On Tuesday, I went to the bank. The teller said hello, asked me how my day was. This was a work trip – I make deposits at this bank almost every week. I asked her how her day was and she replied with that half-joking voice of dread we’ve all come to recognize in our day-to-day corporate existences. She said something about it being just past noon on a Tuesday. I half expected her to follow it with, “am I right?” Trying to keep it positive, I mentioned the holiday on Monday – banks were closed. I think it took a few moments for my comment to register. She asked if we had off and I said, “sadly, no.” My plan was to make it an official day off in our employee handbook, but that requires board review and approval – which can sometimes be complicated. I don’t think my board would disapprove, but there are other things I want to address and don’t want to re-write the handbook (and get approval) one piece at a time. The teller seemed almost aggravated that they were closed. She thinks if they get Juneteenth off, they should get Good Friday off. I couldn’t argue for or against her statement, but something about it seemed resentful – like why don’t I get what’s important to me off… like what is this fake holiday stuff… like why do these people get a day off? She didn’t say those things, but it felt like that’s where the comments were headed. She said she’s not allowed to be political at work.
If Juneteenth is political, it’s because a certain number of Americans have decided to make it political. The other day, I was on a different bank’s Facebook page. They had an announcement about being closed on Juneteenth. The only comment was, “Really?? Since when is this a national holiday? Ridiculous!!” This is a very local bank and I’m going to assume a very local customer (probably not some bot trolling Kohl’s or Target). The teller at my bank changed the conversation to how she saw on the news (Fox News) that Kroger and another store were pulling patriotic products from their shelves…. products that were made in America and said things like “Give me liberty or give me death.” The teller made it very clear (despite not really being allowed to talk about politics) that this is what America was founded on liberty, and freedom – and I presume death. I could almost see the stars and stripes in her eyes. She seemed upset about this type of “cancel” culture.
I hadn’t heard about this latest cultural wars brouhaha (distraction) – it hasn’t hit my commie NPR station yet. When I got home, I decided to look it up. What she failed to mention was that the items being pulled depicted assault rifles and customers had asked that they be removed given the recent mass shootings. I had a lot of things I wanted to “discuss” with the teller – not least of which would have been to ask why she’s so riled up about stores that don’t even operate in our area? This “controversy” quite literally has no bearing on her day to day life (unless she was planning on buying that item in that out-of-state Kroger). I wondered if she considered that the “news” piece was designed to get her up in arms (pun intended)? Instead I think I said something along the lines of, “it’s a shame we can’t have honest conversations about issues” or something equally droll that didn’t register. I felt uncomfortable with the entire exchange and really just wanted the small talk to stop.
I’ve been thinking about the “politics” thing a lot lately. It seems that resentment and outrage are everywhere. I find a lot of things to be disturbing and disappointing in our political landscape. Even within my own work, I feel as though I’m caught between our motto which is to “Live United” and the “anti-woke” sentiment I see and hear every day. On a personal level, I vehemently disagree with the “anti-woke” mob and the new culture wars that are taking place. As the CEO of an organization that is supposed to be representative of its community, I have to tread more cautiously. I was on a call the other week where a colleague expressed similar concerns. Our overall organization wants us to focus more on equity work – to be leaders in equity work. That is difficult to do in homogeneous communities that are fairly insular. Most of the tools that have been developed around diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) have focused on race and gender. My colleague acknowledged that DEI goes well beyond those two categories, but in a community that is 99% white, she has to work harder and be more creative in addressing equity. For organizations like hers and mine, equity and anti-racism work might look different. It might mean bringing on the first African-American board member in the organization’s history, it might mean a slower approach to training our board and staff. Unfortunately, organizations like hers and mine, where we might have further to go and will have to be more creative, tend to have fewer staff members to do the work. On many days, it feels like a losing battle.
This notion of swimming upstream became a theme for the week as a cohort of my colleagues from across the state gathered here in State College for a state-wide conference. We had good conversations that served as a check against our despair or feeling small. There was a keynote talk on diversity that made the point I’ve been trying to make – we have to assess our communities readiness for diversity and recognize that we’re all at different starting points. One colleague shared that in her community a teen was marching in a park with a BLM poster and residents showed up (bearing their second amendment rights) and shouted at the teen to go home. It seems as though the message from such folks is, give ME liberty or give me death – which includes my right to threaten your liberty. This has always been the case in a country that counted some people as not whole people and has always struggled with the idea of equal rights.
Yesterday the Supreme Court overturned Roe. I don’t have much to say about it other than I’m sorry. Men, who mostly look like older, stuffier, and better dressed (suits and ties) versions of me have had far too much to say on this issue. The other day I wrote that sometimes I hate where this country is headed. The irony here is that the “other side” feels the same way. Perhaps we need to craft a new constitution – though I suspect we may be beyond the point of finding common ground. In these moments, I have to remind myself that change is inevitable and often without value – neither better nor worse, just different and seldom permanent. The pendulum swings and sometimes swings back. We, as a species have made it through massive atrocities. Sometimes we learn, often we forget, but we always keep moving even if it is upstream.