This past week, a powerful speaker named Van Jones spoke at the Unitarian Universalist General Assembly. He spoke about politics, the economy, the environment, and family values. But his speech was about us.
A few thoughts and a link to the video below the fold.
Yes, he spoke to a gathering of Unitarian Universalists, but he may as well have been addressing Netroots Nation.
For the past few days, there has been diary after diary focusing on righteous anger and mistrust; on protest and opposition. Without quoting anyone in particular, I'll just remind you that many of us have been feeling disillusioned, angry, sad, anxious, and, yes, even betrayed. And those feelings have arisen not one month after we won the battle we have been fighting for months and months. Our choice for the Democratic nominee for President of the United States won the achingly and wearingly long primary contest. And, by all polls and accounts, it looks like he will have a virtual cakewalk to the White House as long as our support continues at the level it has been for the last year and a half.
Our choice won. After almost 8 years of disillusionment, anger, sadness, anxiety, and, yes, even betrayal. After almost 8 years of loss after loss after loss--even when we thought we had won (2006). And here we are, still feeling the same feelings.
Could it be that we don't know how to win?
Could it be that we don't know how to be in power?
Could it be that we are so accustomed to identifying ourselves as the people who are against those in power that we don't know how to have power?
Could it be that we are anxious about the possibility that we will be in charge, and thus responsible?
I wonder.
Van Jones spoke about being stuck in the David and Goliath story. We, of course, are David--pure, good, willing to fight for what's right against terrible odds, all the while never losing faith that a miracle was possible. But, as Jones pointed out, the problem with that story is that in order for it to work, we have to have an enemy. Someone has to be Goliath. Someone has to be "other."
Here's a paragraph from the summary of his speech:
He spoke about the role and responsibilities of Unitarian Universalists now that "it looks like change is about to break out." He credited the resolve and persistence of Unitarian Universalists for the possibility of a "new era in American politics," and also reported bad news: "Y'all are about to mess up and be successful." Protest and critique of injustice is about to be replaced by a new challenge: "Prepare to govern." Whichever candidate one supports, there will be change, but some will be asking, "Can those people govern?"
The video is here: http://uua.org/... Scroll down the page (UUs never make anything easy) to Saturday, June 28, "4061 Ware Lecture delivered by Van Jones (Slides take up the first bit of the video; for President Sinkford's introduction, forward to 14:31; for the Ware Lecture, forward to 18:34.)" And it's long. Yeah well. It's worth it.
UPDATE: Many thanks to RevRandy for providing direct links to the video. Makes it much easier to find!