Holder, the New York Post and Us

Attorney General Eric Holder's comments earlier this week calling Americans "cowards" when it comes to conversations about race and the New York Post's cartoon depicting a bleeding wild looking monkey representing the stimulus package being shot dead by white policeman both evoked nasty attacks of racism. While Holder's statement and the NY Post cartoon happened independently it may well be that they are indeed related to this cultural moment as we ought not to be surprised that in response to Barack Obama becoming the first African American President there would be increasingly conscious and unconscious eruptions around the issue of race.

For Obama's election represents a powerful next stage in our country's dealing with race and as it is when entering any new psycho-social and psycho-spiritual stage such development unleashes deep fears of boundaries coming down and loss of identity and equally profound hopes for even greater healing of prejudice and new self and communal definitions.

Holder's comment, made in a setting celebrating Black History month, was a very inelegant expression of the hope for greater racial justice associated with Obama's election. However, calling Americans cowards regarding race after the way the country dealt with Obama's campaign and election -- from Americans understanding Obama's sophisticated speech on race in relation to Rev. Wright to completely making a lie of the dreaded Bradley effect -- is simply wrong and rather than helping and encouraging Americans to build upon this historic moment Holder simply diminished and dissed Americans. This is precisely the opposite of the way a leader ought to behave. Holder actually needed to needed to say something like, "given the courage (the very opposite of cowardice) that Americans have shown in confronting race we now, all of us, need to continue to address with equal courage the serious prejudice and injustices that still exist."

In a similar vein, the NY Post cartoon was a not a fully conscious expression of the fear and anxiety surrounding this new stage in our country's dealing with race and the fact that staff people like the associate editor of the Post herself expressed discomfort with the cartoon indicates that at the very least printing the cartoon was very very poor judgment. This is precisely the opposite of the way a responsible newspaper ought to operate. Creating the cartoon may well have simply been a clever connecting of the crazy Connecticut monkey and the sense that the stimulus plan was crazy out of control but as soon as someone pointed out the racist stereotypes and images in which the cartoon traded and which it evoked, even if completely unintended, the Post should have nixed it.

Now here is the key. What we all got in response to these two unfortunate incidents was far more destructive and worthy of correcting than either of the two incidents themselves. All we heard were the predictable reactions from our cultural polarizers -- people who see the world through the prism of victim and victimizer, who make their living and draw attention by inflaming racial hostility, and who rather than try to bring understanding always seem to offer the most extreme and nasty interpretations of events. And so Holder is attacked for being an angry black racist and the Post is accused of being a nasty racist tabloid. And of course the media loves the entertainment value of the Pat Buchanans vs. Al Sharptons show with the result that hope is diminished and fear heightened.

What we really need and what would have been far more interesting is for those who found Holder's remarks offensive and who reflexively went on the attack to have reflected about the way the cartoon hurt people and for those who found the cartoon offensive and who reflexively went on the attack to have reflected about the way Holden's comments offended people. Then we would have had a very different conversation.

What we need is to bring a different sort of wisdom to bear on judging these two events. Rather than blame and inflame we need to try to explain ourselves, understand each other, and invite accountability. Imagine a critique of both incidents that arose not from a desire to condemn and destroy but that actually did what every wisdom tradition teaches: gave the benefit of the doubt, located the partial truth in the opinion with which one disagreed, and was compassionate.

To Holder, the first African American Attorney General under the first African American President we need to explain how his remarks were hurtful. And at the same time we need to try to understand the level of pain from prejudice and inequality that still exists even for someone as accomplished and successful as Holder that emerges in his lashing out and calling Americans cowards when speaking about race. Yes, we need to make clear to Holder that calling Americans cowards undermines his very goal of helping us to become a more just society. But, rather than simply attack him, we should trust what has been accomplished in race relations and then realize that if we find ourselves being very angry or very defensive about his remarks then it just may be there is more that deep down we know needs to be done in our hearts and in this country that Holder, in admittedly an inappropriate way, has pricked in us.

To the Post, we need to explain that whether intended or not the cartoon was very hurtful, that there are images that carry with them cruel histories and that despite the great advances we have made these images still sting and that if we want to live in a decent society we ought to at least try to avoid hurting fellow citizens. And those who are hurt need to try to understand the genuine fear of change that is implied in the reality that Obama described in his Inauguration Address, "that it is time for the lines between tribes to dissolve." This is a profound change in the very world we live in and the way to mitigate fear of change is not to call people racists but to imagine the best in people -- including this cartoonist -- and explain what hurts in a way that ratchets down the tension and shares our humanness.

Then perhaps we can ask each side to hold itself accountable. Imagine Holden saying without the fear of being destroyed or picked apart, "I am sorry for speaking the way I did. I ought not to have called Americans cowards. It was a mistake. This is a great country and we collectively have accomplished so much and I know we do have the courage to accomplish more. "

And imagine the NY Post saying without it being attacked or picked apart, "We apologize for publishing the cartoon. While we did not intend it to trade on racist images our intention is not sufficient and it may well have been that with all the conversations and unprecedented events surrounding race these days these images reflecting our fears and anxieties unconsciously emerged. The very fact the cartoon was interpreted this way and hurt so many people means it was wrong and neither worthy of our paper nor commensurate with our job as journalists. So, we are sorry. It was a mistake."

Handled this way -- without the toxicity of our polarizers -- the fears unleashed by the reality that the lines of our tribes are indeed dissolving each day would be lessened and the hopes evoked by the lines of tribes indeed dissolving each day would be nurtured.