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Perspective: A Nation On A Desperate Edge

It is the desperation, fear, and hatred in their faces that follows me. The pained shouts. The hand-to-hand barbarian combat. The use of blunt objects and murder weapons that were at hand. January 6th leaves me with troubling questions like a family member after a suicide.

What drives people to a desperate edge? Why does a person embrace lies over truth? How does a person turn the flag he claims to revere into a weapon?

The first silent stirrings of this horrific societal eruption go back to before any of us were born, back to what Isabel Wilkerson refers to as “the origins of our discontents.”

It’s significant that some carried confederate flags while stalking the halls of Congress. The hostile sundry group of malcontents were held together by a chain of anger. Some angers they could name and others unnamed boiled over from deep inside.

Until now whites could always be certain of their rung on society’s ladder. This eruption is deeper than a supposedly stolen election. Truth and logic is of little importance to those filled with the fear of their privilege being threatened.

Our nation will be teetering on the crater’s edge until we acknowledge those frightened out of their minds, face all our shadows, engage in truth and reconciliation like this nation has never had.

Will we move from the edge? It is up to each of us to choose.

I’m Dan Kenney and this has been my perspective.

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