Tikkun (https://www.tikkun.org/category/uncategorized/page/15/)
That gay marriage went from impossible to inevitable in this country in such a short span of time is a testament to the wonderful suppleness of the human heart. Through this process we all got to witness firsthand how societies, like individuals, have the thrilling ability to change from the inside. It has been breathtaking to watch as, household by household, gay people have become human in the eyes of the American public.
Whether catalyzed by Pope Francis’s encyclical, the wake-up call presented in Naomi Klein’s urgent polemic This Changes Everything, or the activists calling for system change worldwide, there is a growing realization that sustainable development goals and CO2 emission targets simply won’t be enough to remedy the climate crisis. Many millions of people now recognize that, without reforming the policies that are responsible for widening inequalities and for encouraging environmentally destructive patterns of consumerism in the first place, our response to socioeconomic and ecological crises will remain inadequate and fail to create what Charles Eisenstein calls the “more beautiful world our hearts know is possible.”
I’m troubled by the evil of banality that denatures terrorism, reducing it to entertainment. However, I’m more concerned about the possibility that terrorism entertainment actually promotes the evils of violence and repression endemic in U.S. terrorism policy—whether this is intentional or not. Could the slow creep of terror entertainment promote unaccountable conflict beyond the pale of international law, as expressed in overt and covert military operations, secret prisons and torture chambers, and unprecedented domestic repression and surveillance? The answer is yes.
A tradition within modern social Christianity that should be renowned is the black social gospel. Long before Martin Luther King Jr. emerged, there was a black church tradition that fused the racial justice politics of abolitionist religion with the social gospel emphasis on economic democracy, comprehensive social justice, and modern criticism.
My Sikh American upbringing taught me to see all people as equal in the eyes of Waheguru and to recognize that living in American society poses racial and class-based challenges to equality.
I contend that we must begin to take seriously the impact of our food choices on the other sentient beings with whom we share the planet. A spiritually progressive paradigm must challenge the ideology of carnism and help shift our culture toward veganism. Compassion requires us to look at the immense suffering inflicted upon animals for the sake of profit and taste.
Last year’s “Hoffman Report,” the independent investigation conducted by former Inspector General of Chicago David Hoffman into the American Psychological Association’s collusion in the torture of prisoners at Guantánamo Bay and other CIA “black sites,” has sent shock waves through the psychology profession, whose members are not at all happy to be the public face of torture in America. Listservs around the country are erupting with consternation and outrage, with demands for accountability, justice, and reform, and with cries of betrayal. Our profession is in a full-blown crisis and psychologists around the country are confused, embarrassed, and unsure of how to respond in a meaningful way.
It is no secret that our nation is riddled with prejudice, not the least of which is its pernicious discrimination against its own African American citizens. But mere prejudice cannot explain the degree of such atrocities as the one that occurred in South Carolina.
I was assaulted on a Sunday. I taped signs to a sidewalk on Wednesday. Because three days after that Sunday assault, my friends cooked me dinner and we took Sharpies to poster boards. “My short dress does not give you the right to grab me.” “He took my safety but not my strength.” “I was assaulted here X on Sunday.” “Protect your community.”
Like most American women, I have been the target of uninvited comments like this one in the past. The regularity with which such intrusions are directed at women in public space recently inspired its own hashtag, #YouOkSis. The co-creators of the online campaign, Feminista Jones and @BlackGirlDanger, hoped the use of the hashtag would break the silence surrounding the experiences of black women and girls with street harassment.
I coined the term intimate violence over twenty years ago to describe domestic violence, rape, child abuse, female infanticide, and other brutal practices, many of which take place within families and are still not prosecuted in many regions of the world. Some countries in Southeast Asia do not even have laws against wife beating, though beating a stranger is of course a crime. Even human rights organizations have only in recent decades started to address intimate violence.
These online exclusives are freely accessible articles that are part of an ongoing special series associated with Tikkun’s Winter 2016 print issue, Intimate Violence, Societal Violence. An Invitation to Community: Restorative Justice Circles for Intimate Partner Violence
EMILY GAARDNER
Intimate Partner Violence and Intimate Partner Justice: How Spiritual Teachings Impact Both
REV. AL MILES
AfroLezfemcentric Perspectives on Coloring Gender and Queering Race
AISHAH SHAHIDAH SIMMONS
Intersectionality and Intimate Partner Violence: Barriers Women Face
VENESSA GARCIA AND PATRICK McMANIMON
If you appreciated these free web-only articles, please help enable us to keep up this important work by becoming a print subscriber or offering a donation.
I have never quite liked the framing of “lesser evilism,” because having that category suggests there might be “no evilism.” The expectation that any candidate or party would ever be perfect to a substantial body of people is unrealistic, and compromise is a necessary part of politics, even for those, like myself, on the left. I understand why it is necessary to vote for the least-bad candidate in many cases, but that approach is largely defensive. It seems like you eventually lose on issues of central importance to the plutocrats who own the country.
It is my belief that the two-party system in the United States is an impediment to achieving true democracy. Both major parties are funded heavily by corporate money. In fact, most big corporations donate to both parties to keep their corporate-backed, two-party system in place. In all other advanced countries, there are parties based on promoting the specific interests of non-corporate sectors, such as the interests of ordinary working people. What a novel idea!
Leftists today could build a matrix apart from state power, locating political power on a communal, municipal level rather than on the level of the state.