Let’s speak from the heart here.
I’ve gotten a lot of response from readers on a recent column about Donovan Mitchell’s difficulty in handling the Jazz’s playoff loss and his discomfort with some aspects of life in Utah, or, more accurately, with the way some people think about and act on matters of race, equality, justice, fairness and education. He expressed an interest in talking with lawmakers here about critical race theory.
Standing up for the majority of Jazz fans — and Utahns in general, who may or may not agree with some of Mitchell’s positions but who still respect the man — while criticizing extremists, the intolerant and ignorant, who do exist here and who too often rear their ugly heads and spew their hate, elicited some passionate comments from a wide range of respondents.
Some agreed with the premise of the column, that Mitchell could thrive by continuing on his journey for a championship with the Jazz and that most fans would support him on the court and support his right to express himself as an intelligent, progressive agent for change, for greater racial justice and for improving social and institutional behavior as it pertains to race — in Utah and around the country.
Whether they would listen to him was left unanswered.
Some said that was naive, that Utah is, in fact, filled with racists, residents who have racism baked into their minds and souls either individually or institutionally, and that’s the way it is and that’s the way it always has been. And further, that way is evidenced by a conservative legislature, by lawmakers who either have no clue what it’s like to grow up Black in this state and this country or who decide to ignore it, and who want the elements of tragedy in American history as it relates to race to be whitewashed from discussions, books, schools and education as a whole.
Others agreed that most people here are just regular people, many of whom are good, well meaning, fair citizens who are far from perfect, who need, in truth, to focus more clearly on the injustices of our day, of a million days, and actively work against prejudice and injustice of all kinds, and might be willing to do so.
Is that last part true?
Is that last part so difficult to make true?
It’s recognized that most Utahns, like most members of the state’s Legislature, are members of one party — and that party usually has its political way in Utah. It’s no revelation that there’s a dominant, powerful church here that holds sway over many issues, and that many members of that church, for whatever reasons, are conservative and Republican.
But a major tenet of that dominant religion is to, “Love your God, love your neighbor as yourself, there is no commandment greater than these.”
It’s not, “Love your neighbor unless he has a different color skin than you do.”
If you don’t roll into the hallways of any church, or believe in any divine tenets, it’s not so hard to embrace basic human decency, to avoid mistreating others for looking or being different.
It’s obvious from my rudimentary approach here that I don’t cover religion or politics or social issues. I write sports. But given the feedback I get when those realms intersect with sports, one thought keeps coming to my mind, ricocheting off the far reaches and bouncing back, be it simple or naive or unsophisticated or whatever:
Why the hell can’t people come together to agree on the need for fundamental understanding and equal treatment and equal justice and equal education and equal opportunity for people of color in this state and in this country?
Maybe they say they do, but do they do what they say?
Inequality and injustices and inaction have been going on for years, tens and hundreds of them, and should have been figured and solved long before now. But issues of equality, of social and racial justice, should and could transcend party affiliation, religious affiliation, club affiliation, affiliations of all kinds, short of hate groups who may be too far gone.
The trouble, some say, is in the details, and those details usually circle around ignorance and fear, money and power, regarding those last two, who has it, who can get it, who can control it, and that’s also understood. Regarding the first two, some who are privileged in one way or another protest the idea of stressing that Black lives matter, confusing the sentiment and the movement with the original organization.
Some continue to lean on — and use as an excuse — the idea that “all lives matter.”
No, duh.
But all lives haven’t been marginalized the way the lives of so many people of color have been. Pointing that out isn’t divisive. It’s an acknowledgment that there’s been a sad-and-sorry problem in this country — and in Utah, too — for a long time. And, with education and effort, not only can blindness to that fact be healed, but the fact itself can be eradicated.
Speaking of healing the blind, the preacher was right who pointed out that people who counter the notion that Black lives matter with the mantra that all lives matter are the people who would have argued with Jesus at his Sermon On the Mount, when he said, “Blessed are the poor in spirit,” shooting back with, “Well, no, Jesus, blessed are ALL people.”
This whole idea that a large number of Utahns are racist must be addressed and solved.
I don’t know what that exact number actually is, big or small, but whatever it is, it’s past time to properly address it, a hundred times, a thousand times, a million times, a billion times, to properly and truthfully educate our children, our children’s children, and ourselves, that people of color have been marginalized for far too long, and that ending that mistreatment with emphasis and awareness and understanding is paramount to our better society.
Yeah, it’s naive to believe people can just come together to, as John Lennon put it, “live as one.” If that’s unreachable, maybe we could settle for people coming together to treat each other respectfully and equally.
Is that so damn hard?
Is it?
It’s something Utah, most of it, can do.
GORDON MONSON hosts “The Big Show” with Jake Scott weekdays from 2-7 p.m. on 97.5 FM and 1280 AM The Zone.
Follow @GordonMonson