ABC News Service looks at Jena

[Ed Pettibone]

Try this link:

http://www.abc-usa.org/news/2007/20070917a.htm

[mattreal]

Racism is evil.

Unequal prison sentences undermine what we say is a core value as a nation, that all men are created equal, and are an affront to our responsibilities as created in the image of God.

But is the tone of this article really how we as a denomination want to be perceived? Beatings, by both black and white students, are dispicable- but this was not a lynching, as the Billy Holliday song referenced implies. Isn't balance, a call for repentence from all who have used violence and threats, really more in line with Christ's commands? My impression from reading the article was that the beating that the black students committed in retaliation for wrongs done to them was justified by the writer. I don't agree.

"In Jena, La., sitting under the “white tree” was just as dangerous as confronting a fiery serpent bearing a flaming sword. " This is just not true.

Matt

[Haruo]

[Ed Pettibone]

I want to thank you fellows for your reasoned input and keeping the discussion on what is happening in Jena. Thus far I am amazed that our local media outlets have had very little on this, how about your local area?

[pastormikejordan]

Hi folks.

I'm almost afraid to write this because I don't want to be misperceived.

All that is truly clear about the Jena Six incident is that so much is unclear. A simple trip to the quick and dirty introduction at wikipedia () demonstrates this. Of course hanging nooses in a tree is despicable and the students involved should have been prosecuted with something. Of course the prosecutor is a hateful moron for making the statement "with one stroke of a pen, I can make your lives disappear" (or at least he appears to be a hateful moron without whatever context the statement was made in). But beyond this, we know very little. There are contradictory stories, unsavory characters of every shade and assertions and denials all over the place. What do we know?

1. Some white youths hung nooses in a tree. No matter what, this is more than "an innocent prank" as one school administrator said. There should have been more punishment meted out as a statement to the kids, and the rest of the school and community about the school's commitment to providing a safe place for learning for all people.

2. These nooses may or may not have led directly to the Dec. 4 beating of the young white man. This appears to still be very much up in the air.

3. Six black youths kicked and beat a young white man Dec. 4. Reports of how injured he was vary.

I hope we all can agree that the kind of intimidation nooses would provide has no place at a school or anywhere in a civilized nation. And of course, I hope we all would realize that a six-on-one beating and kicking of a person, no matter what race the perpetrators and what race the victim, is also injustice. Tim, I'm sorry, but we're not talking about little kids without moral culpability. To insist the Jena Six had no choice but to repeatedly kick and beat another young man until his face was swollen and he could not see out of one eye (if his testimony is true) is to infantilize the young black men involved in the case. It is, IMO, its own type of biased statement to say that blacks simply can't be responsible for their actions when provoked. They have the same ability to make reasoned responses to hatred that you and I do; recognizing that might help racial equality in the long run.

This is not a case of four little girls on their way to a Birmingham Sunday School, or the impossibly evil Bull Connor turning fire hoses on peaceful protestors; we are talking (and making bold statements as a denominational representative) about a situation we know very little about but we do know that a young man was alone being beaten and kicked by six of his peers. You better be darn sure there's real injustice before you hitch your train to the beaters and the kickers.

My two cents: we have to know SO MUCH MORE about what really happened before releasing this kind of statement as denominational leaders. Just a year ago, it was tempting to jump all over the Duke lacrosse players until the party-wrecking truth came out that they didn't do it. Oh well. What an inconvenience--not that anyone let the truth stand in the way of a good story. Now everyone involved with that at Duke, all the profs and administrators who repudiated their students, have egg on their face. Now we have this story and while no one seems to have a good handle on the actual facts, we are ready to compare them to the "strange fruit" which grows on Southern trees--despite the facts there have been no complaints about the police handling of the incident, the jury selection process, and the charges against four of the six are no longer attempted murder, but second-degree battery. It treats as fact so much that is still unclear--whether indeed a black student had been beaten with a beer bottle (still disputed), the context of the District Attorney's remarks (in an assembly, not apparently to the student sitting in under the white tree), the white students' punishment for the nooses (which the AP insists was a two-week internal suspension and placement at an alternative school for a month, not a 3-day suspension as the ABC document insists).

Ben Reid, a 61-year-old black resident of Jena (one presumes he has seen injustice), said, "This whole thing ain't no downright, racial affair...You have good people here and bad people here, on both sides. This thing has been blown out of proportion. What we ought to do is sit down and talk this thing out, 'cause once all is said and done and you media folks leave, we're the ones who're going to have to live here."

Sounds downright...well, Christian! Talk it out? We have to live together? Let's make it work and acknowledge that there is good and bad in both sides? Let's acknowledge each other's humanity, both the good and the bad? Too bad that's harder to do when Hollywood and mainline denominations are saying things like this.

And I will close by taking one very brief spin on my hobby horse: we as a denomination cannot pretend neutrality on controversial issues when we release statements like this. We cannot lay claim to being merely a mission-sending organization when we elect and support leaders whose job it is to release statements like this. It is an attempt to have our cake and eat it too, to maintain autonomy while supporting leaders who make bold "prophetic" statements like this.

Just my 2 cents--sorry if I sound frustrated. I guess I am.

Mike

[Haruo]

[pastormikejordan]

Tim, I agree in general with you. I was just going for a quick introduction to demonstrate how little we know.

Did you see any substantial errors in the Jena Six article?

Haruo, since you know more about wikipedia than I do, does the fact it is moderated mean in general it is more accurate?

[Haruo]

[pastormikejordan]

Thought some here may still be interested in this recent story from Jason Whitlock, KC Star columnist. Cites (though not approvingly) the ABC minister who provided many of the facts for the ABC document.

http://www.kansascity.com/273/story/296701.html

Mike

[Haruo]

Well, it gets murkier. Incidentally, if Bean is an ABC minister, why does Whitlock call him a "self-proclaimed" Baptist minister? Is Whitlock himself a "dispassionate" observer, or does he have a dog in this, too? I don't have any idea how to assess this story, but it's not a clear debunking of the basic story as previously presented. It just makes parts of it murkier.

Haruo

[pastormikejordan]

Yeah, that was a strange modifier, wasn't it? I don't really know the story...all ministers are "self-proclaimed," aren't they? Just put it up for an FYI--

MJ

[jerryl]

Whitlock might, and I'm being generous, have used 'self-proclaimed' because Alan Bean does not minister in a church setting.

I've met Alan Bean and after Tulia, he's made Friends of Justice his ministry.