This Film Is Not About Poverty!

When the film, Beasts of the Southern Wild, was released, I did not see it in the theaters. I read the reviews. It was described as surreal, a fantasy. It was said to present fortitude in the midst of “a desolate wilderness of poverty where a small community struggles to survive.” No, thanks.” Then I started reading things about it’s lead actress, the then 7-year-old, Quvenzhané Wallis. So, I purchased the DVD to support her, and the filmmakers. It had set on my shelf for months, but then I finally watched it. It is like being able to watch The Odyssey from its contemporary vantage point, or the telling of the fables that sustained people through centuries. Beasts of the Southern Wild provided an experience that has left me tingling inside, still.

The power of the visual image is in its potential to stir the human imagination to create a moment unlike the reality of seeing a picture and knowing that it is whatever medium it is; that someone framed it or not; that someone else hung it or propped it, or strung it together with other images in a magic of technology. This power is manifest in that moment when we suspend our disbelief, and give our humanity over to this interaction where the eye tells the brain to tell the heart to beat faster and for the innards to glow with each quickened breath.

Such was my experience viewing Beasts of the Southern Wild. I was given the gift of sustained joy that comes from the power of the visual image multiplied into a moving picture and combined with primordial storytelling. I think that Joseph Campbell would have loved this movie. Bruno Bettleheim would have loved this movie. The ancient Greeks and philosophers would have loved this movie. African griots would love this movie. And those of us like me, who have been longing, searching for a hero’s journey in which to not only imagine, but to also see myself within such a quest; to recognize that the quest is mine and ongoing, and to be heartened by this fact.

Stories of the African-American sojourn have been filmed many times. The images have been created and recreated to tell of noble and ignoble acts, suffering, triumph (even if historically short-lived), but never images of power and transformation. Never, until now, with the macroscopic images of a small child in Beasts of the Southern Wild. These are not images of segregated poverty nor of subjugation through racial divides. These images project a humanity as raw and joyful as life can be, should be.

The young filmmakers who made this work of art created a vision of the heroic that translates across communities. It translates to anywhere that people have made a conscious decision about how they will live, not how much money they will have. It is a vision of true survival, the survival of the human spirit as one among many spirits in the natural world.

If you look, truly look and release yourself to this film, what you will find is the imperative to face the question: what are the important things of life? Why survive? What must we treasure and protect and therefore nourish in our youth and the generations that follow them. Perhaps it is that we, African-Americans, will ever only sojourn in this country until we again take up these profound questions en masse. Perhaps it is the same with all of us here.

In the film, there are so many instances of sharing and concern for the welfare of others. And, there is a strong differentiation made between the sharing and concern that respects the individual’s autonomy and the sharing and concern that is imposed on the powerless. For the very first time, I feel that I have the beginnings of an inkling about why there are people of extremely limited material means who refuse charity. And for the very first time, I have been presented with images that recognize material limitations as the least of our concerns.

Survival is not the fare served up via reality TV. It is not making sure that you not only keep up, but have more than the “Joneses.” Survival resides in an active intellect and the creativity that accompanies it. Survival allows us to join with others, not to oppress them with our power and possessions. In survival we come to recognize ourselves. Survival insists on the lusty scream of joy. Beasts of the Southern Wild is a model, not a template, but a model of survival. It is wonderful!

Out! Out! Damned Fowl!

USDAgov flickr Upload on April 17, 2012

SumOfUs (sumofus.org) defines itself as a nonprofit movement of consumers, workers, and shareholders speaking with one voice to counterbalance the growing power of large corporations. Currently, the organization has 1,249,265 members worldwide. I’m one of them.

So, when I received their alarm! alarm! email over the current status of plans to revise U.S. poultry plant regulations and privatize plant inspections (against the warnings of the government’s independent oversight office), I sprang into action and called the White House comment line to voice my opposition to this plan and urge the President to reverse any such new regulations. I hung up the phone and was left with this nagging feeling that it was the waste of a dime.

