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GUEST COMMENTARY - It's pretty clear to me that with the rise of fascism and autocratic tyranny gaining hold in countries around the world (Brazil, Israel, Russia, America, China) there is a whole LOT of waking up that has to happen.
The 'faster than the speed of light' technological and information revolution and its consequent influence on our social structures compel us to Wake Up, Stay Alert, Keep our eyes Open. Things are changing!
Let's say the history of civilization was equal to one hour. The idea that all people (men, women, sexual orientation, races, even children) are created equal and deserving of respect and equal treatment, has been a reality for about the last 5 seconds... and still isn't fully embraced in many countries.
Old paradigms we cling to are on the chopping block and those who gain power from those paradigms want us to keep our eyes closed, to not ask the bloated corporate profiteers to pay a decent wage and take care of its workers. They want to keep reminding women that their primary purpose is to birth babies. To tell those who do not fit into the social construct, that they don't, can't exist. To keep abusing nature as if she is our B***ch until she has nothing left to give. Then look on in despair and shock as she fights back. To continue to co-opt and manipulate the language and tell you not to believe what you just heard or saw. Nothing to see here! Go back to sleep!
Newsflash...it's not about "white guilt" it's about the fact that until recently in the timeline of history, white Americans enslaved and tortured a whole race of people . Blacks were freed 152 years ago, which means that most Americans are only two to three generations away from slavery. My great grandfather was born a slave. Are we to believe that the effect of that insanity has been eliminated from the culture in three generations? Really? When there are people in America today who still believe that black, brown and even Asian people are less than. Trump turned over that rock and gave them a tiki torch to wave and permission to wave it. With the repulsive rise of unabashed white nationalism, do you really think that minority people have nothing to worry or complain about? Nothing to see here? Go back to sleep!?
Of course those who benefit from the old paradigm of power over and control of others, want us all to stay asleep. They vilify the idea of waking up and staying woke. In the struggle to stay awake do ideas sway a little as it finds its balance...of course. But I don't see book banning, oppression of people who are "different" and an effort to elect someone who has never read the Constitution because he doesn't like to read, anywhere near the left's agenda. There is no comparison to the absolute insanity of the fascist pull to the extreme right of the power hungry Maga Republicans.
The opposite of being awake is being asleep. Your choice.
(Dianne V. Lawrence is the Editor of The Neighborhood News and a resident of Council District 10 since 1979.)
