Religious Freedom ???

(Claimer: I am an agnostic theist and strongly believe in the separation of religion and God)

Despite being a strong sceptic of all religions I admired the fact that the right to religious freedom in the US was not limited to paper. The government does not interfere in how one worships and treats all religions equally. However the recent events at Texas have me wondering.

I believe that some of the stuff that goes on within the FLDS is obnoxious and disgusting. I also believe that it is their right to live as they want to. The state did the right thing by going into the compound and evacuating the children when they received the call, even though now it is being accepted that 16 year old Sarah the caller does not exist*. 

However, what happened next would have make have made Stalin and Mao proud.

It is best to untangle the mess to understand it clearly. 

April 4 -7:  After evacuating the mom and kids the State(Child services, DA and other agencies) tried to verify their identity (biological parents) and check for abuses.

April 13: cell phone were taken away from the women and children to "prevent the possible tampering to witnesses"

April 14: Mothers and children 5 years and older were separated because the State claimed that they were "coaching the children"

April 18: Judge rules that the children be kept by the state and DNA testing performed to confirm maternity and paternity. 

After all this the 'evidence' discovered to suggest child abuse are a few pregnant teenage girls. 

WOW!! I would expect such a reaction by the State(judge included) in a place like Iran but for it to happen here ......

If one bothers to read a little about the FLDS it is clear that there is no rampant sex abuse in the community. It is not a haven for pedophiles nor are they running a child prostitution ring. What is happening is that in some cases underage girls (14 -17 year old) are being married off to older** men. In fact other than these 'marriages' there is no evidence of child abuse. Instead of separating mothers and kids and putting the kids in foreign environments while the investigations were ongoing the the State could have easily let most live in their homes and kept the men away to prevent abuse. Since the group lives in a compound they could easily have regulated and monitored the contact by men. The handful of young girls who are 'child brides', especially those pregnant, and vulnerable to  abused should be the only ones considered for protective custody. If it was not logistically possible to keep mothers and kids in their homes they could easily have used the church (that seems to be large enough) to house them and keep the men out.  I see no reason for keeping a 5 year old handicapped boy away from his mother.

What is really surprising is that the self proclaimed 'liberals' have very little so say about the matter - we have have had barely a squeak from the ACLU. It is a rare occasion when there rants on both the left and right wing blogs are the same - FLDS has managed to achieve what even a butcher like Saddam couldn't. 

Not surprisingly the government has reacted very differently in similar situations in the past.

After the widespread sex scandal in the Catholic Church was revealed what did the Government do? - nothing. Priests continue to interact with children in the absence of other adults.

There are numerous underage mother in all parts of the country who continue to live in their homes. They have not been moved to foster homes because they will receive the best care at home.

I believe sexual abuse is merely a ruse to take on the main issue of polygamy that has most americans fuming. While I find polygamy weird there are also laws against adultery and fornication and if all these laws were implemented half the nation would be behind bars.

The state enforced kidnapping of  all children from a community reminds one of Ceausescuean Romania. The mothers and children of FLDS are paying a price for their beliefs in a nation that prides itself on its freedoms.

* Texas Child Services continues to believe that Sarah exists and that the raid was justified - feels eerily similar to the "weapons of mass destruction"  argument.

** The perception normally is that these teen brides are married to much older middle aged men. Interestingly, Warren Jeffs the leader was convicted last year for forcing a 14 year old to marry a 19 year old boy.

Race in America

I have been thinking of an appropriate topic to start and thanks to the recent events I have decided to write about Race. I am basing this on my experiences of living in the US for the last few years and  graduate school courses I took on the subject. 

Race is actually the four letter word in the US that no one wants to speak aloud. Interestingly while everyone seems to agree that it is a major issue few want to discuss it. Looking at the two main groups, White and Black, I found two broad categories within each. 

The blacks have a very legitimate right to be angry and hurt for the inhumane treatment they have received in the past. Some continue to build on this anger while other have a milder approach. Those who build on their anger are fueled by the prejudices that continue to exist. The other group realizes that while prejudices and stereotypes still exist there are a lot of good people who are not racists. 