I hold certain assumptions about how public food safety works in this country, but I have to admit that I haven’t the foggiest idea where my assumptions originated. What I do know is that they are far from the reality of industrialized food production and the government’s regulation of same. Perhaps it was the four basic food groups and later that ubiquitous food pyramid, both brought to you by the USDA. They have a strong presence in my memory. Perhaps it is this ethereal presence that made me feel there was a guardian over the safety of the food that I purchase. Perhaps, but at any rate, I set out to learn more about the regulation of food in America. Well, poultry processing anyway.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) was established in 1862 by President Lincoln. Subsequently, he termed it to be “rapidly commending itself to the great and vital interest it was created to advance. It is precisely the people's Department, in which they feel more directly concerned than in any other. I commend it to the continued attention and fostering care of Congress."

The “people’s Department,” such a safeguard makes sense to me given that food is of fundamental interest. In the ensuing years, the USDA was given cabinet status under President Cleveland and the American farmer was supported in the effort to produce a veritable cornucopia of foodstuff. Just looking at the photographs from the USDA website, even for someone familiar with “super” markets generates a profound appreciation. 

An interesting aside deals with the handling of U.S. patents. The U.S. Patent Act became a part of the Constitution in 1790. It assigned the granting and control of U.S. patents to the Department of State, namely the Secretary of State. (I have to wonder if this act would have been structured in this way if someone other than Thomas Jefferson had been the Secretary. But, he was and it was.)

Subsequently, The Patent Act of 1836 created a Patent Office. Although still a part of the Department of State, patents were placed under the control  and maintenance of a Commissioner, the first being Henry Leavitt Ellsworth. Here’s the interesting part: Ellsworth was a lawyer who apparently had a great deal of interest in agriculture. His position gave him access to members of Congress, and he used this access to collect and distribute new varieties of seeds and plants. These interactions obviously were held as valuable because in 1839, Congress established the Agricultural Division within the Patent Office and allotted a budget for "the collection of agricultural statistics and other agricultural purposes."

Okay, back to the future. Well, after one more aside that I certainly never heard in the media. Hard to believe that I would have ignored it. Did you know that in 1999, the USDA settled a class action lawsuit, the Pigford Case, alleging discrimination against 13,300 African-American farmers? The government's settlement of just over $1 billion was reportedly the largest civil rights claim to date. The 2008 Farm Bill provided for 70,000 additional farmers to submit their claims. In 2010, the federal government made another $1.2 billion settlement for outstanding claims and President Obama signed Public Law 111–291—December 8, 2010, which appropriated funds for the government’s settlement obligations. Farmers in Alabama, Mississippi, Arkansas and Georgia were among those affected by the settlement.

As this final appropriation bill was being completed, Republicans attacked Shirley Sherrod, claiming that she was biased in her performance as USDA Georgia State Director of Rural Development. That I read about. The allegations were false and the Administration was prematurely and incorrectly reactive. I now believe that this attack and the immediate firing of Sherrod are tied to the acknowledged discrimination against Black farmers and resentment toward the settlement. Republicans screamed Black racism against Whites in the USDA and embellished with charges of fraud on the part of Black farmers, and the President, possibly focused on getting the settlement funds appropriated, was caught by this subterfuge. The result being that Black farmers did not get the national attention that their ongoing cause deserved.

The report on the initial distribution of claim payments has yet to be completed. I’m very much looking forward to reading it. If you share that interest, reports are posted at the USDA Office of Inspector General website http://www.usda.gov/oig/foia.htm .

Okay. I’m back to the present vision of the future for real this time!

In April of this year, the USDA changed the rules for poultry processing. Perhaps, the changes were in response to sequestration budgetary pressures. Perhaps. USDA Secretary, Tom Vilsack says the regulations change is designed to “keep the poultry industry profitable and save the government money” (firing 75% of USDA poultry inspectors would reportedly save approximately $90 million over three years). Really? So money and money topped the “peoples Department” rationale list - even though what we’re talking about is our food!

