one way to do it. But sadly, I think most of the division comes from ourselves. Are we becoming a house divided more and more each year?
I don’t truly believe that most people are truly trying to cause division on purpose. The issue is too few of us truly study the past so we can talk and debate the issues. The U.S. unity in not build on uniformity, we come from a myriad of countries and traditions. Our unity was build as we came to the U.S. willingly or not and fought to be a part and have a part in the dream. Political correctness is not mortar that will hold us together, it is just painting over the cracks. It is a “quick fix” to try to get us to forget the cracks. It is a distraction. The unity of the U.S. states was build on hard work, honest debates, allowing our differences to be celebrated. That is part of the mortar that holds us together. But too ofter we are too afraid of offending each other that we choose the “easy” route. Honest conversations are hard and maintaining friendships in the midst of debate is challenging for most of us.
With old issues coming back at us, with new faces, I’m wanting to learn more. I think the Civil War is one place to do that. I think it is very appropriate that this year is the 150th anniversary of the war and the 25th anniversary of Ken Burns’ The Civil War (Remastered to make his dream a reality). Starting September 7th, PBS will be airing the re-mastered series, done by Burn’s company Florentine Films, and it will be available on Blu-ray for the first time (Click to here to buy via Amazon). It was a landmark series that changed documentary filmmaking and it opened many up to look at history more deeply. It helped people see that history was less about dates and places, but about people and relationships. It made us see that not everyone fought for the same reasons and propaganda existed on both sides. It made us acknowledge that we fought with ourselves and almost destroyed the nation. But we used it as a first step for change and a chance to build strength by forgiveness.
I look forward to watching it in the light of current events. I am going to take time to watch the series and talk with others. I challenged you to do the same. Also feel free to talk with me about it here or on social media, xforce11 in most of those places. Let’s do the hard work of studying, thinking and debating and build some unity.
Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it. – George Santayana
09/07/2015 – The series starts tonight. Burns & others say that The Civil War was about slavery. Other folks argue that it was a states’ rights issue. I believe slavery & states’ rights are just two of the issues that lead to the war. I personally think that the mindset of the U.S., at least in the early part of our history was to have a fiery debate and then to fight it out. This lasted through the “Old West” era but it has been replaced with tossing rhetoric and accusation. There is very little true debate left these days. So after the tossing of rhetoric we run to litigation. I’m not saying I want literal fights over issues, but I would like to see real debate. All that to say I think the U.S. had two very different societies before the war. I don’t think either side truly understood the issues and challenges of the other. The fiery debate then turned to war. War requires an enemy. No one really wanted to make our fellow citizens the enemy, that was a hard sell. Economics, philosophy, and other issues didn’t provide a solid enough target. So slavery and states rights were pushed as the targets. Not to say that this was artificial, they were two huge issues that the U.S. All I’m saying is that any war is complicated and has many factors. A civil war is even more murky. The U.S. really was not the U.S. until after the Civil War. The Civil War was our crucible that refined us and the anvil that shaped us. I think our nation had to address these two issues to move forward and we did it in the most American way possible. I try to imagine how our country could have dealt with the issues differently and what kind differences that would have made. It is hard to visualize. What are your thoughts?
