Bradley and Vicente are two different individuals with two totally different entities of which they are proud. I don’t know Bradley at all, but I did casually know Vicente. So I made some assumptions about both, based on circumstantial evidence, which I admit, is always dangerous. But I’ve been dancing with the Grim Reaper since moving to Idaho 30 years ago as an environmental scientist and liberal Democrat. In Idaho, danger for my kind lurks on every corner, in the Capitol restrooms and behind every potato. In Bradley’s case I used a photograph to make my inferences, and in Vicente’s case, I used his English writing assignment. Bradley is probably a U.S. citizen, while Vicente is a citizen of Mexico wanting to become a U.S. citizen.  

Bradley: Proud of Being Selfish

A few hundred people demonstrated Friday against the coronavirus lockdown in Pennsylvania, an AFP reporter said, with many carrying signs declaring themselves “Selfish and proud”. (Agence France Presse, May 15, 2020)

Even though there have been hundreds of protests around the world since the Covid-19 invasion and the murder of George Floyd, this anti-lockdown rally caught my attention on the evening news because of what Bradley’s sign said. A few days later, around 4 a.m., the hour when brilliancy occasionally comes to me and fetid ideas overflow my brain like a clogged toilet, the low wattage light bulb in my brain lit up. Could Bradley could be expressing the sentiments of too many Americans who believe self-interest is of paramount importance and a desirable trait?

We lived in Alaska from 1981-1983. While there, I became friends with a man who had moved to Alaska just so he could build a runway and hangar for his aircraft, on his own property, without any restrictions. He succeeded. My friend was not a jerk or excessively greedy but simply single-minded; a selfish myopia.

Before moving to Alaska, I had read a book by Joe McGinness, Going to Extremes, about the year he spent in Alaska during the oil boom in the late 70s. He wrote about how so many Alaskans moved there because they wished to be totally free of governmental restrictions and do their own thing, like my friend. That attitude is not so much disrespect for others as it is simply not taking into consideration the possible negative impact of a personal action.

Now, 40 years later, we have come to this protest in Harrisburg where Bradley with his sign is inferring that his life is more important than the lives of others because lockdown procedures, even though proven to save lives, restrict his freedom of choice, whatever that may be. And in this case, his choice is not trivial but potentially deadly. Did Bradley follow the anti-lockdown practice through to a possible lethal ending because of him?  If he did, that still did not stop him.

Vicente: Proud of His Life

This photo of torture was taken somewhere in Latin America.

The Learning Lab (LL), here in Boise, is a literacy education center for low-income adults and families with young children, most of whom are refugees. Until Trump took office with his delightful immigration policies, schools like LL across the country flourished. LL had students represented from 50 countries not that long ago. I volunteered to teach students there, some who had witnessed unspeakable atrocities, not uncommonly to their families and before their very eyes. But, I found, as did other volunteers and staff, that many students talked openly about their horrendous backgrounds, and they never complained. They always came to class with huge smiles and seemed ecstatic to just be alive and in the greatest country on Earth. The class assignment below was written by Vicente, who I don’t believe had a tragic past. What follows is the result of one of Vicente’s writing assignments.

THIS IS MY LIFE.

FROM VICENTE.

Hi, this is Vicente, and I will talk about my life, In my poor opinion in think my life is great family , also I think my family are happy and this is very important for mi and I think for all father of family , My kids they are very good kids they have a good grades ,I love my wife she is a perfect women , mother and partner ,also I have a good job that make me happy because a do a lot of things this is one of the things of my life ,thank you so much for your patience.

Whriting for Vicente…

Conclusions

I know nothing about the backgrounds of any of the protesters at Harrisburg, PA. I can only speculate that all of them have the opportunity, but perhaps not the finances, to buy anything they want, drive anywhere they want, and have no fear of saying anything they want (unless, of course, they are a person of color). I also suspect they aren’t content because they feel the need to flaunt the fact that they are proud of being selfish, which says to me that they expect their wants and needs be fulfilled before those of others even if there’s insufficient for all. Greedy people never seem to be satisfied or happy. Sadly, we are a nation of too many greedy and spoiled people, taking our lives for granted and our every expectation to be met.

