“The Arc of History Bends Towards Justice.” But Does It? Has It Really?

I have had to turn inward and face a few things about my reaction to all the revolt and riots. I spent alot of (too much) time reacting to the destruction going on.

I restore things, so anytime I see destruction I react negatively. As someone trying start a business, I see others life work burning, and I feel grief for them. It’s hard for me to accept the argument that one community’s grief should subject another community to the consequences. I am used to democracy as the ultimate best instrument of change.

But it has failed, and been failing. I always thought we were on a path to being better. “The arc of history bends towards justice”. But does it? Has it really?

For some certainly. As a gay man, HIV positive, injustice has slowly morphed into a semblance of justice. But it did not come about without moments that broke through the indifference and apathy.
Sometimes violent, indiscriminate and random.

I still struggle with the notion that this is needed. That many of those taking to the streets never reached for democracy before they found a bat to put through glass. But as a formerly homeless man, I know that democracy has bars around it. And gates and certainly limitations in delivering justice. Especially for black and brown brothers, sisters and trans. Majorities are not always just.

If we are to be honest, our majority has been unjust for quite a long time to a great many people, and more often than we ever like to admit. The bargain was that we were to tollerate some injustice around the margins, for a vastly greater justice for as many as possible.

I was born into that bargain and the architecture that sustained it. But that bargain was broken long ago. I still want to fix it. That is who I am. But you can’t fix a car with broken parts.

So things are burned, and change gets messier. And those who really wish to break this nation are eager to see and goad all this along. They too perhaps get what they want. The virus that seems to have disappeared from our consciousness gets what it wants.

But the black and brown community is now in our eyes front and center. We get to see the product of indifference and the consequences of sustained injustice. Victims will be on all sides, and pain will be more widely shared than it was.

We failed, and this is the price of failure.

The question yet to be answered is whether we rebuild, or if we have finally reached the point where our society has accumulated too many faults to persist.

Those who benefit most in our society are the wealthy, and they are surprisingly absent from this debate. They created the desperation, exploitation, starvation and co-opted government as their house pet. They starved our schools, let our roads and sidewalks crumble while theirs get refreshed every year.

If the police serve anyone, they serve the wealthy. The riots are not in La Jolla, they are in the poorest most neglected communities. Which means that the true costs are inflicted on the most destitute.

I don’t know where or even if I fit into any of this. I joined the Marine Corps to deter and prevent violence in hopes that sometime after I am gone we evolve to a humanity that no longer needs violence or a military to be protected from it.

I knew full well the history of the abuse of that kind of commitment. Smedley Butler said it well, he was a “mercenary for capitalism”. I had hoped we were past that history (naively so). 

As a nation, we walked past an encyclopedia set worth of injustices and crimes, because we were powerful enough not to be called to account. We were a bully and a saint at different turns. But as we begin to falter under the weight of so many mistakes, we now face a decision more monumental than any generation before us.

Will this experiment continue? And, if not, then what?

I only hope those on the streets and those on their couches watching are aware of the stakes. And that we are up to the task of resolving this for future generations. Because failure will reap a whirlwind more destructive than any yet seen.

Timothy P. Holmberg
Taste of Salt Vintage Yacht Excursions

Lead photo credit: UnicornRiot under Creative Commons license.