Column: Thoughts from Dr. Joe: Recent events in our country paint a dismal picture of who we’re becoming
It’s time to look back over the day, the week, the month, the year, and try to figure out what we’ve become. Sorting through what we’ve done and what we need to do gives us a clue as to who we are and who we are becoming. And, if we were ever a shining city on a hill — that light has dimmed, if not gone extinct.
On Memorial Day I’m going to have a difficult time attempting to find solace with the dead. In light of recent events, which paints a dismal picture of who we’re becoming, how do we keep faith with the dead when we read their names inscribed on the gazebo wall in La Cañada?
Before they made that final assault, their rationale would have been that it was for freedom. “Freedom” might just be the most important word in the world, and if there is anything that defines freedom, it is our 1st Amendment right toward freedom of expression. Yet at University of Notre Dame, during graduation, students turned their back on the commencement speaker and walked out. Is this who we are becoming? Are only those who validate our personal perspectives worth listening to? If we don’t believe in freedom of expression for people we disagree with, then we don’t believe in it at all. It was shameful. Disrespectful. There’s much more to an education than a defined curriculum.
We are tolerant not because we claim tolerance, but because we practice it. Is tolerance only inclusive for those who are aligned with our personal ideology? Is this what we are becoming?
In my novel, “Girl with the Purple Ribbon,” character Ofa Hawkins debates a North Vietnamese colonel regarding her 1st Amendment right to speak against the Vietnam War, even if by doing so she abets the enemy. “In America, we are free to express ourselves even if that expression causes us to lose the war,” she asserts. “When freedom of expression becomes subjective, that’s when we will become totalitarian,” she expressed.
Is that what we are becoming? In the “Republic,” Plato implies that totalitarianism does not evolve from government; it evolves from the people. Ronald Reagan said, “Freedom is not more than one generation away from extinction.”
Last week in Washington, D.C., the goons on Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s detachment assaulted protesters, and because of diplomatic immunity, they got away with it. This happened on our soil, they trampled on our flag, defiled our 1st Amendment right, and assaulted our citizens. They brought their Turkish oppression and unleashed it in the United States of America. I’ve never been a peaceful person and when I see this, I know I never will be.
How do we bear true allegiance to the fallen in light of recent events? It’s a rhetorical question, and there is no answer.
In the movie, “Saving Private Ryan,” young Private Ryan, played by Matt Damon was given a challenge by Capt. Miller (Tom Hanks). Before Miller succumbed from his wounds, he said to Ryan, “Earn this — earn it!” And the millions of soldiers who lie in gardens of stone, underneath the sea, or who went missing will have the same admonition on Memorial Day.
But again and again, we avoid the deep thoughts. We ignore the present as long as it doesn’t affect us. But we’ll be remembered by the things we do and the things we fail to do.
JOE PUGLIA is a practicing counselor, a retired professor of education and a former officer in the Marines. Reach him at doctorjoe@ymail.com. Visit his website at doctorjoe.us.
