Pretend you are blind. Pretend you live in a place where violence in words and deeds is common. You are unable to get a job. You have to rely on the charity of others – friends, family, neighbors, the Government – just to eat. Pretend you want something better. If I open a door for you and tell you that on the other side is a better life, one where violence is only a rumor and jobs are plentiful, would you walk through the door?
What if I told you that as you walk through it you will experience unbelievable pain because you have to change – not physically, but emotionally change. You will have to have your mind opened to possibilities that you are not able to understand where you are now. You will have to be willing to be responsible for yourself and accountable to your new neighbors. You will have to change as you walk through that door and that it will hurt and it will seem like an eternity but it will be worth it. Would you still walk through that door?
This is the question that divides us.
I have been watching the developments in the Kansas City Missouri Public Schools for the past few weeks. As a suburbanite mother with childhood ties to the district, my interest is shallow compared to those who have children in the district now. I know that most people won’t understand why I’m riveted by the drama. For me, though, the future of Kansas City (and of my suburban hometown) is linked to the future of the school district. The decline of the schools and rot of the urban core are traceable to the same cause. On the surface, it looks like racism. I believe it is something more insidious: a culture of entitlement versus a culture of accountability.
It’s the question of whether or not you are willing to endure pain to achieve a better life. Everyone is faced with this decision at some point. Somewhere along the way our parents and teachers and neighbors hold us accountable for our actions and we have to decide whether we are going to accept that responsibility or if we are going to blame someone else for our behavior. Some of us walk through the door when we are young and the pain of transformation is brief because we don’t have to change as much. Some of us walk through the door much later when the choice is harder and the change more painful. Some choose not to walk through the door at all.
More than anything else – more than race or age or gender or class – this is what divides us.
