President Kennedy has mythic status in US political history.
I’m under no illusion that President Kennedy wrote all his own speeches. Nor do I believe the American Camelot myths. Kennedy, like all of us, had his strengths and his weaknesses, and, under the lens of history, his Presidency was mixed. What I find intriguing however, is that during a period of social upheaval, massive global change, and bitter domestic political conflict, President Kennedy had to make a choice about what character he presented to his country. And, to paraphrase from an earlier President, he chose to give voice to the better angels of humanity’s nature.
Some may say that the tide of liberal democracy, which was starting to rise in Kennedy’s time, has reached its zenith. There is now a pushback against liberal idealism, and a return of conservative practicality. After all, we’ve seen these types of ebbs and flows throughout Western history.
However, we’ve also seen the results when a backlash, against either end of the political spectrum, moves from ideological, to fanatical. Throughout Western history, an enormous amount of blood has been spilled in the name of political virtue.
And so, my letter today is to President Kennedy.
Dear President Kennedy:
The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.
These words, or a variation on them, are well-known. You uttered them in 1961, when speaking to the Canadian Parliament. Versions of them have been attributed to such luminaries as Edmund Burke, and John Stuart Mill. In the latter half of the 20thcentury, this has been a phrase used by many leaders and philosophical thinkers as a touchstone, to remind us all, of the horrors unleashed in mid-20thcentury Europe, when the Nazis set upon their course of eradication, while the rest of the world looked away.
In the wake of the US mid-term election, these words are haunting me today.
Even more so, as this week, in the very same place where you uttered these words, the current Canadian Prime Minister stood before the House of Commons to apologize for Canada’s 1939 refusal to grant asylum to the refugees on the MS St. Louis ocean liner. Prime Minister Trudeau underscored that Canada’s, and the rest of the world’s, inaction and dismissal of those in peril, made it possible “for the Nazis to come up with their own final solution”.
It seems like we are still having to teach these lessons. While my focus in this letter is on recent developments in your country, I do not believe that the issue we are facing in the first half of the 21st century is isolated in one country alone. There seems to be a global rise of nationalism, and with it and ugly specter of bigotry and fear mongering among national political leaders.
I understand that many of those who voted for Republicans in this last election did so for a variety of reasons. They did so because they had strong beliefs about abortion, the economy, law and order, tax cuts, or deregulation. They did so because they believed in the policy agenda that the Republicans put forward.
I believe that the vast majority of people on this planet, including in the US, are good people. They are trying to do their best for their families, their communities. They care for their neighbours. They try to stay true to their values, they raise their kids to be good people. They contribute to making the world a better place, and they strive to live harmoniously with others regardless of race, religion or ethnicity. Yes, there are racists and bigots among the citizenry of the US, just as there are in every nation. But, I firmly believe that the fast majority do not share the values of white nationalists.
And yet, over the last two years, we have watched a US administration use bigoted rhetoric and actions to incite the fears of these good people. President Trump, and the leaders in the Republican party, have stoked those very traits typical of good people – their desire to take care of their families and communities – and used it as a weapon to discredit and dehumanize those who do not fit the mold of what this administration believes makes a “good American.” Their vision is white, middle class and unquestioning of leadership.
And despite the President’s hateful rhetoric and abuse of power, to isolate and target ethnic groups, women and foreigners, good people are looking the other way.
They looked the other way when women were denigrated by a candidate for the Presidency, and a disabled reporter was humiliated for his disability. They looked the other way when a Presidential candidate encouraged crowds to chant for the imprisonment of a female political opponent. They looked the other way when that same candidate implied that a judge’s ethnic heritage disqualified him from performing his duties. They looked the other way when one of the first acts of this Presidency was to use an executive order to ban people from entering the country from a certain religious group. They looked the other way when people with a specific gender orientation were banned from military service. They looked the other way when the President of the United States encouraged violence against media outlets that he felt were being unjust to him and questioned the validity of their broadcast licences. They looked the other way when the President of the United States re-distributed videos from white nationalist groups and refused to admit any wrong-doing when it was proven that the videos were fake. They looked the other way when the President publicly supported a political candidate who had been found guilty by the court of racial profiling while a Sheriff. They looked the other way when children – mostly of certain ethnic groups – were used as deterrents for illegal immigration. And they looked the other way when the President sent 5000 soldiers to the southern border to deter Hispanic refugees, who are walking thousands of kilometers in the search for a better life.
The list is endless and exhausting. The administration’s rhetoric and hate-filled targeting, ultimately culminated in the lead up to the 2018 mid-term election, when a disenfranchised, isolated and troubled individual, interpreted all this rhetoric and bigotry into a licence to send pipe bombs to individuals, and media outlets, that publicly disagreed with the President. And still, the President refused to tone down the rhetoric.
Despite all this, good Americans looked the other way, and they voted to continue supporting this administration’s policies and agenda. From what I see, that’s a lot of looking the other way. And I can’t help but wonder: how big does the evil need to get before it gets noticed?
President Kennedy, I am turning to your words and those of your contemporaries. I am hoping that the lessons of the past will not be forgotten. I am counting on your legacy, and voice, to believe that it is possible for a country suffering through a divisive time, to find the path which allows, in the words of Dr. Martin Luther King, to “decide to choose love over hate. Hate is too great a burden to bear.”
Median Mama 