When I was about 21 years old I had an epiphany about myself and my intellectual vs. emotional understanding of politics. I'll never forget it. I was at The Intiman Theater in Seattle seeing Tony Kushner's "Angels In America." For those not familiar, there is a crucial moment in the show when two men who have been falling in love with each other are about to kiss for the first time. It's that same moment in any love story, soap opera or romantic comedy when the audience just simply wants the new couple to kiss. You know that moment: the couple comes in close, it's slow and much anticipated and if anything stops that kiss it could interrupt the trajectory of that couples' love forever. So the audience is holding their breath in hopeful anticipation.
So, at that minute I found myself wanting these two men to kiss. I was fully enthralled; intellectually, emotionally, all of it. And as they did..and I heard my self let out my breath.
After it was over, I thought, Well, that was interesting, that was literally the first time in my life I really wanted two men to kiss. Prior to that, I knew the "right" thing was to be "ok with" homosexuality, to support gay rights, gay marriage all of it; but having that intellectual understanding versus really having that emotional agreement with it are two very different things. I suddenly realized that I needed to examine that conflict personally in all aspects of my political/social beliefs. It began to feel false for me to just agree with something because I knew I was a liberal or a Democrat and so had to or else risk being called conservative in anyway.
Now, I don't want to give Chris Matthews too much credit here. But I wonder if his "aha moment" during the State of the Union Address was a little like mine. Like maybe he never intellectually considered himself a racist because he believes that racism is wrong; but it was still in there somewhere. So, when he said those words "I forgot he was black for an hour," maybe that was the hour he truly and emotionally was able to look past the color of a person's skin and so judged the President by the "content of his character." At least I hope so.
Thursday, January 28, 2010
Chris Matthews Aha! Moment
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4 comments:
You're being very generous. I think he just didn't know he was being lame.
I think both the blog entry and the comment are self righteous and blinded by the posters' personal issues. Oftentimes, Chris, although somewhat clumsily, tries to evoke peoples' thoughts beyond their own limitations. He states the obvious that others will not state. Sure he is an ass hat a lot of the time, but he is also a generous and open and very human commentator, at other times. This time it appears he was wanting to illuminate the fact that so many "non-prejudiced" people, because of our society, have the repeated awareness that Obama is black. He was addressing particularly those who have no negative connotation at all. He was enjoying and sharing that there are times when Obama soars to such heights that he "emotionally" gathers "the many" with him and in this even well meaning people who sometimes remember he is black, entirely forget it and instead experience that ideal of a non-prejudicial society, if only for that moment. Chris is sometimes very publicly self sacrificing and yet this is not generally credited to him. He often takes a chance to better our perceptions. If you have not yet realized that Chris's first love is not his wife, but witnessing the interplay and effects of politics on people's thoughts as well as feelings, the gamesmanship of it all, then it makes it harder to understand him. Chris Kvells (yiddish term)and cries inside, many times. That being said he is still often an ass hat.
I think that your assessment of Chris Mathews makes sense. I really appreciated your personal story.
With respect, I think the other posts are missing the point. Matthews was saying that he was so taken with Obama's presentation, he forgot he was black. He meant it as a compliment. Of course it's racist -- but racist in a "nice" way.
Argument by analogy: "I was so impressed with his presentation, for an hour, I forgot he was Italian."
Any way you slice it, it's not good.
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