Thirsty for Justice
Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied.
Matthew 5:6
Access
to clean, safe, and affordable water is a basic human right essential
for a healthy population, environment, and economy. Not everyone gets
that right. The Commission for Racial Justice of the United Church of
Christ first coined a term to explain why. About 30 years ago, the UCC
came out with a report and coined the term, “environmental racism,”
calling out corporate and government actions that result in the unequal
exposure of racialized and low-income people to environmental dangers
that threaten their physical, social, economic, or environmental health
and well-being.
The Commission found a link between a person’s race and one’s likelihood of living near a hazardous waste facility. This ground-breaking report prompted numerous other studies that supported the UCC’s conclusions. Evidence mounted quickly saying that racialized and low-income communities bear a lop-sided share of environmental dangers and are victims of environmental racism. Some will go on the defense and argue that exposure to environmental toxins has to do more with income than race. But, signs indicate that race is more of a factor than class. In other words, if one were to compare a middle-class community of color to a low-income white community, and look at which community is more likely to have a hazardous waste facility near its neighborhood, the middle-class community of color would have a greater chance of being targeted for such a facility. In fact, in some cases, race is a more significant indicator of pollution burdens than income, childhood poverty, education, employment or home ownership.
For me, this is a faith issue. It is a thirst issue. Are we thirsty for justice? If we are thirsting for God to fill us, mold us and use us, are we also thirsting for all people to experience the same blessings? If others do not receive them, then my faith compels me to do my part to spread God’s love and compassion cover the earth, as the waters cover the sea. And for me, it starts locally. People of faith are called to care for each of our neighbors, regardless of race, income level, or life circumstances. Can we look around us, during these dry and withered times, in our region, with our neighbors, and say, “We thirst for righteousness, God”?
There are important parallels between racism and climate change denial. Both ideologies protect the interests of a wealthy elite. Both continue to undermine the interests of the working class. Both are a form of willful ignorance. While researchers produce report after report detailing the cataclysm to come, Americans remain ambivalent about whether humans are causing climate change. To end the debate, citizens concerned about the steady rise in temperature should decide that climate denial, like racism, has no quarter in the public square. Advocates should call out climate deniers and shame corporations who associate with them. And journalists should refuse to give a platform to climate change denial.
Fighting both racism and climate change denial means treating these dehumanizing and dangerous systems of belief as outside the bounds of public debate. Denial of degradation is too ugly, too hazardous and too backward to be validated in the marketplace of ideas. While we are busy debating whether racism and environmental degradation are real, American businesses take taking advantage of racists structures and general ignorance to make money. Did you know that during the 2010 BP Oil Spill, incarcerated workers were hired from the prison system to help with the clean up? Inmates on the cleanup were forbidden to speak to the media about their work, which state agencies called ‘green jobs’. Inmates earned between $0-$0.40 an hour. So, BP and its subcontractors got workers who were not only deeply discounted but also easily silenced—and BP received lucrative tax write-offs in the process. In a region where nine out of ten residents were white, the cleanup workers were almost exclusively African-American men. The racialized nature of the cleanup was so conspicuous, Ben Jealous, who was the president of the NAACP at the time, sent a public letter to BP demanding to know why Black people were over-represented in “the most physically difficult, lowest paying jobs, with the most significant exposure to toxins.” It’s environmental racism: the unequal exposure of racialized people to environmental dangers that threaten their physical, social, economic, or environmental health and well-being.
California hired incarcerated workers to help fight wildfires. While non-incarcerated fire fighters earned $22-$34 and hour, prison laborers earned $2 a day. And we know who most of the incarcerated workers are – they not white-collar criminals like Michael Cohen, right? We are talking about incarcerated Black workers brought up in a cradle-to-prison pipeline. The most dangerous place for a child to try to grow up in America is at the intersection of race and poverty. Black and Latino children are more likely to go to jail in their lifetime than their white peers not because of potential, but because of systemic inequity as a result of race and poverty. We should be very alarmed by the idea that the greatest predictor that a baby will succeed in life is the color of one’s skin and the family’s income level.
On a day like today when we commemorate the first enslaved Africans who were brought to this country against their will and forced to labor here, it’s hard to believe we, as Americans, are over the sin of slavery when we still find people laboring in similar situations today.
Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness. Righteousness is not just the private practice of doing good; it sums up the global responsibility of the human community to make sure every person has what they need, that everyone pursues a fair sense of justice for every, and that everyone else, that we are living in right relationship with one another, creation, and God. Jesus instructs us to be passionate for social, economic, and racial justice. Resist systemic, structured, institutionalized injustice with every bone in your body, with all your might, with your very soul. Seek justice as if it were your food and drink, your bread and water, as if it were a matter of life and death … because it is. Within our relationship to the God of justice and peace, those who dedicate their lives to that struggle, Jesus promises, will be satisfied. It will take a long time, but our nonviolent persistence and truth-telling will eventually win out and bear the good fruit of justice. Truth is on our side; God is on the side of justice.