What were the changes, you might well ask. Well, one huge concern is an increase in processing speeds at the same time as a decrease in the number of USDA inspectors.  Large poultry slaughterhouses are “factories” that process chickens through “kill lines,” currently at a regulated rate of 140 birds per minute, with each line overseen by four USDA inspectors. In September of 2014 when the new regulations take effect, each line will be allowed 175 chickens per minute and will be overseen by a single USDA inspector.

Additionally, the new regulations change the way that slaughtered chickens are sanitized. Instead of relying mainly on visual evidence of illness and contamination, the USDA will now allow that harmful pathogens be addressed by dipping all slaughtered chickens in water laced with chlorine and other antimicrobial chemicals. In other words, all of these chickens will have absorbed a chemical brine that also provides a little profit bonus by increasing the bird’s meat weight. Turkeys are also effected, but that’s yet another story!

Alternately, there are methods available for sanitizing poultry at this stage of the processing that do not include incorporating chemicals into the meat. Air chilling is one example. (Now I know why Whole Foods has that section labeled “air-chilled chicken!”) But, air chilling takes time and the four companies that account for nearly 60% of the chickens slaughtered in the U.S. (Tyson, Pilgrim’s Pride, Purdue and Sanderson) rely on keeping price points low and inventories high through increases in the speed rate for processing the birds.

I can’t imagine working on a “kill line.” For those who do, having your expected work output increased by 25% per minute, while you are welding extremely sharp utensils sounds like a very dangerous proposition to me. And what about air quality in these slaughterhouses? Just thinking about chlorine makes my allergies act up. But, that is not the concern of the USDA. That worry belongs to another protector of public safety, the Department of Labor Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA). Haven’t learned what they have to say yet.

Who regulates the regulators? Congressional committees don’t seem up to the task. Maybe that would be a good job for all those fired inspectors?

U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) Agricultural Marketing Service (AMS) Poultry Grader Guillermina Aguilar performs an Acceptable Quality Level (AQL) Check, Package Defect (P/D) Check, net weight of boxes, measures frozen temperatures and counts pieces per box of frozen chicken breasts in a Tyson Foods poultry processing plant in Berryville, Arkansas on March 25, 2010. Chickens, turkeys, ducks, geese, guineas, and pigeons are all eligible for grading and certification services provided by the USDA AMS Poultry Programs’ Grading Branch. These services are provided in accordance with Federal poultry grading.

If You Want Peace, Fight for Justice

My earliest memories are based in a childhood world bordered by the two blocks along Giles Avenue from 37th Street to 35th Street in Chicago, IL. My mother and father lived in the rented second floor of a regal brownstone mid-block north from 37th Street. But the true hub of this world was the home of my great-grandmother and great-aunts on the corner.

My great-grandfather had purchased the building in 1919. In the basement there was a “shop” down a short stairway and under a green awning. This was Melon King. Family myth holds that the watermelons sold, iced and by the slice, on enameled trays at tables surrounded by “ice cream parlor” chairs, were the result of cross-breeding on the melons that Samuel and his friend had developed on a farm outside Charleston, S.C. Each year, the crop was trucked to Chicago and people flocked from all over the city to savor the deep red flesh that was as sweet as cotton candy.

As a Winningham, I was the “rich kid” on the block. There are lots of stories about that, especially during the first twelve years of my life when my great-grandmother was alive. But it is only recently, that I have come to fully realize how rich was the life of this community.

At the opposite end of my world from Melon King was the “Armory.” As a child, I was always fascinated by this what seemed a truly huge building. Having no idea what an armory was, I always thought it was just the name of someplace big. I did not know that it was the Eighth Regiment Armory, built in 1914-1915, the first armory built in the United States for an African-American military regiment.

The Eighth Regiment evolved from a volunteer militia formed in 1871, the Hannibal Guard. During WWI, the Hannibal Guard, which had undergone a number of name changes to accommodate racist objections, became a division of the Illinois National Guard as part of the 370th U.S. Infantry, the “Fighting 8th.” In 1927, a victory monument was erected to honor the achievements of the Eighth Regiment. The impressive monument remains at 35th Street and King Drive.

