So Long, Bob  | |
| The Death of the Album? | |
| My Practice of Zen in the Office | |
| My Blank Pages | |
| Classical Confusion |
SOMETIMES STANDING UP MEANS KEEPING YOUR SEAT by Russell BartholomeeOctober 24, 2005 Fifty years ago, Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat to a white man on a bus in Montgomery, Alabama and was arrested for her failure to comply with an immoral law. Her arrest prompted the African-American community in Montgomery, led by the then-unknown Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. to boycott the buses for over a year, essentially kick-starting the national Civil Rights Movement. When asked later why she didn’t give up her seat, she replied simply that she was tired. She couldn’t have known when she refused to give up her seat that the boycott would take place, much less that it would ultimately succeed. She couldn’t have known then that her name would become synonymous with courage in the face of extreme adversity. I feel certain that she had no idea that day that she would live the rest of her life as an icon, a living symbol of the virtue of dissent in a democracy, of righteous anger in response to wicked oppression. She was just doing the right thing. Her act of civil disobedience could have resulted in a fine or jail time; it could also have cost her her life, something the black community knew all too well in the wake of the murder of Emmett Till earlier that year. But she was tired. Too tired to go along with the racist power structure anymore. Too tired to act like it didn’t matter. So she stood up for what was right. By keeping her seat. Rosa Parks’ example is as essential today as it ever was. Dissent is still a vital ingredient in a thriving democracy. We still need people who are willing to speak truth to power, to stand up to those who abuse that power which comes from the people in the first place. We stand as a society on the shoulders of giants like Rosa Parks, Dr. King, Paul Robeson, Henry David Thoreau, and Cesar Chavez—great Americans whose fearless integrity have been an inspiration to generations. They each found their own way to stand, and they taught us that we need to do the same. Rosa Parks died today at 92. May we remember to follow her example; to stand (or sit) for what is right. Our liberty depends on it. |  |
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