Recreational Cruelty & The Right To Obey

Editor’s Note: The image above is provided by Jack Kirby.

There’s a lot to process, y’all. Republican party leadership has spoken publicly of “the enemy from within” and assured us that our military will be deployed against those who decline to comply with their brutal fantasy about themselves and others and God. Wheaton College alum, Russ Vought, has declared his strategy of unending traumatization for folks entrusted with public safety who oppose his ongoing project. It’s all wild and more than a little dispiriting. I wish to weigh in, but so much of what I imagine might be helpful to say I’ve already said in We Become What We Normalize and elsewhere.

Nevertheless, there are so many ways to love God. Amplify the oracle always. I’m here to amplify a couple.

Here in Nashville, we have the always-amazing Betsy Phillips with a little something to offend almost everyone: “Even if I’m frustrated by my choices, at least I still have the choices. And if we want it to stay that way, we have to get out there and vote for the lesser of two evils.”

Betsy’s out here speaking for herself. Want to know who she voted for? She’ll tell you. Cast your eyes upon Jesus and also this. 

Also here in Nashville we have my friend and colleague Donovan McAbee with whom I share a hallway at our place of employment. As a hands-on dad, a lifelong educator, a poet, and an occasional pastor, he’s a busy man. This has me all the more moved that he decided to speak up publicly on the challenges and the choices we have before us. He gets real specific. He refers to the Covenant shooting. He names elected officials right here in Tennessee whose recreational cruelty we are both compelled to fund. He also speaks of bearing witness:

I intend to bear witness against hate, against divisive and unnecessary fear, against race-baiting and division. I intend to bear witness for the hope that we can do better as a nation, that we can move forward to acknowledge the deep wounds of the violence of our past, to reckon with our ghosts, and to choose together a better path forward…When we act as if our bearing witness matters, it does.

Hear more from Donovan here.

Donovan risks a lot by speaking up. I wish some or all of the men in the photo above could find within themselves the courage to also speak up. I can’t figgle out why they haven’t. I believe their public legacies would be well-served if they did. Maybe they will. We live in hope.

I place all this before you in the hope that there’s something here that might encourage you or someone you know in the work of overcoming fear. Love overcoming fear is, I think, the human assignment. And yes, recreational cruelty seems to be what a few frightened people in positions of power take to be their assignment. But love does overcome fear. Here and there and all over the place. Even sometimes in the beautiful state of Tennessee.

“Nobody has the right to obey.” That’s Hannah Arendt talking. I find it helpful to repeat it and write it down as I try to overcome, in myself and others, the bystander effect: The mental impulse whereby I suppress my own conscience and succumb to silence and inaction in the presence of abuse out of fear. Plain old fear which takes root when I become estranged from any actionable awareness of my own moral power and imagine my hands are tied when it matters most. I want everyone to feel and act upon their own moral power. That includes everyone in the above photographs. That includes Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos. We become what we normalize. There is no right to obey.

“Do not obey in advance.” That’s Tim Snyder’s handy-dandy saying for refusing anticipatory obedience. He knows something about the wearing down of a person’s capacity to exercise their own moral power. Listen: “Most of the power of authoritarianism is freely given.” It’s true. “In times like these, individuals think ahead about what a more repressive government will want, and then offer themselves without being asked. A citizen who adapts in this way is teaching power what it can do.” Ugh.

Here’s a screenshot of this particular page from Snyder’s On Tyranny:

Note to self and others: Keep at it. Don’t comply. Ask questions. Insist on what’s true at every turn. Tell and share jokes. Art it up. Drink water. Stand where you must stand. Be human there. Also dance. It’s safe to dance.

Thank you, Betsy and Donovan, for making your witness.

Also, I’ll mention that I’m appearing in Franklin, Tennessee at Landmark Booksellers ready to talk and sign books on November 13th. My friend and mentor, Cory Bishop, has agreed to engage me in conversation in front of people. Come out if you can. Tell your friends.

Stay safe, y’all.

Second editor’s note: The above image is provided by Stanley Kubrick.