A NATION OF WATCHERS?
by Andrew Williams

"We are here to help each other get through this thing, whatever it is."
--Mark Vonnegut, M.D. (Kurt Vonnegut's son)
"You cannot build a new Kosovo on retributive violence. No one ever gets
even in this life."--Bill Clinton

As all inveterate cable news network junkies know, the East Coast had a
close encounter of the hurricane kind two weeks ago. Although Isabel
didn't have quite as much fury as the usual "woman scorned," there were
hundreds of thousands of people in the D.C. metro area without electric power at home
for a week or more. And PEPCO reports there may still be a "handful" of
customers without electricity.
The local governments, fearing the worst, made advance arrangements with
utility companies in Detroit, Florida and Georgia to expedite repairs of
the legions of downed power lines and burnt-out transformers throughout the
area. It was one of the most sensible moves made by local authorities. (I
also think it was wise to shut down Metro, although I would have kept the
system operating until 8 PM on Thursday the 25th to minimize the amount of
people stranded in the cities.)
I saw one of the convoys from the Motor City pass me en route to another
power outage. I waved a "Thank you" to the driver. He smiled and waved
back. That simple human moment felt damn good to me. And it got me
thinking about the public spirit, the government spirit and how each has
manifested in this country since September 11, 2001.
Ram Dass, the spiritual teacher formerly known as Dr. Richard Alpert,
has said in interviews that people everywhere in the world experienced
what he calls "fierce grace" on the morning of September 11. "Just as my
stroke was 'fierce grace' (for me)," he said, "September 11 was fierce
grace for humanity. For humanity, not just the United States. It brought a
lot of people to the fundamental questions that religion addresses."
Ram Dass defines 'fierce grace' as that which opens one to deeper
levels within one's being. It could be a stroke, or seeing a loved one
die, or any other event we humans tend to describe as catastrophic. By that
definition the aftermath of Isabel could be called an incidence of 'fierce
grace.'
That aftermath did indeed bring about a period of discovery. All I had to
do to witness it was look up and down my street to see the ongoing works of
local Good Samaritans: A neighbor bringing out his chainsaw to chop up the
tree branch that fell in someone's yard. Another neighbor helping the
widow lady clear her walk so she can get out to buy groceries.
The public spirit that one normally associates with the Amish, the Quakers
and other religious communities is present in every community, though it
can lie dormant for months, years or even decades. It is the part of us that
says, "Think globally, act locally." It is the part that says, "We're all
in this together, so let's help each other. Many hands make light work."
The government spirit, aside from a token bone thrown to Americorps and
other ersatz snoop groups, seems to be this: "We're all in this
together--against them." And who they are changes every month: the
Taliban, Saddam Hussein, Al-Qaida, Iran, etc. (In my wildest imagining, I
picture a dart wheel in the Situation Room, with all the countries on it,
and whichever country gets hit with the dart is the target of the next
Two-Minute Hate.)
So, as a result of this endless quest to eradicate terrorism by provoking
terrorists, we're supposed to watch everybody for the least little signs of
suspected terrorist behavior. We're supposed to listen to our parents talk
in their sleep and report any dissenting comments. We are supposed to
become little McCarthys, little Big Brothers. A Nation of Snitches.
Now back when I grew up, to be a snitch was a small, cowardly thing. It
meant betraying your comrades, inflicting unnecessary pain. It meant,
worst of all, breaking the childhood code and selling the secrets to the
enemy. As an adult, however, I grok the necessity to report behavior that
has or could harm others. That's why I make crystal-clear distinction
between narcs and whistleblowers, between the stukach who rats on you for having pot and the
factory worker who reports that his company is selling defective brake
partsto automobile manufacturers.
But I don't want to live where everyone is "guilty until proven innocent."
I don't want to live in a nation of snitches. I don't want this country to
turn on itself and cannibilize itself. I want the public spirit to
overwhelm and transform the government spirit. The reason we're in this
mess with the world is our government meddling with other people's
governments. If scientists and artists from different countries and
cultures can find ways to share resources and information, the only reason
governments can't is a lack of trust, embodied by a will to power that
trumps all humane ambitions. When the public spirit, fully roused,
transforms life on Earth, there will be no need to hide and nothing to
hide. We can only imagine what such a world would be like. But it is
imagination, creativity and the will to love that have gotten us naked
apes this far in our tripartite evolution.
We are, I believe, on the verge of a great transformation--physical, mental
and spiritual. We can't make other people go through it, but we can help,
in the same way we help lift a branch off of a sidewalk. We can, in the form
of service, become voluntary slaves to one another, giving aid out of our free
will. Let the words of the late Bill Hicks ring out as the Liberty Bell
once did:
"The eyes of fear want you to buy more guns and locks for your door. The
eyes of love recognize that we are all one. It's only a choice: between
love and fear."
The choice we must make.

Copyright 2003 by Andrew Williams. Free to forward with attribution.