Bradley’s perspective on life is quite a contrast to how Vicente sees his new life in the U.S. I would bet Vicente expects very little, takes nothing for granted, demands nothing, and appreciates just about everything. In other words, Vicente is not greedy. He is happy to be alive and in what he believes is the greatest country on Earth. To him, America has opportunities to live a better life than he had in Mexico, but he still loves Mexico. I would never expect him to go to a protest such as the one in Harrisburg.  

So, who better represents the values and ideals for which America stands? Who is proud of America for the right reason(s)? Who would make a better neighbor? Does it matter? I think it does matter because it says a lot about how we see ourselves in an incredibly diverse and complicated nation. I believe that both Bradleys and Vicentes exist abundantly in America, so they both are true in that sense.

Obviously, to me, Vicente represents the ideals and values upon which this country was founded: humbleness, generosity, compassion and freedom from tyranny. Bradley is not only exercising his right to free speech; he is already practicing what he espouses. He would have to know, unless he is totally ignorant, what his myopic and greedy anti-lockdown position could lead to. He could potentially be guilty manslaughter, however unintentional that may be. The writers of the First Amendment certainly didn’t write the amendment with the idea that any action could accompany any speech. Speech alone is harmless, while actions may come with horrible consequences. That’s why we say that, “actions speak louder than words.”

Repeating what I said at the very beginning, Bradley and Vicente are two different individuals with two totally different entities of which they are proud. Bradley’s pride doesn’t extend past his nose. Totally inward – directed. Vicente’s pride is the exact antithesis: totally outward – directed. Extrapolating a little, Vicente is not only proud of his family, he is already proud of his neighborhood and his anticipated new country. When my wife and I lived in Mexico for four years with the Peace Corps, we repeatedly found loving, compassionate and giving Mexicans who would take the shirt off their back for you, even if it was their only shirt. I literally had that happen once when I spilled a bottle of salsa on my favorite Mexican shirt, after a tiny too much tequila. A little old lady ran to her house and returned with her backup T-shirt for me to temporarily wear, taking the dirty one with her to wash. I think all she really wanted was to gawk at my my 6-pak abs and rippling lats.

A nation of Bradleys would be a nation of selfish individualists who place their needs above that of community and country.  Bradley’s perspective only serves to push us further down the road of societal polarization, which is exactly what we don’t need in this time of multiple global crises and exactly what our current president wants to Make America Great Again—MAGA. A monoculture. His is a totally unrealistic and unwanted nightmare, not totally unlike Hitler’s was. A country of robots which is what he “owns” now in his base. How else can one explain it? Lobotomies aren’t cheap on the black market.

While Trump thrives on a polarized country because he believes that “to divide is to conquer” and he desperately wants to be the conqueror. In contrast, Abraham Lincoln was worried about a national schism when he delivered his famous 1858 House Divided Speech where he said, “A house divided against itself cannot stand.” More Bradleys and fewer Vicentes would mean exactly that: a strengthened inequality. One would think that a mix of both types would be good, but I don’t think so. That assumes that the deck would not be stacked, when, in fact, it is. The Bradleys would come to the table with money and power and with a desire to win even if it means lying and cheating. The Vicentes would come with only their humble selves. Isn’t that what we have now? An entire field of migrant workers, invisible against the shadow of one Republican Texan billionaire, and aspiring against overwhelming odds. Currently, America is a faltering democracy. I like to believe it isn’t a 737-Max on final descent. Hope springs eternal. The protests today are good, regardless the flavor, only if they lead to real change. And that change won’t happen if all we do is reshuffle the stacked deck and continue, business-as-usual (BAU). When the dust has settled from both Covid-19 and our racism, if we return to BAU, we should update the definition of insanity and reconsider our dreams of ever becoming a true democracy. Maybe we never were one but that makes our goal all the more desirable; it will be a new experience.