AfroCentric_News Features - Dr. E. Faye Williams Column

Bad Behavior Runs Rampant Among Leaders!

By Dr. E. Faye Williams, Esq.

(TriceEdneyWire.com) January 29, 2012 - I rarely say I am angry because plain old anger can consume and destroy, but it’s about time for a lot of us to get constructively angry and tell these so-called leaders with such bad behavior that they are getting out of hand! We have got to unite and find action to stop them or we risk having a whole generation of young people who are listening to and observing their garbage grow up thinking this is the way things are supposed to be!

In the past few months, we witnessed a bunch of racist candidates fighting to become President of the United States saying any and everything about Black people, about our President, about our First Lady, about our children, about Latinos, about women and just about anybody with whom they disagree. We have witnessed a man shooting at the White House, another throwing a smoke bomb. We’ve heard about someone exploding the car and trying to set a fire to the home of the family of well-known civil rights leader, the late Robert Hicks, down in Bogalusa, Louisiana.

I am sure you’ve heard about the horrendous racial profiling of Latinos by the police in East Haven, Connecticut. To make matters worse, the mayor of the town flippantly responded to a reporter’s serious question of what he planned to do regarding Latinos, that he would probably have tacos for dinner! Maybe the atrocious behavior of officials of that town would be considered less egregious because their behavior affects fewer people, but really, would our country actually in this day and age elect a racist President of the United States over the brilliant President we now have? There is certainly a big effort underway to try to do just that.

I, like so many people in the country today, am angry about the bad behavior of the people I have mentioned. Add to that Governor Jan Brewer bristling against the President and wagging her finger in his face when he recently visited her state. We have to take some form of action to show these people that there are consequences for such behavior. Would you want to go to that Connecticut town knowing that you would not be among the protected and served? Would you want to be anywhere in Arizona facing a rude governor as you stepped off the airplane? Would you want to live in a country where Presidential candidates have made it clear they hate you so much that they are willing to lie at your expense to get elected?
After so many Americans acted in accordance with their “better angels” in 2008 to elect President Barack Obama, I refuse to believe that was just a fluke. I still believe the majority of the people in this country are decent people, and I believe they reject the meanness of people like Senator Mitch McConnell who continues to express his disdain for the American people by willingly blocking all forms of progress, forcing many people to struggle and suffer just so that he can spend his time figuring out how to defeat President Obama.

It has been said that evil can triumph only when good people do nothing. We must act to show so-called leaders what it means to be a true leader and a person who loves America enough to show basic respect. Let’s begin with the Presidential hopefuls. Don’t listen to them. Don’t vote for them. Don’t stop over to buy your gasoline or your snacks in East Haven if you happen to be passing through. As for Arizona, don’t even think of vacationing there. If they make anything there, try to resist purchasing it. Don’t attend meetings there. There is a principle in law that says, “Silence gives consent.” Surely we care more about our country than to allow the few to set such low standards for measuring the intelligence and behavior of Americans.

Register your disdain for all such behavior on social media, by writing letters expressing how you feel about such bad behavior. Call your talk shows. Write op-eds. Don’t allow stupid behavior of the few to be a reflection of all of us. We are charged with being a civilized society so we can’t sit back and allow this to continue.

(Dr. E. Faye Williams is Chair of the National Congress of Black Women and a Presidential Scholars Commissioner. Website: www.nationalcongressbw.org or 202/678-6788.)