The Failure of Homeland
The United States has been ridiculously entangled in Western Asia since the mid-1930s. That probably has something to do with oil. It also has to do with a deep distrust of Islam. It also has to do with wanting a secure place for Jews. And it has produced an endless mess.
The Shiites hate the Sunnis, Hezbollah hates Israel, Hamas hates Israel, Hezbollah hates Hamas, Israel hates them right back — toss in the poor Kurds, all the fools in Yemen, and whoever else showed up this week — and I don’t know what all!
Every one of these groups, gathered around ideology, religion, tribe, or cult, insists on obtaining its homeland. The result is that millions of ordinary people must abandon their own homes and watch them disintegrate in explosions, smoke, and rubble.
The idea of Homeland is a failing motto of oppressors and other fools.
But there is another answer.
It is not an answer that four millennia of warring tribes in Western Asia seem able to comprehend.
The answer is HOPELAND.
And that answer is still possible in the United States of America.
The people of the USA came here — and continue to come here — from many different historical streams. Some came hoping to make a better life. Some came in chains and, against all odds, continued to hope for a better life. Some were here first and still just want a better life.
Hope.
Right now, the regime wants us to be more like the warring tribes of Western Asia: peace through domination, order through fear, unity through exclusion. The hope of everyone not “with us” must be crushed. And being “with us” is always subject to revision.
Hope begins by asking, “Does this pick my pocket or break my legs?”
Then Hope looks to others and asks, “Is this picking your pocket or breaking your legs?”
But most importantly, Hope asks, “How can I help with your pocket or your broken legs?”
So the real question is this:
Do we want to become one more Homeland?
Or do we want to become what we have always had the chance to be — a confluence of human beings in this vast, rich Hopeland?
There is a slightly harsher line-edit available too, if you want this to cut more like a blade and less like a sermon.
