Posts Tagged: blaming others

“We Are All One of Us”

On January 7, 2023 by Dteb With 0 Comments - down to earth believer

I heard someone say the other day that a certain politician only thought in terms of blaming “them”. I do not think that this politician is alone. Indeed, he has tapped into a deep vein of human stupidity.

Thinking in terms of us and them categories is as ancient as the human race. In fact, it may not even be peculiar to homo sapiens. Wolves are not kind to other wolves who are not in their pack.

However, the fact that something is ancient or widespread doesn’t make it either inevitable or right. Perhaps we should all think about how to move beyond our us versus them thinking. But how could we do that? I don’t know, but I have some suspicions. And where knowledge is lacking, suspicion must do.

Maybe the first thing I can do is to ask a simple question: What am I getting out of my us-and-them categories. This simple question has at least two simple answers, neither of which I like.

One of the things that I get out of us versus them thinking is an easy sense of belonging. What I mean by this is that, if there is an outside group, there is also an inside group. And if we are not part of the outsiders, we must be insiders. We belong!

There is nothing wrong with wanting to belong. We are each unique beings, but we long to be part of something bigger than ourselves. It is the word “easy” in the phrase “an easy sense of belonging” that is the problem. Anything that is too easy is almost certainly not a healthy thing. Like the second piece of apple pie, easy belonging is only easy in the short term.

Something else that us-them thinking does for me is that it gives me someone besides myself to blame. Having someone else to blame is great fun because it exempts me from the profoundly uncomfortable process of acknowledging my own problems and doing something about them. If the problem is “out there”, I can complain about my chosen “them” rather than change myself. In other words, us and them is a form of laziness—or, at least, it is an excuse for laziness.

After I’ve done the difficult task of wrestling with the question of what I get out of my us-and-them-ism, I can get down to the really serious question. Which is what? I suppose that this question has many forms, but I would phrase it this way: Is there really any such thing as us and them?

The answer is, at one and the same time, an emphatic “Yes!” and an equally emphatic “No!”

Yes, we are all unique individuals, and we are part of unique configurations. Whether that configuration is a family, a race, a religion, a socio-economic class, or something else, us-and-them categories are real. To deny this flies in the face of the facts.

Yet the answer is also “No!” Here is the truth: We are all born. We all some basic needs: air to breathe, water, food, shelter, companionship, a sense of purpose and significance. We all eventually die. To say that we have nothing in common is to reveal that we are not simply blind, but also fools.

So, whenever we are tempted to fall into the us-versus-them trap, we had better get back to the basics: breathing, eating, and such. After all, we are all one of us.

, , ,

“The Lame Blame Game”

On October 30, 2020 by Dteb With 0 Comments - down to earth believer

“Blame must be assigned, and it wasn’t me.” (A 12-step friend about how his family handled wrong-doing.)

“The woman, whom you gave to be with me, she gave it to me! (And I ate it.)”  (Genesis 3:12: Adam, the first man, when God confronted him about his disobedience.)

Blaming others is our national sport right now.  Perhaps it always was.  We see it (and do it) daily.  It is practiced by small children and old people, by men and women, by religious people and by irreligious.

But in reality, blame is really lame.  By using the word “lame,” I mean this: Just like a person who can’t use his legs, blame can’t go anywhere.

Don’t get me wrong.  Acknowledging the role of others and ourselves in creating problems can be helpful.  Confronting others and ourselves when they/we’ve done wrong can be healthy.  Cleaning house is not done by merely throwing things in the closet or shoving them under the bed.

However, blame doesn’t simply acknowledge or confront wrong.  Blame contents itself with continuing to talk about the wrong of others or of self.  Yet, at the same time, blame refuses to do anything to change what’s wrong.

Of course, it’s easy to see the stupidity and uselessness of other people blaming other people (or circumstances or God) for why things aren’t the way we think they ought to be.  Seeing that we ourselves are playing the blame game is not so easy.  No!  Of course, we aren’t blaming.  We’re telling the truth about why things are as they are.

Really?

