Lost in all the furor about the Miami Dolphins issues in their locker room is our own national cultural hypocrisy. We are still waiting with held breath to find out what exactly happened. In the meanwhile many pundits and sports personalities are chiming in about what they think. Is it bullying? Is it someone being a crybaby? Should Martin simply be tougher? Man up? Should Incognito (and others) get punished for being mean? Lighten up?
Yet through all the hand wringing, we aren’t asking the right question. To me, the real issue is why would a society that supports financially rude, crude and cruel behavior be so shocked?
This is the same culture that will pay money to see a movie about cruelty, about poor taste pranks. We watch TV shows that glorify violence and sick behavior, both in fictional shows like Criminal Minds or Breaking Bad or in reality shows like Big Brother and Survivor. Lying is glorified. Being ugly is accepted, even rewarded. Heck, even a terrible show like Dance Moms is successful more for the ugly behavior of the supposed adults rather than the dance prowess of the children.
When our society green-lights shows like this, or games like Grand Theft Auto IV, it merely demonstrates where our true values lie. What should happen in those board rooms is the CEOs, the decision makers, are shocked and horrified that one of their employees would have such low values and morals to even suggest such a show.
But of course we know that doesn’t happen because leaders of those industries are in pursuit of the almighty dollar. And they understand how sick our culture is. Again, what should happen is that those movies, TVs and video games tank, lose millions and are shunned off the stage with great shame for those companies that would dare lower our societal values.
Instead, with great fanfare, most of those cultural deviants rise to the heights of success as millions of Americans embrace their message. Its good to cause others harm. Its good to lie openly to another human. Its best to use crude and dismissive language to another person.
This is the tragedy coming from the Dolphins locker room. There, and in countless other locker rooms across America, in all sports, at all levels, these people (boys and girls alike) merely act like the culture they have been born in.
What we used to believe is in a golden rule given to us by Jesus, someone the country largely used to attempt to follow. It was simple. Do to others how you wish to be treated.
The concept was based on another simple concept…every human is a being of worth, a life to celebrate and respect. Of course, we have spent the last 40+ years killing babies, so already we don’t hold to that value. Our language has equally become more and more crude to the point that clear epithets like the “n word” and the “b word” are used openly to others in casual conversation. Then people joke that the word matters not, though of course used in the wrong context (whatever that means) the word is bad.
No, we used to attempt to live with respect. And yes, we sometimes failed. We are like the other humans on the planet, and we react poorly to people who don’t look like us. Our racism has been our cancer. Yes, we sadly were like the rest of the planet with 4.5 million humans enslaved…an ill that simply will not go away since now there are over 25 million people enslaved globally (and some right here in the USA).
But we still boldly made statements declaring that God had created us and as such we have inherent values of life. Our President would speak bravely about a new birth of liberty. We would attempt to fix our errors by allowing former slaves to not only vote but also hold office, within a year of the change of their station. Many of all colors would work tireless to make our society better, often at great personal cost.
The call to a higher way of life, to be a model society for the world, a city on a hill, was our mission from the start in the 1600s. When no other society or culture in the world would make such an audacious claim, our citizens did! And, in some respects, we are still a society trying to live up to that claim.
And yet….unless we decide now, TODAY, while it is still called today, to return to honoring that rule, that golden rule, we are doomed. What we will see coming from NFL locker rooms and corporate board rooms and middle school hallways will continue to sink in depths of degradation.
We are better than this. Let’s not point a finger at Incognito and the Dolphins. Instead, we must humble ourselves and return to our classic values. Life does have value. All life. Let us again take up that golden rule and make it our position that as for me and my house, my family, we will not support TV shows, movies, video games, activities or any other things that treats life so caustically, that acts so rudely, so crudely, so ugly towards others.
Before we can stop bullying, we have to eliminate the forces that suggest acting like a bully is a good thing. And don’t try to tell me that movies or video games are no big deal, that TV doesn’t cause bullying to happen. These forces absolutely do impact the minds and thoughts of our society.
We are better. We must be better. Listen to the better angels of your nature. It’s a rule that IS BETTER. It really is golden. Let’s live that way.