Yesterday, I talked about how I feel like I’ve become a ‘native’ in my southern Appalachian home, even though I wasn’t born here. Native is belonging. Nativism is the opposite. It is excluding all others.
The reality for a significant number of Americans and immigrants, is that they can’t possibly feel a sense of belonging, because the current residents, (or often, more accurately, the politicians and pundits who claim to represent the residents), won’t allow it.
I had a much longer draft post written, but all I will say for now, in the wake of the horrific shooting in Buffalo is this:
The next chapter welcomes whites, and christians, and conservatives. But it is not a whites-only, christians-only, conservatives-only club. It’s not a club at all. It’s a civilization, a community, a neighborhood.
And I would urge us all to remember that there IS NO cultural majority in America, no matter how noisily some segments yell. We all get to create multiple cultures that can co-exist and change, not just one that has to dominate so the lucky can belong and the rest must be shunned.
Xenophobic nationalism (nativism) has no place in the next chapter. We have never owned a static definition of our collective culture. America doesn’t belong to one, loud (but small) group of people that would have you believe they are the only true natives and the only ‘correct’ arbiters of traditional, national values.
I hope that we, in America, can recognize and celebrate that even in our relatively short history, our nation has seen and supported a changing culture many, many times. Sometimes against great odds and only through great sacrifice.
Let’s not stop now.