Honestly, now.

“I have a dream that one day, when i call an 800 number i dont need to press 1 for english. that one day i wont have to work a 40 hr week for someone who sits on thier ass, perfectly able to flip burgers, but collects welfare. that one day we will have plenty of american jobs and everything will be American made. that … one day blacks and hispanics will quit playing the victim game and relize they’re treated better than whites. that someday we will support a white president again. that one day our children will be able to pray in school and say the pledge of allegience.that one day Americans will support our troops instead of corrupt Politicians..
just my opinion.. which is why our troops are over there anyway so we can be free..”

I’ll give you a moment to wrap your brain around that.

This was taken from an online argument on facebook.  (I’m not publishing the name for a myriad of reasons.)  And, like I imagine most of you, parts of my brain simply shorted out from the overload.  I could spend my time tearing this paragraph apart.  From the audacity to echo Martin L. King Jr.’s words in order to spread of message of racism to the asinine idea that minorities are playing a game at being victims.  I could.  But I won’t.  Instead, I have a question:

How should we respond to this?

While my first instinct to grab whatever blunt object is handy, that really doesn’t change anything.  Ultimately, I don’t want people like this to shut up.  I’d like to change their mind.  I’d like for them to be a little more logical and a whole lot less fearful.  I want them to feel compassion.   Sure, I could beat them over the head with facts.  But that only goes so far.  Eventually, they close up and then you’ve gotten exactly nowhere.

I recall an event at Walmart in which a grandmother was terribly upset for some reason.  She only spoke Spanish.  Nearly in tears, she was frantic and couldn’t communicate why.  Another employee make the comment, “Why can’t those people just learn English?”  After finding that the woman couldn’t find her grandson, finding the grandson, and getting things squared away, I went back to the employee in question.

I asked her how far she would go to make her children’s lives better.  She said that she’d probably do anything.  I asked her if she had to choose between raising her children in a place where there was a high crime rate, where they could never get ahead, and where education would be limited or raising them in a place where there was a chance that they might do well, what would she choose?  She chose the later.  Would she still choose the later even if it meant that she would have to move far away from her family, not know the language, and take a job washing floors?  She admitted that she would.   I asked her to imagine her day.  She might have to work long hours and maybe she could only see her kids for a few hours each day.  Would she take an English class or spend time with her kids?   She got very quiet after that.

Skip ahead a few months.  I overheard the same employee gently dressing down another associate.  She was have the same conversation that I had that day.  But this time, she was the one appealing to the associate’s imagination and compassion.  Yeah, I cried at work that day.  But for the very best of reasons.

How do I respond?  I ask questions.

Too often people try to railroad others into changing their minds with facts and logic.  The problem is that those two only work if the other person has a base made of them (so to speak).  And if they do, that’s fantastic.  But if they don’t, in the end, both parties are angry and nothing in accomplished.

I like my sister’s method.  She merely postulates this: How does insert behavior here make you a better person?

So here’s my question for the readers of the vast interweb: How would you respond?