The biggest fear of a white person I have found is to be considered a racist. Because of this most will totally avoid the subject and are visibly uncomfortable when they are expected to comment on the issue. Only very close friends will talk candidly. Many whites have a tremendous feeling of guilt about the way the blacks were treated. Those who feel so typically have liberal views and support affirmative action. The others are not supportive of affirmative action because they believe that positive discrimination  is against equality. They believe that they should not be made to feel guilty for something that they personally have nothing to do with. Many in this group are very likely to feel that 'political correctness' is/has gone too far and  that O.J. got away with murder because of the color of his skin.

 

Like most issues each group is justified in the way they view race however if America has to come to terms with the issue of race there needs to be a open discussion amongst the citizens with civil society taking the lead. It is very important to keep the three groups, that perpetuate race for their own gains, out; politicians, media and clergy(radical). Interestingly the three in turn are largely interdependent on each other to create, disseminate and perpetuate the issue of race for their collective benefit.

Let's start with the politicians the wiliest of the three. No better than to discuss the two most prominent currently. It took McCain over two decades to realize that it was wrong to have voted against having a holiday for MLK's birthday. More interestingly he chose the site of MLK's assassination on its 40th anniversary to apologize. While It is admirable on his part to do so in front of a militant crowd(knowing fully well that no one there would actually consider voting for him in November) it was a brilliant move. He realized that with a black opponent race would invariably come up and if the democrats got the racist tag to stick on him (however remote) he was sunk as the independents would consider him to be the plague. Also the recent past has shown that a single word could cause doom - remember 'macaca' which was not even used for a black but sank George Allen. Another great move, McCain is currently touring inner cities with large black populations to endear himself to the independents who live in these cities. He knows he has little chance with the black vote considering that Hillary, the wife of the first 'black' president was swept aside. That brings us to Obama, whose use of race would bring a smile to Machiavelli's lips. He avoided the issue till it hit him and then in a brilliant move he turned what was essentially an issue of extremely poor judgement into a racial one. I was aghast when many blubbering liberals compared his speech to MLK's. Notwithstanding that he dragged his poor white grandma through the filth by comparing her prejudices  and stereotypes decades ago to the currently held venomous views of his pastor. But the mere fact that he spoke about race put him on hallowed ground (I found it hilarious that the next day on radio  he went ahead and stereotyped dear granny).  Interestingly, for all the rhetoric about the need for a discussion about race he has not said or proposed anything on the issue in the past few weeks. I guess now it suits him best for race to move back to the back burner. 

It is a good thing that most politicians don't talk of race - something Bill Clinton, Ferraro and others have learned to their peril - lets keep it that way.

(I admit that I am biased against politicians of all hues as I have yet to come across one that is not self serving. Even Gandhi had his detractors,such as Winston Churchill, who found many of his actions questionable - little surprise that the 'apostle of nonviolence' of our times never won the Nobel peace prize.)

Parts of the clergy have always been able to use race effectively for their benifit. From providing more than tacit approval of slavery in the past to venom spewing rhetoric in many current 'race based' churches.  Some radical pastors spew rhetoric that is lapped up by the the congregation that wants to believe in it. Few people would actually believe that the government would 'invent' AIDS to kill the blacks but when a man of Gods says it from the pulpit it somehow becomes palatable. These churches seem to justify their stance by portraying that this is how historically  'typical' black churches are, something very untrue. I may be wrong but I have not across any sermon or speech by MLK  that spews venom or riles racial passions. These churches are however useful places for people aspiring to create and build 'black' credentials. I initially wondered as to how an extremely intelligent & aware person like Obama would stay in a radical church for over two decades ( I am sure there is enough choice in Chicago). The answer is actually quite simple, he needed to create a political base amongst the inner city blacks in Chicago. To digress slightly. From a sociological point of view it is difficult to consider Obama as truly black. The first thing you are told in a sociology class on race is that it is not a biological(skin color) but a social construct. From that point Obama son of a post-colonial Kenyan and a white american cannot be considered as black. He is best categorized as a kenyan american with no black blood relatives (except his daughters through his wife who is black). Interestingly I have not come across any other recent immigrant from Africa who consider themselves or their children to be black americans - most are strong to point out your error when you mistake them for being one. 

