The form of my letters to you is not set in stone. After nearly a month, they are already a mixture of photologs, daily remembrances, specific events, and random thoughts to you. I know that when you are younger, you will be focused on the pictures, but my hope is when you are older, you will look back on these, hopefully in book form, and see what it was like for me trying to be the best Daddy I could be to you. It is in writing to that future you that I think I am writing tonight. You and Mommy are not yet home yet, and I just finished writing yesterday's shorter "daily recap" style letter that I didn't get to write last night because you wanted and needed me to take you to bed after I had finished eating, but this will be a longer letter.
Today, I became very angry at work. It was not to do with work, itself, or my boss -- Everything is fine there. It has to do with something that is very ugly: Ignorance and ignorance's children: hatred and fear.
I work in an office where most of the people hold more conservative views that I do. Though I am economically conservative, I am socially liberal, and I am fully aware that my conservative economic theory comes from my complete fear of poverty. My liberal social views come from my belief that all people deserve the same rights to pursue their lives in ways that make themselves and those around them happy. I also have a strong social justice streak where I believe that people should aspire to make the world a better place than what they found, and to make their little part of the world better so that if everyone did their part to make their corner of the world a better place, the world as a whole would be a better place.
Many of the people that I work with do not have these views. They call themselves Republicans. On Facebook today I wrote, "You know why I am not Republican? Because I have not met one in the last ten years who cared a damn about another human being other than themselves and cared about nothing more than protecting their wealth. Human beings should be so much more than that." One particular person that I work with is a type of person you will no doubt get to know as you get older -- Privileged white, from the collar suburbs, never interacting with people different from him on a daily basis outside of work. This is the kind of person I have the most trouble with. Since they have never had struggle in their lives, they think that those who have struggled are lazy and it is not his job to help those less fortunate than him. He, and many people like him, have the attitude of, "I've got mine, and I must make sure you don't get it."
Usually, I am able to ignore the banter, because I do like to keep the peace at work. I try to avoid three topics at work, religion, politics, and abortion. Nothing good ever comes out of these arguments, and they always descend into the verbal equivalent of a Facebook flame war. (And, by God, I hope Facebook is dead and buried if you are reading this as an adult.) Certain folks thrive on discussing their views and trying to convert others to their way of thinking. I have ignored his religious bigotry, homophobia, and closeted racism on a regular basis, and it always felt that a little part of me died inside when I didn't stand up for what I believe in. Then again, I am just trying to get a paycheck to provide for you and Mommy, and in Corporate America, if you rock the cart too hard, you end up laid off.
Ignorance and hatred are insidious and cloaked in euphemism in White America. Instead of complaining that they can't use racist names for minorities, they will claim that they are tired of political correctness. Instead of openly bashing homosexuals, they will start a sentence with, "I am not homophobic, but..." and then proceed to bash homosexuals. And when it comes to immigrants, they won't say that they don't like our largest immigrant group at this time, they will say, "My (insert ancestor here) came here legally and they should, too." Don't be fooled by any of it. We are not living in an age of free expression being suppressed like some Fascist regime. We live in probably the freest, most openly expressive time of all history and it is getting better. People have free rights to worship as they please, and the internet has made free speech more powerful and unedited (and in many ways, more ugly) than we have ever seen in the past. And, finally, the tide has turned in American culture where we are accept that homosexuals should have the same basic human rights as anyone else. We aren't there yet. We can always strive to become better, freer, and more educated and open. These people who say they are "protecting tradition" are racists and homophobes who fear these people who are different from their own and are angry that they cannot use their words of hate as acceptable polite language anymore. We should view this a triumph of human progress, but so many people fear change. They fear the "other".
Today, I ignored conversations on why gay marriage will "destroy marriage and the family". I ignored complaints about how Affirmative Action suppress White people's abilities to get jobs. An amusing concept since they entire team at my job save one are Whites and that "those people" would not need if if they weren't so "lazy". Never mind the glass wall minorities face with White hiring managers who have this negative view of them coming in the door. Then, he moved on to immigrants. Now, immigration is close to my heat because I have seen how incredibly tough it has been for your Mommy and her family. I think it is that personal connection, and a day of listening to ignorance that pushed me over the edge today.
Toward the end of the day of being exposed to these views that are heinous to my own, this coworker talked about how "Zero", his name for President Obama should be impeached for pushing for immigration reform. I said there are 11 million people here trying to live whatever it is we call the American Dream and he said, send them all back to where they came from. I said that wasn't possible, this is their home, and he said they are all criminals and if they can't be deported, they should be put in concentration camps. By this time, I had had just about enough. I told him to stop talking about it because we have vastly different ideas and work is not the place to express them, but he pushed forward and said, "Besides, the immigrants coming in now and the trash of the world. They won't even learn the language." This pushed me over. I told him, why don't you just say you hate the f***ing Mexicans? Better yet, why don't you shut the f*** up until you can learn to say something intelligent?" His last comments were, "I never said I hated Mexicans," to which I said, "Yes you did. Trust me I can read through your euphemisms. They are good enough to be your salve labor," (He had been talking about landscaper "Pedro" earlier in the afternoon), "but not good enough to be treated like human beings."
I will give him credit, he kept his mouth shut for the rest of the afternoon, and didn't say goodbye at the end of the day. But he no doubt went home and talked to his family about the crazy liberal who went off on him for speaking "the truth" (as he calls it), and that makes me sad. Racism and hate are taught, not bred, and to see these cycles continue makes me hope that his children will evolve their own views beyond their father's. Luckily, my boss was in the Cage today, and I was able to talk to him for about an hour after the incident and I told him what I have written here, and he supports me in getting politics out of our workplace. No doubt this may be viewed as "suppressing" their free speech but I also have a right not to listen to hate all day and maybe, just maybe, when people stop speaking hate as much, they will stop thinking hate as much.
I look at you sleeping, and know there will probably be tough times for you ahead as an Hispanic woman and all of the gender and cultural biases that you may face and that your Mommy has faced, and it makes me a bit sad. But I also have faith in the steady drumbeat of progress and hope that I can do my small part to support you and make your little part of the world a better place, and that you may do that, too, in your own life. What more can we strive for in life?Love,
Daddy
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