letter from a burning down world
over the past few years I have been gravely disappointed with the moderate — white or otherwise
16 April 2020
My Dear Fellow Countrymen:
While confined in this election hell, I came across your recent statement calling our movement “radical and untimely”. Too often do we pause to answer criticisms of our ongoing work building political power for the poor and working class people of this country. The constant justifying to those who think themselves our allies — and unilaterally demand as much of us come November every 4 years — leaves little time for our constructive work. But since I feel you are people of good intention, and that your criticisms are genuinely felt, I hope to respond in reasonable but impatient terms.
I think I should indicate why I am here, since you have been influenced by the view that we are naive, or angry, or impractical. In 2015, the first election season I was politically conscious of, I found the system and candidates to be unrepresentative of me or my interests. I found those vying for power to be unresponsive to the problems of yesterday, today, and tomorrow. I found the prospect of real change to be lacking — do we prefer a younger Bush or a female Clinton?
I was disheartened by the lack of meaningful offerings to substantively, materially change my life and the lives of the most vulnerable among us. Merely finding the best person to manage the current oppressive status quo was not enough to earn my vote.
Then, Donald Trump rose up as an uniquely destructive individual — someone to vote against. And Bernie Sanders began leading a uniquely constructive movement — something to vote for.
Fundamentally, I was pulled into this movement because injustice surrounds us. Righting these inequities is a responsibility none of us can evade in good conscience. We are all called to drive out darkness wherever we find it, even when it is not within our immediate proximity.
We are tethered to each other as citizens of the same nation, inhabitants of the same planet. Now more than any other era, our connection stretches across borders of race, nation, and creed. So too must our mutuality. We must recognize our interwoven fate — that anyone’s suffering is a stain upon the garment which threads us together.
We are sadly mistaken if we feel that the nomination — even the election — of Joe Biden for President will bring needed change to America. While Biden is more genteel than Trump, they are both of the past, both dedicated to maintaining an unsustainable status quo. One offers a return to the 1950s, and the other to 2008.
Either way, choosing backwards-looking men to lead us into the future is hope misplaced. We must build a forward-looking movement to usher in the freedoms we deserve.
You speak of our activities as radical — we’re asking for too much, too fast. At first I was rather disappointed that fellow working citizens would see our goals as extreme, while neglecting that they are also necessary. In order to win not just this election or the next, but the world to come, we each must commit to fight for our shared principles and values. I had hoped you would see this need.
But I was disappointed.
You deplore the tactics and supporters of this movement. Regrettably, your statement fails to express an equal concern for the conditions that brought us to where we are. Yet I’m sure that none of us are satisfied with merely addressing harmful effects while avoiding the underlying causes.
Lamentably, it is a historical fact that powerful groups don’t give up their power voluntarily. There are those who will outright deny justice when they can, and delay it whenever they can not.
We’re mistaken to accommodate or compromise with these individuals — those uninterested in bending the arc of history towards righteousness. We’ve seen with every successful movement for change that progress is never offered willingly by the oppressor at the cost of their power. It must be demanded and taken by the oppressed.
It is unfortunate that the country’s rich power structure leaves everyone else no alternatives to win power for themselves. But it is more unfortunate that this power structure has bought your consent. Your complicity has been commodified and purchased by the richest people in the history of the world — in exchange for a sense of relative comfort.
Perhaps it is easy for those who have never felt the stinging darts of poverty, of hunger, of medical debt, of homelessness, of student loan debt, of impending climate catastrophe to say, “Wait.” Perhaps it is easy to shelve the struggle for justice to generations that only come around once we have departed this burning world.
In the spirit of transparency I have a confession, my fellow Americans. Over the past few years I have been gravely disappointed with the moderate — white or otherwise. I have almost reached the regrettable conclusion that our greatest stumbling block in our stride towards freedom is not the Billionaire Plutocrat or the Climate Change Denier, but the moderate, who is more devoted to civility than equity; who prefers the untenable comforts of exploitation over the enduring justice fair treatment brings; who constantly says: “I agree with everything you say, but it’s not the fight I want to have right now”; who treats another’s freedom as something to apportion out at his discretion.
We are done waiting on freedom. We are done waiting for rights and equality and liberty. The time, as it has always been, is now.
I had hoped the moderate would understand that incrementalism is a dam blocking the flow of progress. There will always be those who will forever oppose a more fair world, but we cannot allow our vision to be waylaid by these opponents.
I had hoped that the moderate would understand the tension between the haves and the have-nots, between the many who work to survive and the few who hoard every luxury. Addressing this growing tension is a necessary phase to transition from a polite, negative peace of separation, competition, and profit to a substantive, positive peace of equality, solidarity, and human dignity for all.
Those in our movement are not the source of this tension, we’ve merely inherited it from passive generations before us. We bring the tension forth, knowing that it must be seen and named before it can be remedied.
When I was rapidly enmeshed in this movement a few years ago, I felt we would be supported by the working moderates, who share in our suffering underneath Capital power. I felt that they would become our strongest allies. This has not been the case.
Shallow understanding from people who claim our cause is more frustrating than intentional misunderstanding from the affirmatively ignorant. Moderates argue that our calls for equity could be more pragmatic, more sensible — all while the world staves off calamity.
I am heartbroken at the moral apathy that faces us day after day, exhausted by the ongoing superiority the expedient profess. As if practicality is in itself a virtue detached from what is done in its name.
The offer of expediency can never be a substitute for justice.
Justice is never convenient. Justice is never pragmatic. Justice is never practical.
Maybe I was too optimistic. Maybe I expected too much, too fast. I should have remembered that those in comfort will seek to defend their advantages, earned or not. Those who can maintain a sheltered distance will retreat into ignorance and indifference, spurning all who yearn to end their shared oppression.
Still, we cannot allow our most vocal opponents to supplant the long fight for freedom with a sudden flight into the past. When others default to caution over courage, or fall silent with apathy, we must respond to the cries for justice.
We will no longer settle for symbolism decoupled from substance.
I hoped that our performative allies would recognize the righteousness of our efforts, and strive to sway the power structure. I had hoped you each would understand us — understand me. But I remain disappointed.
In spite of my shattered dreams, I find myself inexorably trying to convince you, seeking to root our cause in mutual understanding, resilience, and solidarity.
We all share the same human condition. The very elements that keep us separate — the need for personal safety and social understanding — will be the conduits through which we will fold others into our movement to win the world we require.
Combating discrimination based on class, gender, race, religion, sexuality and any combination therein is a necessary struggle our generation can not abdicate. Aligning these interests within one coalition is our movement’s task, and it is work we must enter into collaboratively instead of prohibitively.
I am thankful for those who have found meaning in this social and political revolution and see value in our cause. I pray this letter finds you strong in your political commitments beyond the singular myopia of electoral concerns.
If I implied anything that overstates the truth and implicates you beyond reason, I beg you to forgive me.
If you infer that I’ve understated the truth or that I am patient in settling for anything less than justice, I beg god to forgive you.
— Yours for the cause of Peace and Brotherhood, a betrayed generation