 

 A fascinating history with so many untold layers, but what drew me to thoughts of the armory was a little historical tidbit, also with many, many untold layers.

On February 14, 1936, more than 800 delegates, representing 500 different organizations from across the nation, gathered in the Eighth Regiment Armory for 3 days of an event which inaugurated the National Negro Congress and was designed to build a national constituency to pressure the Roosevelt Administration for labor and civil rights.

I am so familiar with the street that I can see the crowd of people who gathered outside of the armory to listen to loudspeaker broadcasts of the sessions inside. The discussions concerned sharecroppers, interracial organizing, women and labor, the arts, business, and the war in Ethiopia.

The next year, several young leaders who had attended the Chicago event formed the Southern Negro Youth Congress (SNYC) in Richmond, Virginia (later moving their headquarters to Birmingham, Alabama). Over the next twelve years the organization membership grew to 11,000 at its peak. The SNYC worked to make southern blacks aware of their rights, especially regarding the vote, and of strategies for protest, including anti-lynching campaigns. They worked for the establishment of unions and fair employment practices. Notably, the SNYC was associated with two other organizations working on these issues, the Communist Party USA and the Congress of Industrial Organizations (CIO).

Southern Negro Youth Congress members meet with Idaho Senator Glen Taylor, 1947.

Sallye Bell Davis has been characterized as “the most active lay member” of the SNYC. I’m learning (surprise!) that the role of female activists is definitely underrepresented in the predominant histories of the political and labor movements of this period and through the 1950s.

So, if your mother was Sallye Bell Davis and you had developed in a household that included an independent and entrepreneurial father, Frank Davis, and the goings and comings of intellectuals and activists, and, communists, what kind of adult would you become? One answer is that you would have become an adult like Angela Davis.

On this past Saturday, the Crossroads Fund presented Bending the Arc: The Robert Howard Annual Symposium. Cheryl Corley moderated a panel representing the YMCA Youth Safety and Violence Prevention Initiative; Project Nia; Violence Interrupter; the Marquette University Peace Works Program; and, with special guest and commentator, Toni Preckwinkle and, Keynote Speaker, Angela Davis.

Angela Davis. I remember that she was added to the FBI’s Ten Most Wanted List in 1970. I remember thinking upon reading Soledad Brother that George Jackson had little of substance to say about her (but, maybe that was my own gender bias at the time). I remember that Nixon called her “a dangerous terrorist.” I remember she was acquitted of the legal charges against her. In retrospect, I think that Angela Davis became so publicized because she is a woman. She became the female face of the Black Panthers, and possibly, it was that she became the warning to black women that gender would not protect them. Black women knew that. Perhaps it was actually a warning to white feminists.

There were lots of warnings in those days, punctuated with object lessons like the events at Kent State, Jackson State, Grant Park, and the apartment of Fred Hampton. Okay, I won’t go there - back to the present:

I think that this symposium was extremely important, and extremely boring. It was important because the panel represented people and organizations extending their resources to find solutions and work to their effect. It was boring not because of what was said or how it was said, but because it is impossible to say everything that must be said in 2 hours. It was boring because I was antsy for the call to action.

The contemporary situation is well-defined. Violence has overrun urban communities. Education is plummeting to mediocracy at best and total ineffectiveness at worst. Anger poisons the young, and, the police. These things we know. But, what is to be done? Where is today’s National Congress? (Commemorating the March on Washington ain’t it.)

It feels to me that established leadership at the national level in every segment and sector of the society has carved out who will lead. Rather than be incorporated and supported, youth groups like the Dream Defenders are shunted to the side. Community activists are engaged as Democrats or Republicans, but not for the cause(s), but for partisan politics.

The Crossroads Fund symposium was in some ways a counter to these attitudes. There are young people stepping forward to enable a better world. Right here in Chicago, as the panelists showed, and across the nation. These are the voices I want, I need to hear. These are the voices I want to join.

So, what will it take? I’m feeling like there are at least 500 organizations around the nation today that if gathered in such a place as was the Eighth Regiment Armory, might just generate the ideas and the energy that would spark true change for the better.

