In Case You Don't Know Me
Fri., March 28, 09:24 AM
I feel as if I’m sliding down the side of my soapbox. Maybe I need to talk about some background, especially for people who are new to my various rants.
To begin with, friendship does not require oneness of opinion. I know I read that somewhere, but when I tried to find it, instead I found the following:
and conduct is not worth much.”
Mohandas Gandhi
That’s not bad company to be in, I would say. Very basically, I don’t require you to agree with me about everything in order to be my friend.
Personally, I tell stories about individuals in order to demonstrate — I hope — that one really can’t class all people together. That is a very common practice: “All ——s are ——.” Maybe we do that because it’s easier for our minds to grasp; I find it degrading because, whatever their group, all people are different. I may be going off-subject here.
When I was a teenager, my best friend’s father didn’t like Jews. Any Jews. The subject was never discussed in my presence, but I knew that was his opinion. What was I supposed to do? Drop the friend? Not likely, since we sat together in almost all our classes. Argue with an adult? Don’t be silly; that just wasn’t done. So I just continued to be her friend and, yes, I often felt defensive when I went to her home.
But we were good friends, and eventually he changed his tune — a little. He didn’t mind me; it was just cheap Jews he didn’t like. Was that any better? No, not really; what if he found out that I was thrifty, careful with money, all those things he might classify as cheap?
There are many Jewish people who are frugal; it is a characteristic built on the experience of not having enough. There are many Jewish people who are extremely generous, philanthropic, in fact. Finally, there is a subset of people who are all three: Jewish, frugal, and philanthropic. None of us have lived through the exact same life experiences, and no two of us are exactly alike.
I too am disturbed by the number of illegals in this country, but I am certain they’re not all the same. What made them illegal? Was it misinformation? (And if so, who misinformed them?) Was it a law based on specious reasoning? (That has happened more often than you know, unless you’re an expert on immigration law.) Were they turned down by some clerk who didn’t care to check? (I could tell you stories…) Are they truly evil, y’know, bent on destroying us? (Yeah, yeah, I know; those exist too.) As MzBee commented, there are plenty of nasty legals out there too.
What I wish I could do is find out the backgrounds of all of these people, where they came from, why they’re here, what their intentions are.
And then, what can I do to make them legal? I’m not going there right now, because I still don’t know whether or not they belong here. I don’t know where they have to return, if we deport them. May we never cause another voyage of the St. Louis.
