Church, State, Minorities, & Internal Imperialism
Interesting article in the Times about the seperation of church and state, its historical development, and a suggestion about going back to a more traditional divide than the mixed-message one we have now.

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/07/03/magazine/03CHURCH.html?pagewanted=1&th&emc=th

However, after reading it, I was struck that the author really seemed to know nothing about what it's like to be a minority, either religiously or otherwise. He seems to think that it's just as possible to feel like a true part of America when the majority around you is doing its best to express their own values and traditions in a way that's loud enough to drown out all differences and objections (and this is, a large part of the time, the whole point). Majorities are, most often, not simply ignorant of other ways of life (even in their own country), but almost criminally neglegant in educating themselves about their neighbors. This, after all, would require having conversations with those people, who look funny and probably don't even speak English properly. A lot of this is not overtly malicious, but based on laziness and discomfort. It's so much EASIER to approach people with whom you are unlikely to have real barriers, misunderstandings, and the potential for hostility. So, as an alternative (especially in the US), they tend to broadcast their own Selfness, claim that it's "universal," and hope that it masks any unsightly blemishes.

In China, especially this year, since I wasn't as embedded in the foreign student community, I was able to witness the casual cruelty of the majority in a way that I never had before. Majorities tend to be incredulous about different ways of being or doing, as if other possibilties could never be as valid or meaningful. Granted, China can be a little extreme in this regard, especially when I probably encounter anywhere from 25-100 people every day who have never had a single meaningful conversation with a foreigner. This gets old VERY quickly, especially when people are constantly making all kinds of assumptions about who you are, what kinds of things you like, why you do things the way you do, and that all Americans (or even worse, all white people) are more or less the same. Still, however, I think the general principles still hold over to life in America. I imagine being Korean in the rural South is probably quite similar to being white in China (and, potentially, much worse).

So, basically, as a white male of Judeo-Christian background (whether or not you actually believe in it), it's really easy to come up with universal statements like, "Everyone should be okay with having the folks around them freely express their own beliefs and cultural ideas, since that's the First Amendment and everything, and it's not like they're really being oppressed or having their rights trampled." For example, it doesn't bother me all that much when people express Christian sentiments that I don't agree with (I mean, I hang out in churches enough that I've mostly gotten over that), but I feel the pain of "wrongness" because I'm sensitive to other people around me. Inclusive language in hymns really annoys me, because it fucks up the natural rhythms and the authors intentions for the piece, but I realize why it's there. Having God described as a "He" or a "Lord" or a "King" all the time might piss me off if I didn't already think of God in mostly male terms.

What I'm trying to say is: it's really easy for members of the majority to downplay or overlook the concerns of minorities, because, try as they might, they aren't their own concerns. When I get back to the US and am no longer a minority, I hope that I will continue to pay attention to these issues, but I'm worried that I won't, because they won't be my problem anymore. I'll be able to walk down the street and not have people pay me any special attention. It's easy to forget. I mean, amendment schmendment, free speech is all well and good, but, like all rights, it stops where someone else's rights start. And your free speech can trample on someone else's right of self expression in an instant. If there's one thing we've learned from modernism, it's that language can also be violence. If you shout louder or with more force (usually money) behind it, you're going to leave quieter voices unheard. That's just the way of things.

So, while I thought Prof. Feldman had some good ideas, I'm afraid that the "legal secularist" in me thinks those "values evangelicals" can take their school prayer, their modified Pledge of Allegiance, their Ten Commandments posters, their mistaken assumptions of "universal" values, and their new Supreme Court candidates and keep them as far away from the Government of the United States as possible. And I'm sure both my pastors back at Pullen Memorial Baptist Church would tell them the exact same thing. This isn't really about religion; it's about cultural imperialism within US borders. Many people, like that skyscraper-sized iron at the end of Fooly Cooly want to smooth out all the wrinkles, creating a single American identity that all can subscribe to. Well, as far as I'm concerned, that's just not gonna fly. Nationalism is such a relic of the past 500 years, since the nation-state is pretty much on its way out and national borders are less and less meaningful (as the world's security forces have discovered). Grow up, already. Become a citizen of this planet. Stop pushing for your own private Idaho. Open your eyes and become aware of the diverse realities around us.

That's all.