Stay tuned.

What If Socrates Had WiFi?

Many, many, many years ago, I came across a book of essays entitled, “I Dissent” or maybe it was “We Dissent.” I can’t remember now. But, what I do remember is the effect that it had on me. It was the first time that I encountered a validity to the idea of challenging authority. The essays, or at least my internalization of them, presented the challenge of authority as one responsibility of the citizens of a democracy. In this context, the challenge is not a call to man the barracks; it is not to become oppositional simply for the sake of it; it is not to obstruct, as so many in our current Congress appear to believe. It is an entreaty to question and to participate in society with intellect, as well as heart.

I am of the opinion that without a knowledge of history, dissent risks advancing without the substance necessary to persuasion. My formal education in America, alas, did not provide me with a conversance of how human beings got from “there” to “here.” What it did give me was the desire to know. And in the 21st Century that’s all one needs. Information on any and everything is just a click away, waiting for our encounters to make some reasonable sense of it all. Plus, we have the wealth of services at public libraries. I want a bumper sticker that says “Love Your Librarian!”

Our government tells us the what of policies, rarely does it tell us the whys of policies, and never does it tell us the possible consequences of policies, potential or real. These things we must ferret out for ourselves - if we want to know.

Right now, I’m waiting to see if the G20 Summit gets around to discussing how the international community will deal with those wealthy individuals and corporations who have become such adept tax dodgers, and, hoping that we don’t punish one immoral act with another in the Middle East. In the meantime, I dissent.

An Ottoman Is Not A Cushioned Footstool: Part II

You know what the real problem is? The real problem is that people accept political maps as if the Earth came all marked up in lovely little lines of demarcation, with countries shaded in lovely pastels. Like so many things in contemporary society, political maps are a figment of our imagination. We made it up.

Well, the powers that be made them up, as an outcome of revolts, wars, and greed, mostly because they could. The majority of the land that we now call the Middle East was once long held by the Ottoman Empire.

What a difference a couple of centuries can make, heh?

We know that maintaining our modern day dependency on oil demands that we give attention to the Middle East (and anywhere else that oil has been found, but that’s another discussion). But the story of today’s Middle East begins with the slow erosion and then dissolution of the Ottoman Empire.

Whether it’s countries or individuals, it’s debt that’ll do ya - every time. By 1881, the Ottoman Empire carried a huge debt, mostly owed to Britain and France. The Sultan cozied up to Germany. The Deutshe Bank secured a concession to build the final leg of the Berlin to Baghdad railway, including subsurface mineral rights and the sole rights to any petroleum in the area, 20 kilometers to either side of the railway. A gigantic strategic coup for a Germany on the make!

This was bad news for Britain and France, and not particularly cheery news for Russia either. What happens next is very interesting and very convoluted, but the quicky version is that Germany was politically isolated; the established petroleum companies were co-opted; the establishment of a constitutional monarchy after the Young Turk revolutions of 1908 and 1909 gained France and Britain an opportunity for moral and political leadership in the corroding Ottoman Empire; and the end of World War I carved up Africa and the Middle East (including a very large protectorate named Iraq). It is a perspective enhancement to realize that the U.S. was not considered a Great Power in these days.

So what were American relations in the eastern hemisphere, with countries other than England and France, and the resulting policies that have evolved since 1776? Consider this, Morocco was the first nation to recognize the United States as a unified sovereign nation, doing so in 1777. Don’t hear much about Morocco, but they joined in a treaty of “peace and friendship” with the United States in 1787, which though renegotiated in 1836, remains in force - the longest unbroken treaty relationship in U.S. history.

Perhaps Morocco was moved to this alliance to solidify its autonomy in the emerging new world politics. It had maintained its sovereignty in spite of Portugal, Spain, and the Ottoman Empire. To have defeated the British certainly made our fledgling nation of interest. Wonder what the first trade exchanges were all about? Anyhoo ...

