LJWorld.com

I have intended to write on this topic for some time but Mr. Pitt’s column today upped the priority.

We all know from our history that the notion of “guilt “runs throughout the fabric of our society with roots back to the initial colonists and before. As an aside, I do believe it may be declining with each new generation. That said it is still in my humble opinion widespread.

Think about it, why are we saddled with collective guilt about the environment, the economy, international relations, treatment of minorities and more?

Did you consciously do things to try to hurt the environment or have you, like many Americans been making efforts to reduce your “footprint” at ever increasing personal costs? Just what forest did you destroy? Do you really believe that we should all live as our grand parents did or should we use available resources to responsibly improve the human condition?

Have you actively supported actions by our government to hurt the weaker elements of the international community or have you contributed public and private resources to try to improve it? Do you believe we have economically subjucated the world as charged or have our collective efforts sought out and paid appropriately within the period for resources used? Do you believe we have repeatedly waged aggressive war or have we reluctantly responded to threats against ourselves and the weaker members of our community?

Have you been living way beyond your means, incurring debt you could not pay, or have you been using credit prudently in order to try to improve your family’s circumstances or meet unique obligations such as college? Did you have a clue that our financial elites were trafficking in high-risk securities with the blessing of our government elites? Just how did your personal debt, a dept you were servicing as required, drive the economic collapse in 2008?

Have you been actively working to suppress our minorities or have you been working slowly and incrementally to make our community more diverse? Do you buy in to Mr. Pitt’s assertion of our collective exploitations of gays? Are we somehow unique and evil in the way we treat others or does most of the rest of the word have a much less responsible record in dealing with human diversity?

I suspect most of you believe that you have been at least trying to improve things and believe you will continue to do so. You do not look upon yourself as an active participant in the exploitation of our planet or the people on it. So why are we barraged by media and political élites trying to portrait us as evil despoilers of almost everything? Could they be exploiting our historic propensity toward guilt and if so, why?

If one thinks back in history, political movements have used misrepresentation of ones neighbors to justify all sorts of undesirable goals to include mass murder and worse. Just think of Mr. Hitler. Could our political and social elites be using guilt for their own purposes? Are these groups selecting out elements of our society such as bankers, “tea baggers”, people who disagree with them, people of faith and others in order to accuse them of actions retrospectively determined by those élites to be evil. Are the standards being promulgated by the elites way too severe and ultimately self-serving? Are we really evil or is our collectively record superior to most countries, even if not as advanced as we might desire.

Is it not past time to apply a more appropriate standards to measure our past actions and acknowledge all of the good we have done while learning from those actions that in retrospect should have been avoided? Retrospectively blaming our whole society for things done mostly by our elites does not seem to be very productive in our efforts to improve that society in the future

Recently there were a series of letters to the editor addressing a performance of Vespers at KU. I saw the ad but did not attend. The letters concerned the content of the program. Apparently, a Michael Jackson song was included. Now the term Vespers pertains to the ecclesiastical and means a worship service held in the late afternoon or evening in many Western Christian churches. A Michael Jackson song would not seem to be included in that definition. It would likely not be considered religious by those of faith.

Now, I have nothing against Michael Jackson. However, I think there is a very real issue here - just who decides the meaning of words in our society? If I had attended, I would not have expected such a song. One of the writers apparently did not either. Two letter writers defended the performance because the song had merit. Great! However, if we are to arbitrarily redefine terms, how will we communicate effectively? Misunderstanding and potential conflict are a direct consequence of the arbitrary use of words.

Perhaps the writer who suggested a political intent could be correct. You would think that a university would understand the importance of language. The decision to include content inconsistent with the meaning of the term used to describe the event would suggest the writer might be correct.

Since moving here we have been very impressed with the commitment of the community to those less fortunate. There seems to be a group supporting just about any human need imaginable from battered women to our homeless. Our faith based community is very active as is our secular elements.

We as a community are again revisiting our support for the homeless. There has been consistent pressure to move our shelter from downtown. The shelter has responded by finding a location that is away from most commercial activity and about as removed as possible from residential locations. The move also enables additional services to include accommodating homeless families in a better setting.

Unfortunately, no location exists where there will not be some impact on somebody. The impact voiced about the chosen location raises issues as to transitory actions by the homeless themselves. I know the city is attempting to address panhandling in downtown. Good luck as most jurisdictions trying that have been defeated by the courts. Everyone pretty much has a right to go where they may and do as they will within the law. The new shelter location will only improve the situation for all of us.

The real question here is whether our community is willing to help the homeless. Admittedly, some of them are a long way from the warm and cuddly single moms with babies that we help with other programs. So is the nature of homelessness. However, it is just plain naive to assume if we do not help the homeless they will go away. Most of those receiving shelter are local. They will not go away; they will just find less regulated and more dispersed locations to occupy. In that circumstance, we will lose almost all possibility of helping them escape the trap they are in.

I defy anyone to find a better available location for a shelter. Lacking such a find the chosen location is about as good as we will get. We need to support the shelter as it seeks zoning approval by communicating to our commissioners our support for helping the homeless. Warm and Cuddly they are not; but they need our help just the same!