I went to the Sharpton rally with a few friends and after it fell behind schedule (as all liberal events tend to do), we headed down to the Mall to support DC Vote folks and engage in discourse with people who hold differing views.
The heat and the distance of our walk put one of our party into a state of hunger and we had to head to food. What luck!
On the way, we were discussing presidential birth certificates, and I loudly exclaimed that although I never saw any evidence of the recent El Presidente’s place of birth, I believed that he was born in the U.S. (though not the Republic of Texas implied by his accent.)
A woman of a certain age mistook the subject of my comment and started agreeing that she thought it was wrong that “he never showed us his birth certificate.” Sensing her mistake, I informed her that I was discussing the undisclosed birth certificate of former President George W. Bush. I then asked her why she thought that President Obama was not born on U.S. soil. She said that she had never seen his certificate. I said that I thought that most news channels had dismissed the rumor, and that I had seen a copy in several papers and the certificate could also be found on the Internet. She responded: I don’t use the Internet.
I offered to pull up a copy for us to look at together, and reiterated that while I never saw President George W. Bush’s birth certificate, I still believed that he was born in the States. She rejected my offer and walked quickly away.
Several minutes later, our paths crossed again, and I overheard her say “then he said that President Bush wasn’t a citizen; you just can’t argue with some people.” While I agree with the futile sentiment of her last statement, I didn’t let her misrepresentation of my position stand. I politely told her and her companion that I thought no such thing, that President Bush was a citizen born in the States (even though I had never seen any evidence of this), and that I had seen an electronic copy of President Obama’s birth certificate as well as his birth announcements in the Honolulu papers, clearly showing that he was born in our most recent state.
At this point, I was pulled away, and we continued on our way to Founding Farmers so my friends could eat.
Sitting at the bar, I had the opportunity to enjoy a different type of encounter. I spent most of lunch chatting with a former Annapolis student about the tea party, the wars Afghanistan and Iraq, religious tolerance (and the first amendment), civil liberties, and the upcoming U.F.C. bout.
Although this young man and I disagreed about a lot of policies, we both recognized that the other genuinely wanted the US to thrive as a beacon and example of democracy and freedom. Refreshing.
Perhaps, as She posited later over dinner, the contexts differed and this is an unfair comparison… Yet the first woman’s unwillingness to consider alternative views or proffered evidence was frighteningly similar to the unwillingness of the people I met several weeks ago: completely willing to opine as facts and closed to any contrary position, evidence, or thought.
My theories? Either isolated tea partiers are willing to engage in discourse, or massed tea partiers feed off of group-think and fear and close themselves off. Or, more likely a bit off both.
