Ritual, Power, and Race — by Eric H.F. Law

In times of uncertainty, people instinctively move toward participating in rituals, many of which are religious.  The Civil Rights Movement of the 60s was a prime example, through which a group of historically powerless folks came together to confront the powerful.  In the face of uncertainty, they practiced rituals such as singing songs, linking arms and marching together.  These rituals gave them a strong sense a community to fight for justice and speak truth to the powerful.  While this movement was risky and dangerous, their faith together gave them the assurance and courage to persevere.    In this instance, race, religion and politics came together to achieve change

The most recent “reclaiming” of the civil rights movement, on the surface, had all the same elements – people’s right to assemble and to have freedom of speech.   They sang the same songs and they marched together in ritual very much resembling the original civil rights movement.  The major difference is the people who made up the movement.  When Tim Wise in his blog asked us to “Imagine if the Tea Party Was Black,” he was onto this major difference between this and the original civil rights movement.

“If the powerful employ protest to project their views…”

Freedom of speech and the right to assemble has always been guaranteed by the Constitution of the United States.  Most people think that the Bill of Rights was written for all people.  I agree, but I think they were written down most importantly for those who are powerless and part of a minority group in our society.  The powerful in any society already have the rights of assembly, to speak their mind, to bear arms, and to protect their privacy.  It is the powerless that need the guarantee of these rights so that they are not threatened or penalized for speaking out against the powerful or the majority.  Therefore, it has been the powerless in our society who employed these strategies to achieve change by assembling, speaking the truth, singing songs and marching together.  I am not saying that the powerful do not have the right of free-speech and assembly.  It just seems redundant because the powerful are already in control of the system that propagates their views and influences.   If the powerful employ protest and all the rituals that come with it to project their views, it would be equivalent to Pharaoh’s army assembling to sing “We Shall Overcome,” complaining about how they were being oppressed by the Israelites in the Exodus story.

This is why so many of us are puzzled by the so-called grass-roots movement of the Tea Party reclaiming the civil right movement.  Cynthia Holder Rich, in her article, tried to understand this movement by exploring whether the cause was the dismal state of the U.S. economy.  She was disappointed to find that “the Tea Party activists are, in the main, white, male, older, and economically stable.”  Perhaps, Cynthia was hoping that this was an economically oppressed group, which would therefore justify its anger and dissatisfaction with the system. Furthermore, she pointed out that the Tea Party had major financial backing.  From my observation, this group even has a whole network TV station behind it.  If one will recall, in the early days of this movement, the leaders were complaining that the other news organizations were not giving them enough coverage.  Then when the TV cameras captured the hateful signs in their rallies, the leaders complained that the coverage was not fair.  Any group that can tell TV news organizations what to cover, and when to provide coverage for its movement is not powerless at all.

“Why does a powerful group of people want to give the impression of powerlessness?”

So, the question I want to ask is:  why does a powerful group of people want to give the impression that they are powerless and oppressed while employing the traditional rituals and strategies used by the powerless to achieve change?   I am not denying that many people in this movement feel powerless at times.  At the very least, their choice of presidential candidate did not get elected.  They have the right to protest against the policies of this administration with which they disagree.  They have the right to campaign for the next round of elections.  But their sense of powerlessness should perhaps end there.    Take a look at what they are against besides the policies of this administration.   Take a look at what groups or individuals they are targeting.  They are using their claim to be powerless, from losing an election, to justify using their power and influence to propagate an agenda that is against other minority groups.

Claiming to be a victim to justify one’s action against another is dangerous. Persecuted in Europe, the Europeans arrived in America; feeling like victims, they justified taking the land from the Native Americans.  In the 1870s, in economic hard times, White workers felt powerless; through the Workingman’s Party, they instigated the Anti-Chinese Movement resulting in the Chinese Exclusion Act.  I am sure students of history can cite many more examples of this dangerous pattern in the history of the United States and other parts of the world.

How do leaders of faith communities speak the truth at times like these?  How do we learn to expose these destructive patterns that seem to be part of the DNA of this nation, especially when these destructive patterns are all tied up with race and religion?  More importantly, how do we confront these patterns and transform them, re-channeling the energy toward constructive rituals and actions that build rather than divide our community?

Let the conversation continue.

by Eric H.F. Law