New Tribalism

History has been marked by the inability of human beings to get along with one another. Because of wars, men and their civilizations have walked upstream in a river of sorrow. Rodney King perhaps said it best on the third day of the LA riots, “can't we all get along?”

On a trip to Berlin, Germany, 15 years after WW2, the city was still in shambles. One couple, Americans staying at my hotel, were weeping after they had visited the street on which they had previously lived. The buildings they had known, their own house, damaged beyond repair from the bombs of warfare. The first time I visited Jerusalem, and this was before the 1967 war, the city was divided with Jordan controlling the Muslim section. My Jewish guide was not allowed to go into the Jordanian area.

Perhaps, man's inability to get along with others has led to these great dividing lines, even in America, where, supposedly, there is equality for all. Bill Gates in his Ten Rules for Success in Business said, “life is not fair, get used to it.” When I left my farm home, in a community where everyone was more or less on a level playing field, my mother said,” it is going to be a new life, far different people than you have known before, but if you want the same as you have here, there is no need for you to go to college.”

It did not take long for me to learn about the differences in the status of people. Fellow students from elitist preparatory schools, the chatter of the “fraternity row” crowd, their handshakes, their pledge parties, their expensive clothing, their expensive convertibles. It was a state university, supported by state taxpayers, but the most unequal place under the sun. If your father was a legislator, judge, official in the Democrat party, they would bend over backwards to make sure you were happy, not having any problems of any type, anywhere. The administrative office assigned elitist students to a counselor who made sure all was well. If a professor want to get fired, all he needed to do was upset the son of a legislator. My friend, Charlie Justice, was almost flunked in Spanish, professor Hugo Lopez said, “Senor Justice must pass.” Just I have never known a politician to return from an elected political office poorer than when he went, I have never known the child of a politician to flunk out of college.

Elitist college graduates become elitist civic leaders, usually there is a family fortune to be managed and inherited. This society wants a place of refuge from the “muck and smuck” of poor people. Here comes the country club, delightful paradise for the poachers of the world.

I was just a small child, knew nothing about the tribalism of America, taking a load of cured tobacco to the auction market in Wilson, North Carolina (the world's largest tobacco auction market). You turned the corner off of Highway 301 from our farm and there was a magnificent house up in the wooded area. I saw men with funny clothes, and a black boy caring a bag, these men were hitting a small white ball on the grass. I asked my father, “what are those folks doing?” He said, “that is a country club for the rich, and that is the way rich men get their exercise: hitting a ball on grass and then chasing after it” They wanted exercise, but they had someone else carry their clubs, and some even rode around on a cart. I will never forget, he said, “the rich are not like us, in that large building, the country club, they enjoy the best food that can be cooked, expensive liquor, gambling, prostitution, every sin that Satan can find. Then, they go and make laws for the rest of us, they are held up as examples, many even go to church.” These country clubs are probably the most exclusive tribes known to man, behind the Maharaja's policies in India.

Civic clubs (rotary, Jaycees), social clubs (moose, elk), have become tribal entities, so have committees such as the chamber of commerce, supported by elitists (Committee of 100, Industrial Commission). Authorities such as the airport authority, water and sewer authority, have become appointments for restless worn-out hack politicians seeking to further enrich themselves through these cash cow authorities, who always keep two set of books. You will never find hard-working, god-fearing, respectable individuals appointed to authorities.

Just as homeland security has become the gestapo of America, political intrigue has taken over law enforcement. As a lawyer in one of the most prominent law firms in my city said to me, “don't expect justice at the courthouse unless you have 'political pull'.” So it is with law enforcement. It is a sad day that finds only bullies and thugs wearing law enforcement badges and carrying weapons. Law enforcement is now a tribal affair, us against them. How well I remember walking down the street with my father and his uncle who was sheriff of the county; to every black person on the street, my uncle would say, “keep moving!”

So, as bad as the new tribalism is in America, think of what is like now, and was then, with minorities...not even allowed to go to a public university...not even allowed to go to a public beach.

Many of today's dividing lines, come with financial responsibilities. I note that even national religious conventions are held in such expensive places that the average church member or average pastor cannot afford to attend. The latest Southern Baptist Convention was held last week in Orlando, Florida, the most expensive city in the state. Past conventions were held in such places as Dallas, LA, Las Vegas, etc. Patriots, members of the tea party movement, average working republicans, cannot afford to attend (travel, hotel, food, etc.) conventions in the large convention cities where politicians like to nestle. The Democrats do not worry about these things because most of them, elected and appointed, are on the government time card and credit card. This is the way the tribes of political and spiritual interests are negated and regulated in America.

Traveling the world, every continent, even the villages of Africa, it is always the same, “big I, little you”. Mothers, along with the precious DNA that they have given their children, give them the hunger for equality, affecting themselves and others.