The coming civil war
You see where I'm going with this? If you're out there on the right, or even in that sensible neocon center, you're probably not smelling the gas. You're probably not exposed to the overwhelming mass of sheer ignorant hatred that's out there, coiled and waiting. You're probably not subject to a constant barrage of email that reminds of you of this on a daily, even hourly basis, that makes you wonder, for the first time in your life, even including the years of Reagan and Bush the elder, if this country is actually, literally, genuinely headed for something more frightening than you'd ever thought possible.
And I, for one, find it wholly plausible. Last weekend was San Francisco Gay Pride Weekend. 'round here, it's really easy to forget that anyone perceives anything unusual about someone being gay. Well, at least for me as a straight... don't know what the view is from the inside. I haven't heard my openly gay and bi friends complain, but I haven't asked, either. But I digress.
So it's easy to forget that for what's probably a million or millions of people in the U.S. it's the greatest abomination imaginable. That people openly take pride in it, the greatest travesty there could be — the profoundest failure of our society and country. That for them, it had might as well be what Infant-rapist Pride Weekend would be for the rest of us.
I'm using homophobia as an example here both because Pride Weekend was so recent and because it's something you can still find people being explicit and vocal about, whereas misogyny and racism has gone more underground. But there are also people for whom miscegenation, women doing "men's work", blacks having money and power are just as great travesties.
It's a potential powder keg. Is it going to go off, or is my title entry going to be shown to be stupidly melodramatic?
I don't know. One thing that is encouraging is that I can point to explicit racism and misogyny being untenable public positions. And the civil rights and women's liberation movements are just plain older and more mature than the gay rights movement. Maybe in another fifteen years, it'll nationally be as much no big deal as it is in the Bay Area today.
The price of freedom is eternal vigilance. — Thomas Jefferson
But if so, it won't be through inaction.
"... something more frightening than you'd ever thought possible."
Why would you think it's not possible, we already HAD a civil war.
for fun, try _The Coming Race War in America: A Wake-Up Call_ Carl T. Rowan, not that it's great.
lots of people try to start a race war, The Order, military cult, I seem to recall, tried it and were surprized when it didn't catch on. Likewise the (Charles) Manson family believed they could trigger a race war, set up murders to look like it was racially motivated. Also didn't work for them.
if you feel a need to have a civil war, you probably being manipulated by others.
Frankly I don't think hatred is sufficient for a civil war. A "constant barrage of email" filled with "hatred" is probably just sent by those who are feeling a feeling and then express it the low grade American way they have venting. It's too easy to spout. I suspect a civil war based on nothing but hatred would be over in a week, after the first battle. Feelings change fast. To have a proper civil war you can't just base it on feelings; you have to have principles.
Posted by Claims his Name is Carl on July 19 2002 22:50