The Principles For Which We Fight (From the Book United We Stand, Free Ebook Download)
The Principles For Which We Fight
Featured essay from the book United We Stand: Essays On Protest And Resistance (FREE EBOOK DOWNLOAD)
"The Principles For Which We Fight" by Dr. Yohuru Williams was originally published as part of a collection of essays in the book, United We Stand: Essays On Protest And Resistance (Garn 2017). We are featuring select essays from the book and offering the entire collection as a FREE EBOOK DOWNLOAD. Notable contributions from George Lakoff, Denny Taylor, Yohuru Williams, Jonothan Foley, Charlene Smith, Paul Thomas, Steven Singer, Russ Walsh, Steve Nelson, Anne Haas Dyson, David Joseph Kolb, more. Download United We Stand: Essays On Protest And Resistance ebook for free (EPUB FORMAT). The paperback book is available on Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and other select retailers.
By Dr. Yohuru Williams
Dr. Yohuru Williams is an Education activist and founding director of the Racial Justice Initiative at the University of St. Thomas and Author of Black Politics/White Power: Civil Rights Black Power and Black Panthers in New Haven; Teaching U.S. History Beyond the Textbook: Six Investigative Strategies, Grades 5-12
“Is this for real?” a friend texted me the day after the 2016 election. “Is Donald Trump really the president? What can we do?” Even now, almost four months removed from the contest, I can’t remember how I responded but I will never forget the feeling. For scores of people both in the United States and across the globe, it was a destabilizing moment wrought with fear and uncertainty. Complicated by electoral calculus, it was at once both like and different from the contested election of 2000 in which Al Gore won the popular vote but George Bush won in the Electoral College. Like many others, I was disappointed in the outcome. Few questioned the fitness of the president-elect to serve. At the time, there were no sustained demonstrations in the streets catalyzed by the candidate’s campaign rhetoric of hate and division, no shadowy ties with Russia suggesting a stolen election, and no hastily fashioned Muslim ban solidifying the clear and present danger posed by a leader uninformed by constitutional practice as well as democratic principle.
It was a moment further complicated by the erosion of trust in some of the most important safeguards of American democracy including the media and public schools; both came under assault in the early days of the Trump Administration. Every time I open my Internet browser or turn on the news I am reminded of the advice proffered at the opening of Roald Dahl’s, Twilight Zone inspired television series Tales of the Unexpected. “A wise man,” the narrator cautioned with each show, “only believes in lies, trusts in the absurd, and learns to expect the unexpected.” We now live in a time when facts no longer matter and lies become matter of fact. This is our new realty ensured by the personality and style of the man at the center of this political maelstrom.
It would perhaps be easier to tolerate if there were something remotely presidential about Trump, but his whole biography, not to mention his rhetoric and behavior on the campaign trail contribute to the profound sense that he is not. It was easy early on to scoff at the cartoonish exaggerations of the man known as “The Donald” who also brought us The Art of the Deal, the failed XFL and the reality show The Apprentice. We also have to acknowledge that before he claimed the Republican nomination Trump’s antics were at least somewhat amusing. He turned the Republican political debates into a reality show that while distressing was hard to turn off.
New Jersey Star Ledger editorial cartoonist Drew Sheneman perhaps expressed it best after a particularly embarrassing, if entertaining, Trump debate performance, in July of 2015. “A year from now we'll look back at the past week as the instance the wheels started to come off the Trump express.” He forecast, “Running down war heroes and handing out senatorial cell phone numbers is just the beginning. Donald Trump will eventually implode and if the past few weeks are any indication, it will be in spectacular fashion.” Admitting that he had not been closely following the Republican debates, Sheneman, nevertheless announced his intention to continue to “tune in to watch Trump and his cotton-candy clown, low grade-school caliber insults at other prospective leaders of the free world.” It was outrageous with just enough danger to compel our attention like passengers on a roller coaster or adolescent visitors to a haunted house where speed and darkness blunt the impulse to flee out of the relative security we feel in spite of the carefully curated illusions, climbs and dips, with men in masks to assist our suspension of disbelief.
But the implosion that Sheneman and scores of others predicted never materialized. Now nearly a year and half later we all find ourselves uncomfortably suspended in the dark and disquieting confines of the ride with only a faint notion of how long it will actually last. The former freak show having lost its entertainment value primarily because the implosion that still seems inevitable – given the cavalcade of scandals and foreign intrigue – could have a devastating impact both at home and abroad.
