If the US is Middle Earth…
Then Sauron is Afoot
I’m into my 6th decade of life, and I’ve never seen the like.
I archive my stories in my personal blog to keep them together in one place and to organize them. Preparing this one tonight, I’m struck by how nothing has changed since I wrote it.
I’m struck by how the United States is being run and ruled by nothing less than forces of darkness. As a Tolkien fan from early childhood, what I’m seeing now is new — something best understood though a lens of his epic tales.
- Our leaders openly and unapologetically avow racism and xenophobia.
- Calls to end the unjustified killings of people of color by police forces are met with mockery and rage — at the highest levels of political leadership.
- Christians openly call for the caging of refugee children.
- A man credibly accused of sexual violence against women is praised as a paragon of virtue as he’s elevated to the Supreme Court.
- That same man is known to have persecuted his gay roommate at Yale, and that information about his character is not even entering the national discourse. (Not for my lack of trying. Click here and retweet me!)
- Our political leaders are deliberately enacting policies to cause transgender women to be raped — for reasons of spite and cold political calculus.
- The Trump administration has ordered the State Department to stop pressuring foreign nations not to imprison and persecute LGBTQ people — claiming such pressure would be a violation of “religious liberty.”
I could go on and on, but my point is that cruelty and immorality are being actively pursued and praised in the United States — openly, in ways I’ve never seen in my lifetime. I’m used to my fellow citizens and leaders at least pretending to honor decency and humanity.
Some people say that this spirit of immorality pervading the nation is a temporary phenomenon, an accidental anomaly.
I don’t know. Perhaps the November elections will lend clarity. I know what it feels like to me —
Sauron is Loose in the Land
I’m going to write about the brave woman who kicked Donald Trump’s press secretary out of her restaurant Friday night — in a minute.
I’m also going to tell you something you probably don’t know about that situation. I’ve got more than just a dash of homestyle Queer Rights to season the sauce of this tale. Bear with me while I set the stage first. I promise not to take up too much of your time.
Have you read J.R.R. Tolkien’s epic “Lord of the Rings” trilogy?
Sauron was the principal antagonist, a force of absolute evil — malevolence made flesh. The good creatures of Middle Earth, and most particularly innocent little Hobbitses, watched in horror as a shadow fell over the sun to block warmth, light, and love.
Sauron was loose in the land.
Kindness, love, charity, and compassion shrank and fled before him.
Tolkien penned his epic while the shadow of fascism was falling over Europe. Perhaps he didn’t intend any direct parallels, but his sensibility and framing are inescapable.
It’s impossible not to see those parallels rising again in our own time. Sauron roams, seeking what he may devour. No, by the way, I’m not calling Donald Trump the equivalent of Sauron.
Trump doesn’t deserve that much credit.
The President of the United States is merely reflecting a strain of mean-spirited, small-minded, xenophobic, racist, homophobic, transphobic Othering that’s infecting not only the United States right now, but most of North America and much of Europe.
Fascism is on the loose. Human decency and compassion are shrinking daily.
American border agents have been literally ripping small children and infants from the arms of parents who are legally seeking asylum and refuge from persecution, oppression, and poverty.
Political leaders have been citing Christian texts (of all things) to justify incivility and even barbarity.
Yes, Trump had to retreat and sign an executive order to keep refugee families together. He still insists we have to jail asylum-seeking families indefinitely, though. The administration has few plans to reunite families that have already been separated.
According to Newsweek, the administration is busy taking money from HIV treatment programs of last resort, from Head Start, and from critical cancer research in order to build more jails to house immigrant refugee families.
Sauron is loose in the land.
In the Lord of the Rings, Frodo Baggins proved to be Sauron’s downfall. Frodo was nobody. He was a small, powerless Hobbit. His sword could but knick and sting in comparison to those of his enemies.
Frodo’s heart was filled with love and goodness, however. He was made of stern, stubborn stuff, courageous beyond ordinary courage, determined to take a stand if fate delivered that burden to him.
Frodo didn’t expect to defeat Sauron, but he knew he had to try. He knew he had to be courageous and do his very best, even if his own defeat was all but assured.
Stephanie Wilkinson, owner of the The Red Hen, a restaurant in Virginia, is a hero as unexpected as Frodo. She took a stand for morality and decency. She refused to accommodate evil.
She would not bow to apathy.
Stephanie knows what Frodo knew. Each of us makes a difference. We all matter deeply. We are all responsible for one another.
Stephanie swallowed hard and made a really tough decision that harmed her personally and financially. She walked up to Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders and told her that she and her party weren’t welcome in her restaurant.
You probably know the basics of the story already. If you don’t, here’s Newsweek’s account:
The owner of the Red Hen told The Washington Post she asked Sanders to leave after the staff raised concerns about serving the press secretary. “I’m not a huge fan of confrontation,” Stephanie Wilkinson said in a report published Saturday evening. “I have a business, and I want the business to thrive. This feels like the moment in our democracy when people have to make uncomfortable actions and decisions to uphold their morals.”
Wilkinson said the recent turmoil of separating children at the border and Sander’s defense of the transgender military ban were key contributors to her and her staff’s decision.
“I was babbling a little, but I got my point across in a polite and direct fashion,” Wilkinson said, according to the Post. “I explained that the restaurant has certain standards that I feel it has to uphold, such as honesty, and compassion, and cooperation. I said, ‘I’d like to ask you to leave.’”
I told you I had some Queer Rights to sauce this story!
Stephanie seems to be as worried as I am that the cold winds of fascism are blowing again as they blew in the 1930s. She’s horrified by the inhumane actions of our leaders and our police forces at the southern border.
She doesn’t stop there, though. She made a point of telling the Newsweek reporter that she and her staff object to the immoral marginalization and stigmatization of transgender people.
The Trump administration chose to pick on transgender people because they’re an easy target. Trump and his fascist allies see trans people as weak and defenseless, as easy targets for rallying forces of hatred and exclusion.
Stephanie said no.
She said yes to compassion, and love, and morality, and decency. She’s our Frodo of the moment and our example. She knows something really important that all of us need to know.
We are all our brother’s keeper.
Unlike in an epic fantasy novel, however, Frodo can’t defeat Sauron by casting an iron ring into the flaming bowels of the earth.
One loving woman isn’t enough to defeat fascism.
Stephanie can’t do this alone.
Each of us is responsible for following her example. We must each be personally responsible for the persecuted, the oppressed, the downtrodden and the stigmatized.
Each of us has to take a stand. We’re all Frodo.
When we stand together with Stephanie, Sauron doesn’t stand a chance.
Say no to apathy!
