a moral blind spot
Posted on 05. Mar, 2010 by Seth in culture
words > SARAH NIEMAN
I’m proud to live in Wichita. You could argue that we aren’t as socially progressive as other cities, but you could never convince me that we’re lacking in heart. Among friends and strangers, I regularly encounter kindness and generosity, but if you assume that bigotry and prejudice are problems of the past, take another look. Love and hate are frequent bedfellows.
This December I was shopping with a friend and her son—she was shopping for Christmas gifts for children whose parents were unable to afford them. We drove past a church, and their brightly lit nativity scene caught our attention. My friend’s son was the first to realize the manger was lacking a baby. Curious, he asked his mother who had taken the baby Jesus, and she promptly replied, “Muslims.” My jaw came unhinged. How could such an irrationally hostile statement come from the mouth of one of the sweetest women I know?
I wish I could say that conversation was the most offensive thing I’ve heard from local friends, family, and strangers, but it’s not. Racism, religious bigotry, political elitism, and prejudice towards the LGBT community or those of lower economic status can all be found within our city. Now that I have a child, I’ve begun to worry how to explain the moral blind spots of others. What if it’s someone your child loves or admires? Sure, everyone makes mistakes, but what happens when we don’t realize we’re making them?
Ever since Dr. Seuss appeared on the scene, parents have found his work an entertaining medium for moral instruction. Though Seuss never set out to write a story focused on a specific moral, the issues near and dear to his heart had a way of cropping up regardless.
The Lorax, my childhood favorite, plants the idea of environmental preservation. How the Grinch Stole Christmas is an ever-popular classic, which reminds us that things are not the source of happiness. Another personal favorite is the marvelous collection The Sneetches and Other Stories. The title story The Sneetches illustrates the stupidity and silliness of discrimination. Two of the other stories The Zax and What Was I Scared Of? emphasize the importance of compromise, lest the rigidity of our beliefs leave us standing still, while the world moves on around us, and the insight that knowledge conquers fear.
Dr. Seuss had a wonderful gift—he was able to convey moral truths with tricky tongue-twisters and playful rhymes. But even he had a moral blind spot.
Before his contributions to children’s literature became well known, Theodore Seuss Geisel penned political cartoons. During WWII, he used the same appealing sketches we adore in his books to demonstrate that racism towards American blacks and Jews was detrimental to the war effort overseas. And yet, Dr. Seuss approved of the internment of Japanese Americans and helped to create an incredibly harmful stereotype with his cartoons, that all people of Japanese descent were traitors.
Maybe Horton Hears a Who was his apology. It was dedicated to a friend in Japan and encourages the reader to speak out in defense of those unable to defend themselves.
Take some time to search your soul. If we don’t shine some light on our own moral blind spots, how can we identify them in others? If we can’t identify them in others, how can we help the next generation make the world a better place? We’ve got to teach our children that love and hate do not mix. Any amount of hate, no matter how small, has the potential to poison a lifetime of good.
The Lorax says it best: “Unless someone like you cares a whole awful lot, nothing is going to get better. It’s not.”
3 Responses to “a moral blind spot”
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Monisa
10. Mar, 2010
Very well said. Bravo!
Ryan Henneberg
15. Mar, 2010
It’s our family tradition to leave Jesus out of the manger until Christmas morning. Believe it or not, Jesus spoke about this same thing in his Sermon on the Mount. Here’s his take on it (as found in Matthew 7):
“Do not judge, or you too will be judged. For in the same way you judge others, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you. Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother’s eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye? How can you say to your brother, ‘Let me take the speck out of your eye,’ when all the time there is a plank in your own eye? You hypocrite, first take the plank out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother’s eye.”
Lerhra Teacher
10. Sep, 2010
Ryan, you have just done exactly what you say should not be done, judge others – by citing the gospel passage, which has in it “you hypocrite”. The lord, your God Jesus, had the authority to do this, he was without sin, was He? However, you and I don’t have the moral authority, even to use the scriptures to chastise those whom we believe, are less righteous. The remark of Muslems stole it, was a sort of spontaneous combustion of deep sitted biases, not planed and probably not intended to do harm.