Earlier this month there was a tragic incident that occurred here on Long Island, close to home. It was a horrific reminder that sometimes human rights violations occur right in our own neighborhoods. And if we tolerate it in our own neighborhoods, would we really care about human rights violations around the world?
The victim of the incident was a 36 year-old man from Ecuador, brutally beaten and stabbed by 7 white teenagers. The reason? The teenagers were in search of someone "Mexican" to beat up. Based on the color of his skin, he was tracked down and murdered in a blatant racist hate crime. It is terrible that these teenagers deliberately isolated someone who was culturally different, not to mention their obvious stereotyping.
But this is not the first hate crime committed on Long Island. There have been various others, mostly targeted towards a growing Hispanic population on an island that happens to be in close proximity to one of the most diverse cities in the U.S. (New York City). As several people mentioned tonight in a vigil to remember and celebrate the life of Marcelo Lucero (the Ecuadorean man who lost his life tragically), how can such tragedies occur in a country that has elected its first African-American president? [Read the full story here.]
It leads me to ponder the words of one of the faculty who spoke earlier this evening: how are we contributing to a culture of inaction, rhetoric, and silence? Are we? And what are the consequences of that? Privately we may shake our heads in disbelief, but what do we do publicly to challenge those norms of inaction, of words that become rhetoric but ring hollow in the wake of the silence that follows? How do we change all this and teach the next generation about the value of human beings regardless of their skin color, their shape, their language, their culture, their religion, or their gender?
Something else that rang in my head this evening was the words "never again".... The president of our university echoed those in her remarks; but where have we heard them before? We heard them echoed after the Rwandan genocide - that "never again" will the world standby as genocide occurs. I am tempted to think that is yet more rhetoric, falling from lips to floor in silence and inaction as we look around us, not just here on Long Island but in the U.S. and in the world as more atrocities happen. And yet again the communities stand by and do nothing because of no personal vested interest or gain. It is no wonder the next generation still has yet to learn the value and dignity of human beings.....
Where do you stand? And how will you play your part? I hope that I can answer these questions for myself and attempt to transform inaction to action, rhetoric to meaningful dialogue, and silence into voice. Be a voice, be a neighbor, be a friendly look or hello, be involved, and be a part of transforming our communities.