In the United States, the damage has been most acute to our core American values, those fundamental beliefs that inform our civil theology and have been the hallmark of what it means to be an American. In its clear assault and repudiation of the essence of these values, Trumpism has placed our democracy in real jeopardy. Ironically in his inaugural address, Trump sought to channel those principles and values in a stirring rhetoric fundamentally at odds with reality of his proposed agenda. He recommended for instance that, “We must speak our minds openly, debate our disagreements honestly, but always pursue solidarity”. Yet his relationship with the media and political opponents has been a study in deception and suppression.
Trump’s address also articulated conflicting foreign policy goals that at once pledged restraint and at the same time committed the US to leadership in a worldwide campaign against “Islamic” Terrorism. As he explained, “We do not seek to impose our way of life on anyone, but rather to let it shine as an example for everyone to follow.” He continued, “We will reinforce old alliances and form new ones – and unite the civilized world against Radical Islamic Terrorism, which we will eradicate completely from the face of the Earth.”
It seems inconceivable that neither Trump nor his speechwriters appreciated the problematic nature of this dictum with its troubling claim of uniting the “civilized world” in what would amount to a war against Islam. If the speech left nothing to the imagination, the administration’s ill-conceived Muslim Travel Ban that followed shortly thereafter left little to doubt.
In this case and so many others, Trumpism represents an abandonment of the most basic principles of truth, fairness, and equality so eloquently expressed by countless Americans from Thomas Jefferson to Alice Paul and Martin Luther King, Jr. over the course of the history of the Republic. The constellation of ideas expressed in the foundational documents of this nation and consecrated not only by the blood of those who served in foreign wars, but also by those who have been martyred for the extension, advocacy, and preservation of American democracy at home. This includes not only the stalwart women and men who led the campaign to abolish slavery but the dedicated activists who worked to secure women’s suffrage and civil rights. Often forgotten, it also includes efforts to insure the fair and equitable treatment of immigrants from a wide spectrum of people seeking economic opportunity to those in search of political asylum. Those seeking pathways to ensure the preservation of American core values at this time act in the best tradition of such freedom fighters.
What exactly informs our values? The National Council for the Social Studies produced a useful chart1 for elementary students that present them in a clear and concise fashion, part of our continuing effort to becoming what the founders called “a more perfect union.” They include a respect for Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness but much more, including Truth.
In the “era” of Trump the insistence on “Truth”, the idea that “the government and citizens should not lie” may prove the most significant. It is a call to action rooted in our need to speak truth to power in an effort to preserve the ideals that have been essential to our tradition of open and transparent government and freedom of speech. At a time when conversations about “Alt News” and “Alt Facts” have penetrated the national debate and the head of state has denounced the free press, it is not only the insistence on but also the search for truth that should guide our work and our activism. Likewise, we should reject a definition of Patriotism predicated on the crude jingoism of a bygone era. Instead we should embrace what the council powerfully describes as a “devotion to our country and the core democratic values in word and deed.”
The entire list is reproduced below. They are transparent enough for everyone to understand, share and succinctly restate. They are also convenient benchmarks for measuring the ways in which Trumpism betrayed them. Most importantly, these are principles around which we must organize and fight.
Life: Each citizen has the right to the protection of his or her life.
Liberty: Liberty includes the freedom to believe what you want, freedom to choose your own friends, and to have your own ideas and opinions, to express your ideas in public, the right for people to meet in groups, the right to have any lawful job or business.
The Pursuit of Happiness: Each citizen can find happiness in their own way, so long as they do not step on the rights of others.
Justice: All people should be treated fairly in getting advantages and disadvantages of our country. No group or person should be favored.
Common Good: Citizens should work together for the good of all. The government should make laws that are good for everyone.
Equality: Everyone should get the same treatment regardless of where their parents or grandparents were born, race, religion or how much money you have. Citizens all have political, social and economic equality.
Truth: The government and citizens should not lie.
Diversity: Differences in language, dress, food, where parents or grandparents were born, race, and religion are not only allowed but accepted as important.
Popular Sovereignty: The power of the government comes from the people.
Patriotism: A devotion to our country and the core democratic values in word and deed.
United We Stand: Essays on Protest and Resistance Free eBook Download
The following chapter excerpt was featured in a collection of essays originally published in 2017 in United We Stand: Essays On Protest And Resistance. Now available as a free ebook download (EPUB FORMAT). Notable contributions from George Lakoff, Denny Taylor, Yohuru Williams, Jonothan Foley, Charlene Smith, Paul Thomas, Steven Singer, Russ Walsh, Steve Nelson, Anne Haas Dyson, David Joseph Kolb, more. The paperback book is available on Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and other select retailers.