The Commission found a link between a person’s race and one’s likelihood of living near a hazardous waste facility. This ground-breaking report prompted numerous other studies that supported the UCC’s conclusions. Evidence mounted quickly saying that racialized and low-income communities bear a lop-sided share of environmental dangers and are victims of environmental racism. Some will go on the defense and argue that exposure to environmental toxins has to do more with income than race. But, signs indicate that race is more of a factor than class. In other words, if one were to compare a middle-class community of color to a low-income white community, and look at which community is more likely to have a hazardous waste facility near its neighborhood, the middle-class community of color would have a greater chance of being targeted for such a facility. In fact, in some cases, race is a more significant indicator of pollution burdens than income, childhood poverty, education, employment or home ownership.
For me, this is a faith issue. It is a thirst issue. Are we thirsty for justice? If we are thirsting for God to fill us, mold us and use us, are we also thirsting for all people to experience the same blessings? If others do not receive them, then my faith compels me to do my part to spread God’s love and compassion cover the earth, as the waters cover the sea. And for me, it starts locally. People of faith are called to care for each of our neighbors, regardless of race, income level, or life circumstances. Can we look around us, during these dry and withered times, in our region, with our neighbors, and say, “We thirst for righteousness, God”?
There are important parallels between racism and climate change denial. Both ideologies protect the interests of a wealthy elite. Both continue to undermine the interests of the working class. Both are a form of willful ignorance. While researchers produce report after report detailing the cataclysm to come, Americans remain ambivalent about whether humans are causing climate change. To end the debate, citizens concerned about the steady rise in temperature should decide that climate denial, like racism, has no quarter in the public square. Advocates should call out climate deniers and shame corporations who associate with them. And journalists should refuse to give a platform to climate change denial.
Fighting both racism and climate change denial means treating these dehumanizing and dangerous systems of belief as outside the bounds of public debate. Denial of degradation is too ugly, too hazardous and too backward to be validated in the marketplace of ideas. While we are busy debating whether racism and environmental degradation are real, American businesses take taking advantage of racists structures and general ignorance to make money. Did you know that during the 2010 BP Oil Spill, incarcerated workers were hired from the prison system to help with the clean up? Inmates on the cleanup were forbidden to speak to the media about their work, which state agencies called ‘green jobs’. Inmates earned between $0-$0.40 an hour. So, BP and its subcontractors got workers who were not only deeply discounted but also easily silenced—and BP received lucrative tax write-offs in the process. In a region where nine out of ten residents were white, the cleanup workers were almost exclusively African-American men. The racialized nature of the cleanup was so conspicuous, Ben Jealous, who was the president of the NAACP at the time, sent a public letter to BP demanding to know why Black people were over-represented in “the most physically difficult, lowest paying jobs, with the most significant exposure to toxins.” It’s environmental racism: the unequal exposure of racialized people to environmental dangers that threaten their physical, social, economic, or environmental health and well-being.
California hired incarcerated workers to help fight wildfires. While non-incarcerated fire fighters earned $22-$34 and hour, prison laborers earned $2 a day. And we know who most of the incarcerated workers are – they not white-collar criminals like Michael Cohen, right? We are talking about incarcerated Black workers brought up in a cradle-to-prison pipeline. The most dangerous place for a child to try to grow up in America is at the intersection of race and poverty. Black and Latino children are more likely to go to jail in their lifetime than their white peers not because of potential, but because of systemic inequity as a result of race and poverty. We should be very alarmed by the idea that the greatest predictor that a baby will succeed in life is the color of one’s skin and the family’s income level.
On a day like today when we commemorate the first enslaved Africans who were brought to this country against their will and forced to labor here, it’s hard to believe we, as Americans, are over the sin of slavery when we still find people laboring in similar situations today.
Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness. Righteousness is not just the private practice of doing good; it sums up the global responsibility of the human community to make sure every person has what they need, that everyone pursues a fair sense of justice for every, and that everyone else, that we are living in right relationship with one another, creation, and God. Jesus instructs us to be passionate for social, economic, and racial justice. Resist systemic, structured, institutionalized injustice with every bone in your body, with all your might, with your very soul. Seek justice as if it were your food and drink, your bread and water, as if it were a matter of life and death … because it is. Within our relationship to the God of justice and peace, those who dedicate their lives to that struggle, Jesus promises, will be satisfied. It will take a long time, but our nonviolent persistence and truth-telling will eventually win out and bear the good fruit of justice. Truth is on our side; God is on the side of justice.
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