Hoping for Grace

I wrote this blog regularly for many years, 330 unique posts. Every Thursday I’d post my thinking for the week. I always strove to offer a perspective that wasn’t in the main discourse on a particular issue. It wasn’t left or right or even center – just looking at something from a different angle. There were some really great dialogues that happened with people who appreciated nuance and having a substantive conversation. I never sought for agreement from readers, just a healthy and respectful debate. The election of Donald J. Trump changed the engagement from polite discourse to flame throwing character assination if somebody disagreed. That wasn’t interesting or productive to me, so the blog no longer served its intended purpose.

I return to the format because today because it seems to be a good way to explore an issue that I’ve been long committed to, but handled in a thoughtless way.

Recently I made a thoughtless comment on a Facebook post that was undeniably racist, and demeaning of Asian people. I am deeply sorry for the harm I caused. My comment on that post was unbecoming of who I am as a person or my role as a leader in my church, my organization and my community.

I understand the power of negative stereotyping and the pain it causes. I’ve spent my career trying to transcend LGBTQ+ prejudice.

I know that people were hurt. And not just random people I don’t know which is terrible enough. Most of the people who were hurt by the post and my comment are people that I know, which is particularly upsetting because they are people for whom I feel great affection and respect and consider friends. It wasn’t a large group of people, but the breadth of the impact doesn’t negate the depth of the upset.

How I could have possibly missed just how offensive the post was in the first place. When it was brought to my attention I immediately got it. I mean, it was incredibly obvious. How I could have possibly done this? Me, who’s spent a lifetime moving organizations and people to be accepting of difference.

I was tired. Under extraordinary stress. It was late. I was attempting to be funny. I’m human. Those “reasons” – all true – aren’t justifications. It’s clear that my own white privilege simply blinded me to something that should have been obvious–that the meme itself was a racist, anti-Asian trope.

I’m a cis-gender, white male born on the cusp of the Boomer and X generations. I have privilege in most areas of my life. I grew up in a liberal household and have spent my career working with for-profit and not-for-profit organizations effecting social change and working to make the world a better place.

I have blind spots. If the first step in doing better is understanding where and how you went wrong, well, then, I’ve taken the first of what I know are many steps. I know I can do better and I will. Acknowledging my error and committing to being better is a start.

Will this be enough? Can 2 words seen by 28 people be the thing that undoes a lifetime of service? Some think so. Perhaps context and proportionality are relevant, even at a time when nuance seems to be a relic of the past. I continue to hope that grace, forgiveness and understanding give way to allow us all to become better.

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