Even blaming ourselves isn’t wise or helpful.  That is a truth that I struggle with every day.  When I’ve done something wrong—or not done something that I should have done—I tend to go on and on about my failures.  But here is the deal: I’ve discovered that continually blaming myself is so much easier than doing something positive to make my own life and the life of others better.  But blame is still lame.

In twelve-step programs, steps 10 and 11 seem to me to flow rather naturally.

Step 10: “Continued to take personal inventory, and when we were wrong promptly admitted it.”

Step 11: “Sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with a power greater than ourselves, praying only for knowledge of God’s will for us and the power to carry that out.”

The antidote to the lame blame game is to acknowledge our wrongdoing, and then turn to God and seek to discern God’s will for us.  And then, we do God’s will.  It’s as simple as that.  It is also as difficult as that.

, , , , ,

“Confession: From the We to the I”

On June 22, 2020 by Dteb With 0 Comments - down to earth believer

“Psa. 106:1      Praise the LORD!

             Oh give thanks to the LORD, for he is good,

                        for his steadfast love endures forever!

2          Who can utter the mighty deeds of the LORD,

                        or declare all his praise?

3          Blessed are they who observe justice,

                        who do righteousness at all times!

Psa. 106:4       Remember me, O LORD, when you show favor to your people;

                        help me when you save them,

5          that I may look upon the prosperity of your chosen ones,

                        that I may rejoice in the gladness of your nation,

                        that I may glory with your inheritance.

Psa. 106:6       Both we and our fathers have sinned;

                        we have committed iniquity; we have done wickedness.

7          Our fathers, when they were in Egypt,

                        did not consider your wondrous works;

             they did not remember the abundance of your steadfast love,

                        but rebelled by the sea, at the Red Sea.

8          Yet he saved them for his name’s sake,

                        that he might make known his mighty power.

9          He rebuked the Red Sea, and it became dry,

                        and he led them through the deep as through a desert.

10        So he saved them from the hand of the foe

                        and redeemed them from the power of the enemy.

11        And the waters covered their adversaries;

                        not one of them was left.

12        Then they believed his words;

                        they sang his praise.

Psa. 106:13     But they soon forgot his works;

                        they did not wait for his counsel.

14        But they had a wanton craving in the wilderness,

                        and put God to the test in the desert;

15        he gave them what they asked,

                        but sent a wasting disease among them.

Psa. 106:16     When men in the camp were jealous of Moses

                        and Aaron, the holy one of the LORD,

17        the earth opened and swallowed up Dathan,

                        and covered the company of Abiram.

18        Fire also broke out in their company;

                        the flame burned up the wicked.

Psa. 106:19     They made a calf in Horeb

                        and worshiped a metal image.

20        They exchanged the glory of God

                        for the image of an ox that eats grass.

21        They forgot God, their Savior,

                        who had done great things in Egypt,

22        wondrous works in the land of Ham,

                        and awesome deeds by the Red Sea.

23        Therefore he said he would destroy them—

                        had not Moses, his chosen one,

             stood in the breach before him,

                        to turn away his wrath from destroying them.

Psa. 106:24     Then they despised the pleasant land,

                        having no faith in his promise.

25        They murmured in their tents,

                        and did not obey the voice of the LORD.

26        Therefore he raised his hand and swore to them

                        that he would make them fall in the wilderness,

27        and would make their offspring fall among the nations,

                        scattering them among the lands.

Psa. 106:28     Then they yoked themselves to the Baal of Peor,

                        and ate sacrifices offered to the dead;

29        they provoked the LORD to anger with their deeds,

                        and a plague broke out among them.

30        Then Phinehas stood up and intervened,

                        and the plague was stayed.

31        And that was counted to him as righteousness

                        from generation to generation forever.

Psa. 106:32     They angered him at the waters of Meribah,

                        and it went ill with Moses on their account,

33        for they made his spirit bitter,

                        and he spoke rashly with his lips.

Psa. 106:34     They did not destroy the peoples,

                        as the LORD commanded them,

35        but they mixed with the nations

                        and learned to do as they did.

