More civil discourse

We've been hearing too much violent talk from the right! Particularly about our president. We on the left should be speaking out about this violent talk. It's not acceptable! Of course we also need to understand it as well. Tea baggers are responding to an elitism in our country, even if they many not be aware of it. These are people who have always been treated as losers. They are not successful by the measures of success in this country: By and large, they don't have professional jobs; they are not attractive; many are overweight; most haven't gone to college, let alone ivy league colleges.

Those of us who did go to good colleges must realize that our educations taught us to sneer at these people. Our education taught us that we were superior because we were able to get good grades. We learned to look down on kids in the slow reading group.

Yes, we were children who were being trained to be elitists. But now that we're adults, we should know better. We should realize what's at the root of this anger and work to create a more equal society.

But working for equality is a long hall. We can make a difference day to day by creating situations in which people come together with affection and respect rather than anger and disrespect. We have to create situations in which people come together to laugh and enjoy each other. Keep conviviality alive! And then, maybe the angry people will sense that they're missing something and want to join in.

I think that one way we can do this is to have events with our neighbors. Even in Seattle we have conservatives in our progressive neighborhoods, but the genius of neighborhood events is that we're coming together for other reasons than political organizing, and we can avoid political divisions. Maybe it's disaster preparedness or a garden circle or learning about someone's backyard chickens. These are things we can do. Just start talking to your neighbors!

If you want ideas, take a look at the movements for sustainability and community. In Seattle check out the SCALLOPS group: Sustainable Communities All Around Puget Sound. http://scallopswa.org/
Nationally, and even internationally, is the Transition town network.http://www.transitiontowns.org/ http://www.transitionseattle.com/