I started my series on Rachel Dolezal because I saw it as a safe way of examining the issue of race relations in this country by focusing on a relatively harmless / certainly ridiculous incident. As I noted in the series, my family is about as multi-ethnic as they come (all we need is an Arab and a Jew and a Native American to complete the set). I cannot look at people being targeted because of their color or ethnic background and not see members of my family as the ones on the receiving end.
But reality has a way of sabotaging my plans, and in the middle of what was meant to be a jokey / lighthearted-but-sincere look at race relations in this country, yet anther toxic turd deposited himself in the punchbowl.
This time, as opposed to my truncated Christmas series of a few years back, I opted to complete the series as planned. This is no disrespect to the victims of the Charleston shootings or desire to trivialize that tragedy by deflecting it to something minor.
I have a long piece that will be coming online later today, perhaps tomorrow. It was started before the Charleston massacre, and was sparked by comments on an entirely different matter, but the truth is the problem this country faces consists of the nexus point where several overlapping Venn diagrams of evil create a truly toxic stew.
And while the country could easily shrug off any one of those Venn circles, when they are added on top of one another they become force multipliers.
We have got to attack the problem from multiple angles if we’re to have any hope of solving it.
