What will our Petri dish grow?

    Having made our way through 2020……an altogether forgettable year of pandemic, economic displacement and social unrest …….we vowed, or a least hoped that 2021 would take us beyond those trials. Things would be better in ’21…..or so we thought.

Turns out that hopeful dream lasted about six days…..all the way to 1/6/21, when American democracy was assaulted in a way few of us could have imagined.

Before that fateful day was over, in the depths of an historic national, indeed global pandemic, we found ourselves immersed in a most “uncivil” civil war. 

Our democracy was under attack. Take a moment to consider that reality. In the course of a single day we were exposed to televised scenes most of us could scarcely get our heads around……though some among us had apparently seen it coming for some time.

So here we are, observing a national holiday honoring a black crusader, just days before swearing in a new president. What ought to be a celebration of our democratic values has instead become a time of deep introspection.

I don’t know about you, but that sad reality has me stepping back a bit, to revisit the context of this stunning new national ordeal. What follows is my take on the possibility of the great American democratic experiment unraveling before our eyes.

THE GREAT AMERICAN PETRI DISH

Let’s take a moment to review a bit of cultural history. What if we considered the birth of our United States as a dramatic, one-of-a-kind experiment? You might think of the process as a recipe…….complete with all the ingredients and instructions necessary for a simple laboratory experiment.

We could begin with something appropriately modest, say for instance a gathering of citizens from every corner of the world……European, Asian, African, and Hispanic, along with all the sub-regions scattered among them.

Then, what if we sprinkled that mingling mix with the vast variety of religions, beliefs and cultures represented by each of those disparate groups?

Next let’s stir in the cultural spices of various political leanings......conservative, liberal and moderate. Then to that let's add a variety of sexual preferences ….. straight, lesbian, gay and transgender.

Finally, imagine pouring that well-blended mix of nationalities, races, religions, political and sexual identities, all those potent possibilities, into a giant petri dish ……the one we call the United States of America. 

Now let’s say that every person taking part in that grand experiment, from the greatest to the least, will be given one vote, an equal vote, in determining the future of that experiment, that American democracy ……and at the same time be endowed with the opportunity to become the person they want to be.

Take a moment to consider the possibilities if everyone had an equal voice, and the freedom to become who they wanted to be. The possibilities would be virtually infinite………so many conceivable outcomes ……..some fruitful, some wasteful…….yet all of them directed by the collective will of the people. That sounds like a definition of Democracy, doesn’t it?

At that point it might appear that our nation had become a scaled-down replica of the entire world……representing all its diverse possibilities. Moreover, if things went according to plan, we would have blessed each of our citizens with an opportunity to exploit their own possibilities. Heady stuff, eh? Some might call that Utopia.

Ah, but not everyone would think that was “heady” or “utopian.” Not by a long shot.

You see, if such a dramatic democratic experiment, like the one we claim for the USA, has taught us anything at all we must  acknowledge our experiment’s most important, most unpredictable element ……what I’ll call ”Human Nature.” Though it is an imprecise label, I believe it is well enough understood to serve our purposes.

The thing is, for many of our citizens the cultural possibilities of our great democratic experiment are a zero-sum game……i.e. If you win, I must lose. There will never enough of the good stuff for both of us to win, to have what we want. Somebody will have to win, and someone will have to lose.

With that in mind let’s move from the hypothetical to an all-too-real reality. Take a moment to consider what some folks call “white privilege,’ a sociological notion that too few of us paid much attention to until recent developments splashed it all over our front pages.

It turns out that for some of us the history of our Great American Petri Dish experiment provides an important reminder……confirming that from the beginning, (conveniently excluding the presence of Native Americans) the United States has been a predominately European society. In those eyes what we term “White supremacy” has always been a given…..the way things were meant to be.

But alas, even if it ever existed, that once-assumed reality has been slowly fading from the scene. If you are the sort to believe demographic science you know that our ever-growing national population looks more and more like the world from which we draw our people……more Asian, more African, more Hispanic, and less European. The experts tell us that soon our ‘White’ population, the largely European segment of our great nation, will have become a minority.

And that my friend brings us to today….the dawning of 2021, a time of conflict and retaliation. Those among us who cannot bear the loss of their ‘privileged’ status are making a stand. They can read the signs. Their leader, a true believer in their “White is great” cause, has just lost an election, though he and his followers find that hard to accept. The majority of our population has rejected the privilege he and his ilk claim for themselves. Even states like Georgia, long a stronghold of white privilege, are slowly, but surely flexing their minority muscle. The American notion of democracy is taking on a new meaning.

As a result we find ourselves living in a time of historic transition…..a slow-moving drama that will remain with us for decades to come. The defenders of the old order, and the political establishment that has hosted their beliefs for so long, will not go peacefully. Indeed, many of them are digging in, preparing for a long and possibly lethal battle.

They may believe they are fighting a new war for a new cause. It seems more likely theirs is the most recent skirmish in the centuries-old war for the American soul…..to determine our nation’s definition of democracy……what it means and where it takes us.

Now a new administration has arrived on the scene, with its own vision of democracy and what it ought to mean. The changes they hope for will not immediately end our turmoil. But here’s hoping we have turned toward the path that leads to a more ‘American’ future.

What say you? What do you see as the fate of the great American experiment?