36        They served their idols,

                        which became a snare to them.

37        They sacrificed their sons

                        and their daughters to the demons;

38        they poured out innocent blood,

                        the blood of their sons and daughters,

             whom they sacrificed to the idols of Canaan,

                        and the land was polluted with blood.

39        Thus they became unclean by their acts,

                        and played the whore in their deeds.

Psa. 106:40     Then the anger of the LORD was kindled against his people,

                        and he abhorred his heritage;

41        he gave them into the hand of the nations,

                        so that those who hated them ruled over them.

42        Their enemies oppressed them,

                        and they were brought into subjection under their power.

43        Many times he delivered them,

                        but they were rebellious in their purposes

                        and were brought low through their iniquity.

Psa. 106:44     Nevertheless, he looked upon their distress,

                        when he heard their cry.

45        For their sake he remembered his covenant,

                        and relented according to the abundance of his steadfast love.

46        He caused them to be pitied

                        by all those who held them captive.

Psa. 106:47     Save us, O LORD our God,

                        and gather us from among the nations,

             that we may give thanks to your holy name

                        and glory in your praise.

Psa. 106:48     Blessed be the LORD, the God of Israel,

                        from everlasting to everlasting!

             And let all the people say, “Amen!”

                        Praise the LORD!”

(Psalm 106, English Standard Version. I’ve copied and pasted the whole psalm for context, but I’m only going to make some comments about something I just recently observed.)

“Every generation blames the one before . . . .” (Mike + the Mechanics, “The Living Years.”)

It is temptingly easy to blame the generation before us (or many generations before us) for all the present ills. You see this even in the Bible.

Psalm 106 starts out with thanks to God (vs. 1) and a reminder that only those who do what is right consistently can really proclaim God’s mighty acts (vss. 2-3). Then, the psalm moves to a plea for personal deliverance for the psalmist, as part of God’s deliverance of all God’s people (vss. 4-5).

Then, vs. 6 gets down to a bedrock problem: “. . . We have sinned . . . ; we have done wrong and acted wickedly.” Yep, that sounds about right for about any person or group at any time.

However, look carefully at vs. 6. I left out part of it, as shown by the three dots after the word “sinned.” The whole verse reads as follows (with italics for the portions I left out in the preceding paragraph):

“Both we and our fathers have sinned;

we have committed iniquity; we have done wickedness.”

And then, the rest of this long psalm details the sins of the psalmist’s ancient ancestors!

Sometimes, psalms reflect how we ought to pray. At other times, psalms reflect how we do pray. I think that Psalm 106 reflects how we often do pray. We may nod at our own mess-ups, but we don’t stay with that for long. It is so much easier—and more fun—to blame our ancestors.

Right now, it is both tempting and easy to acknowledge our ancestors’ racism. It is also tempting and easy to confess the sins of police officers who use excessive force or other very questionable techniques, or who make assumptions about people of color. And, of course, we can always blame our leaders. There does need to be accountability for those who are leaders or who have power over others. Agreed.

But when we spend a lot of time blaming “the other people,” whether “those other people” are from other generations or “those other people” are from our own generation, we tend to let ourselves off the hook way too quickly. And when we do that, we fail to ask several key questions.

  • What forms of hidden (or not-so-hidden) racism do I practice?
  • What am I doing to inform myself about racism? What books and articles am I reading that could help me to understand better what is really going on? What podcasts? In what conversations do I need to be participating, primarily as a listener?
  • What can I try to do that might make a positive difference in improving race relations?
  • Am I doing what I can, even if it is pretty inadequate, and late, and lame? (I have to begin somewhere, somewhen.)

My middle name is “Lee.” As in Robert E. Lee. My southern parents gave me the name. My dad was a good man in many ways, but he was definitely a racist.

However, my dad died thirty years ago this fall. Time to take responsibility for my own racism. Changing my middle name won’t help. Letting God change my heart, attitudes, mind, and actions will.

, , ,
Follow on Feedly