Finally the media. Few things are more sensational than race and throwing it in surely spikes up viewership/readership. Again it is more favorable to viewership when an issue is to be made anti-black than anti-white. A stupid comment by Ferraro is splashed across the air waves as racist while Obama calling the rural folk in Pennsylvania(almost entirely white) xenophobic is simply the 'bitter truth'. Imagine the white media calling Obama's comment racist - it would make them racist. Also imagine what the media would have done if a white politicians had stated some 'bitter truths' about inner city blacks.  You have people on the media trying to tell us that the uproar against Jeremiah Wright is race driven and we should look at his speeches in context - I don't see hate and lies being justified in any context but it doesn't seem to stop the media. I would be very interested to know how many media persons actually apologized to the Duke lacrosse players (Ms. Nancy Grace are you listening?) I was watching CNN doing a program at a black University and every student interviewed was convinced that America is still a racist country and while interestingly none of them had faced racism personally in their young lives they based their views on incidents like Jena and Michael Vick(??). The racial hue for both issues was provided by the media. The primary contention at Jena was that a juvenile was being charged as an adult. Recently a group of girls in Florida are going to be tried as adults for a similar crime but I hear no protests, I guess because they are all of the same color. Michael Vick's case has more to do about his being a celebrity than his race - no one protested Paris Hilton getting harsher punishment than a regular person. In the US the words independent media sound more and more like an oxymoron. Amidst the shouts and rants from the left and the right the voice of middle mainstream america is rarely heard.

As I have stated in the beginning the way forward is to have an national discussion within civil society keeping the three self-serving groups on the fringes. In the process people will have to be pragmatic and realize that while it is important to learn from the past it is important to let go to move on. Race was a contradictory element even at the birth of the nation. The founding fathers fiercely supported the idea of life & liberty yet many owned slaves. Should we condemn them for being 'hypocrites' ? I look at race as an element in the process of sociocultural evolution and what the founding fathers did was realpolitik. While maintaining status quo in 1776 they paved the path for future civil rights reform.

To begin, everyone needs to realize that we do not live in a perfect world and as social animals humans are not comfortable with the unfamiliar. This leads to stereotypes that are often prejudicial which I am afraid will always remain. Personally I look at the humor in the stereotypes that people have of me. I remember when I was graduating from business school a classmate and good friend remarked that I could  always start a 7-eleven if I couldn't find a job. Although I did not quite understand* the remark then, I now get it and think that it was pretty witty, he continues to be a good friend. A large number of comedians of all hue would be out of business if stereotypes were not considered funny. What is very important is not to confuse prejudices and stereotypes with racism. 

The whites need to come out and take part in the dialogue without fear of being branded racist. Those who oppose it need to realize that affirmative action is not the only thing that is not merit based. 'Family action' (that primarily helps well connected whites like W) gets people into places they would not have been able to if they had a different name/family but I have heard few people complain.  Also while O.J. may have 'got away' the Innocence project shows that a disproportionately high number of  those wrongly convicted are black. 

Moving on is certainly more difficult for blacks as they have been the victims. They need to realize that 2008 America is very different than four decades ago but still not perfect and will  probably never be. In a country of over 300 million there are bound to be insensitive people who say and do stupid things, but they should not be used to paint the entire country with a single brush. There are a large number of whites who were never involved with slavery and many groups of later immigrants(Irish, Italians) were themselves subjected to prejudices and discrimination. With the three self serving groups ready to exploit sentiments it is difficult to evade the sense of persecution but black individuals in civil society need to take on these 'race mongers'. 

Today blacks have reached the highest levels and become leaders in every field (Oprah, Tiger, Neil Tyson amongst many) while another is poised to enter the White House. It is a great foundation to start a real discussion on race that will lead to building of strong permanent bridges.

* There are essentially two types of asian Indians in the US. Professionals like me and my wife who have immigrated from India. The other group (many running small businesses like motels and stores)  consists of people of indian origin who were living in Africa for generations and where thrown out in the post colonial era and their property stolen. This further proves that racial oppression is not the forte of whites but anyone in a position of power even the erstwhile oppressed themselves.