I suppose my main thesis here, is just to say that American citizens do not have enough information about the Middle East. And that’s putting it mildly! To quote Rick Ungar’s op-ed piece in Monday’s Forbes:

     “If you think our interests are best served by lobbing missiles into Syria or taking an even more active role in their civil war, then you should feel free to criticize this president for not acting in accordance with your wishes. If you believe that this is not a fight that we should engage in, call your Congressional Representatives and tell them to vote against supporting Obama’s war plans.

      But if you are forming these opinions based on the self-interest of the media or the politicians, you might wish to rethink your position based on reality as neither the media nor the politicians are fulfilling their responsibility to give you measured analysis designed to assist you in forming your own perspectives.”

Technology has given us an opportunity to reach beyond the trivia of our own media and the propaganda of our government. I heartily, again, encourage visits to http://syriadeeply.org. I’m hoping that anyone who has other sites or resources to recommend will post them here. Also, have a look at F. William Engdahl’s essay on oilgeopolitics.net (http://oilgeopolitics.net/History/Oil_and_the_Origins_of_World_W/oil_and_the_origins_of_world_w.HTM#_edn19). It is also a reminder that we don't know jack about the Balkans either!

In parting, one last image.

The Necessity of Work

My first job was as a clerk at our neighborhood variety store. I guess they’re called “convenience” stores now. It was my first year in high school. I walked in. Asked for the manager. Asked for a job. And started the next day! It lasted for a week, until the day that my mother demanded to know why I was getting home so late from school! Since you didn’t ignore my mother’s requests, I told her. At which point, she snatched me up and walked us right into that store and up to the manager: “Thank you, but she can’t work! She’s 12-years-old!”

Those were the days when, as a child, just because you wanted something didn’t mean that you would automatically get it. And having money was an ever-illusive dream. You could scheme and beg all you wanted, but there was nothing for it, except to find a job. But, first you had to wait to be 16. Even then, pickings were slim.

Ray Kroc was just beginning his march to dominate what became the fast food industry. At that time there were few opportunities for teenagers, especially girls, to get a job. For those who did staff the counters to make sure “you could have it your way,” there was also a bit of pride passed from older patrons to young workers. That little smile that said, “Good for you!”

More and more, I'm coming to think that those types of interactions cement the work ethic for young people on the verge of emerging into the world on their own. To be meaningfully employed, also gained the approval of the community. A state of grace that made you walk taller and feel you could take control of your own life. Important moments in the transition to adulthood. But, times change.

There is a discouraging trajectory that brings us to the current state of employment opportunities for teenagers. The U.S. Department of Labor Bureau of Labor Statistics reports that the unemployment rate for those 16 years and older in the year I was born was 3.9%. In 1983 it was 9.6%. I remember that recession. It was the first time that I gave thought to the racial disparities in unemployment percentages. That 9.6% was more like 15% in the Black community.  In 2012, the unemployment rate for those 16 years and older was 8.1%. These figures, of course, ebb and flow. Still, in August, 2013, for White teenagers and Black teenagers, the unemployment rates were 20% and 41.6%, respectively. There is little on the horizon that would indicate the likelihood of change for the better any time soon.

Jobs, at a time of unprecedented corporate growth and profits, should be plentiful. However, outsourcing has changed the structures of U.S. employment opportunity, notably in the replacement of teenagers by adults in the most visible service jobs. Looking at this chart from the New York Times, I remember seeing very few teenagers working at these “fast food venues” and stores compared to adults. It is a fact that has given spark to the recent demands for a raise in the minimum wage and working conditions among service workers. And that fight is well and good.

Source: http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2012/01/20/business/the-iphone-economy.html

But, what about the teens? How will we introduce them to the world of work and provide a balance, and maybe ballast, to their media-driven aspirations to live the lifestyles of the rich and famous?

I won’t subject you to my rant about the quality of U.S. education, but I would like to share a program that is looking to prepare urban youth for work in the 21st Century. You’ll find them at http://www.blue1647.com. Blue 1647 is a Tech + Entrepreneurship Incubator in Chicago, IL focusing on tech education, people development, and entrepreneurial events. Their company overview states that “Blue 1647 is a place where diverse people working for a better world can quickly access relationships and support to bring their ideas to life."

