On the heels of the Sikh Temple shooting in Wisconsin, the U.S. Department of Education is hosting its third annual Federal Partners in Bullying Prevention Summit this week, which is fortuitously timed and desperately needed. Without question, the alleged Sikh temple shooter, Wade Michael Page, a self-proclaimed skinhead, neo-Nazi and white supremacist music bandleader, had been trying to bully and intimidate any non-white American into feeling unwelcome, un-American and unsafe. And we know that Page is not alone in his fear-inducing, hate-mongering bullying practices. In fact, there are hundreds of thousands of hate crimes occurring every year in America.
This violent bullying isn't just affecting turban-wearing Sikh Americans; it is affecting Muslim Americans too, as a mosque was torched in Missouri this week. And we know from the countless stories of many marginalized American communities -- from LGBT communities to Latino immigrants -- that bullying is practiced, promulgated and promoted in America. Why are we so good at it?
First, abuse is cyclical. We pass it on. When we are being abused -- by a structurally violent socio-economic system or a by an abusive parent, boss or partners -- we pass that abuse along to others. There is a reason why the adage, one variation of which has been attributed to Gandhi, notes that, "The greatness of a nation and its moral progress can be judged by the way its animals are treated." It's trickle-down economics' violent cousin.
In America where income inequality -- a measure of an abusive economic system -- is highest among rich world countries, you find that this abuse is passed along to fellow Americans, either internally or externally. Because of America's great gap between its rich and poor, we also have the rich world's highest rates of internal abuse -- e.g. obesity, drug addiction, mental illness, and suicide -- but also the highest rates of external abuse, that of homicide, violent crime, and incarceration.
That Wade Michael Page was a neo-Nazi extremist and white supremacist -- who clearly hadn't healed from 9/11 and was possibly struggling with post-traumatic stress disorder from 9/11 and from his time in the Army -- is indicative of how abuse gets passed on to others.
Second, people like to have someone below them, someone worse off, someone less popular, either in a befriended or bullied position. Everyone who ever attended high school can attest to this truism. This author certainly can, having attended Central Christian High School, a small Mennonite school in Kidron, Ohio, where even he -- as one of the tallest kids in the school -- can remember getting bullied by three upperclassmen.
This bully mentality plays out in economic systems as well, where Americans consistently choose economic policies that ensure the "least of these" stay as the least and a rung below on the economic ladder. However poor the voter, and no reminder is needed regarding the record rates of poverty and inequality in this country, it is a salve to the economically abused to have someone even more abused below them.
Third, we watch our government leaders consistently bully other countries. This is what America's economic sanctioning, "shock and awe" foreign policy and saber-rattling rhetoric is all about. This is what America does well, and has done, to Iran, Iraq, Cuba, China, and the list goes on. These policy approaches are rarely effective in reducing or preventing violence and very effective in creating more extreme behaviors of those bullied, generating more enemies in response, and escalating tensions and, ultimately, the likelihood of deadly violence. Congressional sanctions on Iran, for example, are increasing the likelihood of war, not decreasing it. But that is the intention of many sanctions, to force a country into a corner and provoke a violent response. It works with animals and it works with humans. And how convenient: once the dog, having been cornered into a defensive position, bites back, then it creates a justifiable retaliation by those who cornered it.
How to stop these trends? Beyond ensuring that our economic systems are less abusive, that we're providing sufficient care for veterans with post-traumatic stress disorder, and that we're helping to integrate the isolated within our society (from James Holmes to Wade Michael Page), we must make anti-bullying a mainstream message, from our high school hallways to our foreign policy practices. We must build on efforts like U.S. Congressman Honda's recently founded Congressional Anti-Bullying Caucus. And we must be intentional about building social capital in our communities as if our lives depended on it -- because they do.
Michael Shank is an adjunct professor at George Mason University's School for Conflict Analysis and Resolution, serves on the board of the National Peace Academy, and is an associate at the Global Partnership for the Prevention of Armed Conflict.
Follow Michael Shank on Twitter: www.twitter.com/Michael_Shank
Comparing international politics to school yard bullying is disingenuous.
You are spot on about our nation’s history of bullying other nations. It is a very old American trait dating back to the age of colonization and our treatment of Native Nations. This history in part explains why some Americans want the biggest badest military than what we have even today. They know the bully is going to be faced by its united victims one day.
Spot on about how economically depressed people cheer themselves by bullying those they perceive as even worse off.
We face a hard road to maturity still today, in our still young nation. With my own Mennonite background, I know who I trust to help us as we mature into the nation our founding (including many Mennonite) fathers dreamed for us to be. It will happen one day. The dialogue is beginning; you did a great job, now we simply need to keep it going as the bullies howl the passing of their day.
Here I was thinking that real evil exists in the world. Who knew all we had to do was mind our own business and quit bullying and the world could be a peace right now. It's all so clear I can't believe I didn't see it before.
The Muslims only started hating Jews when the US has put economic sanctions on Iran, right? All we have to do is lift those sanctions and stop giving money to Israel and the world would be at peace and oil would go back to $10 per barrel.
All we have to do is tax all income at 100% and redistribute it equally among everyone. That will cure the income gap and society will instantly be rid of addiction, obesity and mental health problems. Why didn't I think of that?
And please, you act as if somehow Muslims are naturally the most hostile people towards Jews. Are you really that ignorant of history, both modern and recent. The Holocaust ended 67 years ago, in the heart of Christian Europe, not the Islamic World. The Holocaust was the culmination of neary 2000 years of Christian anti-Semitism, mostly within Europe, that lead to numerous slaughters and widespread persecution of Jews long before the Holcaust.
The Jews were much better off in the Islamic World for most of the past 1400 years!
Iran is a difficult case, however; it is in our interest that they do not enrich plutonium to weapons-grade. That they enrich to a lower grade is acceptable to the US, but Netanyahu has decided that it is no longer acceptable to him (an aggressive change in position from considering 5% enrichment acceptable). Our dangerously close ties to Israel have us putting their interests (Netanyahu wants a war with Iran) over our own (a war in that region would be disastrous for US interests, as cited by pretty much every agency we have looking into it.)
The people who were in NYC when that awful thing happened were horrified, saddened, grieving, devastated, but they weren't hateful or vengeful. The actual event was way too big for that kind of petty emotion. Nobody who was there had time for hatred. Everyone there was an open wound, looking for some kind of reassurance and not caring where that hand on the shoulder came from, white, black, Christian, Jew, Muslim.
No. He may have been psychologically damaged by being in combat. That's possible. He may have been corrupted by contact there with the advocates of hatred. That's possible as well. But he didn't have an unhealed wound from 9/11. I don't buy that for even a second.