I think it is this potential that gives value to work, and how work spurs human development. It confirms one's ability to bring ideas to life.

Happy Labor Day!

An Ottoman Is Not A Cushioned Footstool Part I

Okay. I admit it: I haven’t an inkling of what’s going on in the Middle East! I don’t get it. You’d think I would. You’d think all Americans would given the huge influence the Middle East asserts within our foreign policy and important sectors of our economy. But, we don’t.

So. I decided that I’d better get better informed, and where else to begin than at the beginning. To my amazement, the U.S. Department of State maintains an Office of the Historian (Who knew!?!) and this office publishes A GUIDE TO THE UNITED STATES' HISTORY OF RECOGNITION, DIPLOMATIC, AND CONSULAR RELATIONS, BY COUNTRY, SINCE 1776. ( http://history.state.gov/countries )

The section of this guide on Syria reads like a pop fiction romance. Our relations have been on-again, off-again over and over and on-going - much like Syria itself. Once a part of the Ottoman empire, Syria was established after World War I as a French Mandate, and represented the largest Arab State, encompassing the sites of several ancient kingdoms and empires. It gained independence in 1946 and the people immediately found themselves immersed in a series of military coups and coup attempts from 1949 to 1971, including a union with Egypt from 1958 to 1961. In 1963, the Syrian government declared the country to be under Emergency Law, suspending most constitutional protections for its citizens. This situation remained until 2011, when civil war broke out.

An alternative government was established by the Syrian National Coalition, an opposition umbrella group. This coalition has been recognized as the “sole representative of the Syrian people” by several nations, including the United States, the United Kingdom and France. And it is with this recognition that we tethered ourselves to the fight over Syria.

The complexities are center stage in the Middle East because this is not the type of “civil war” that Americans would recognize. It is a regional struggle that crosses state boundaries. It is the war between Iran and Saudi Arabia. It is Israel and the U.S against Iran; the U.S. against Russia; and, the Sunni against the Shia. It is a mess! And imagine if you lived there!?! Over a million people have been killed and millions more displaced. Posted at http://syriadeeply.org is a map showing the locations of refugees, as well as a great deal of other information.

In March, 2013, it was announced that we were “training” secular Syrian fighters in Jordan. In June, the decision was made to arm them. At this point, tension escalated between the U.S. and Russia, because Russia is an ally of the current Syrian President Bashar Assad. However, it seems to me that the U.S. is more concerned with Assad’s stockpile of chemical weapons (believed to be one of the world’s largest).

The use of chemical weapons is abhorent. But, I don’t think that the focus of our actions is rooted in morality. I think that it is a case of self-protection. The fear is that Islamic extremists would gain access to the Syrian stockpile of chemical weapons. Not a frivolous concern.

However, what concerns me the most is my relationship as an American citizen to the actions of the American government. Reading over the historical notes, trying to comprehend so much truly “foreign” information, I have to accept that our international policy has evolved from the Imperialist Model. The technological advances of the early 20th Century fostered a demand for oil and the scramble was on.

All of us, each voting and especially non-voting American citizen, have been complicit in achieving not diplomacy, but control in the Middle East and therefore control of oil. Since the 70s, when the OPEC oil embargo caused lines at the pumps and oil companies responded to price controls by creating artificial scarcity, the oil companies have reaped nearly 40 years of unquestioned, tremendous profit. At the same time, the citizens of the United States have internalized the demonization of those who live on top of the planet’s oil reserves.

The question we should all be asking ourselves is not should we punish the use of chemical weapons in Syria. The question is what then? What happens next? What do we want our relationship to be with the other nations of the world? It’s time, past time, that we demanded a systemic change that moves us from propaganda and politics to a reality more appropriate to the 21st Century, at home and abroad.

What would that take, to make such a demand? Is a change of this magnitude even possible? Do enough of us even think it’s worth it?