A brief note from the Editor of Politomatic, pertaining to Glenn Beck’s “Restoring Honor” Rally.
By Micah Hanks
This weekend’s “Restoring Honor” rally in Washington D.C. was largely hailed as a success by its attendees; though it has drawn both praise and criticism from the media, this had been such an obvious expectation since the event’s conception that it’s almost passé to bother saying so here. Looking at the good, it managed to bring people from all walks of life together, traversing from opposite ends of the country and enduring the stress and inconvenience of travel through late-summer heat to join in an inspired effort to celebrate togetherness and change through awareness. The down side is best exemplified by the usual partisanship that emerges after such an event, seeping through cracks in the foundation of the great wall of over-indulgence that is media today, lashing out in criticisms. Fortunately for those who engage in such criticism, the event’s poster-child, Glenn Beck, makes for an easy target.
In a recent commentary piece at the Tri-State Defender website, Dr. Jason Johnson ruminated over the event while, admittedly on part of the author, taking a few jabs at Beck along the way. Johnson, stating he had previously believed Beck to be “a joke and a coward, an example of the weak-willed nature of a spoiled and petulant strand of the Baby Boomer generation that has always been desperate to prove their virility,” now claims to have found certain vindication for his views. “After Beck’s rally to ‘Restore Honor’ on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial last week, not only was my initial opinion validated, we have seen just how limited the reach of men such as Glenn Beck really is.”
Johnson is entitled to his opinion, and for all we know his assessment of Mr. Beck’s political views may not be totally wrong in every regard. In spite of this, it seems that the good doctor is missing the point entirely when it comes to the nature of the event in question.
The purpose of this event was not intended as a showcase for Beck’s perceived desire to grandstand, nor was it an opportunity for the remaining factions of American racially-fueled hatred to pour out before the National Mall in a vulgar display of conservative power. Addressing the latter of these, Matt Mittan, a talk radio host from Asheville, North Carolina, shared an exchange he had with a group of young African American men he met while providing live coverage of the event. “They came marching through with signs that read, ‘no racists in our town!’ A short while later, Mittan saw the young men leaving, dragging their signs along through the grass behind them. “Guys, what’s wrong?” he asked.
“We give up,” the closest protester replied. Mittan, speaking of the incident during the Monday broadcast of his program Take a Stand, said that the words alone couldn’t have conveyed the nature of the man’s expression. “They had come looking for a confrontation,” Mittan said, but found instead that they were surrounded by love and support from attendees who, similarly, would never have tolerated racism in their town, let alone their nation’s capital. Mittan went on to describe PETA protesters who were in attendance, wearing full-body animal costumes in the 90-degree heat. “People were going up to them saying, “I know you’re hot under there. Can I get you a cold drink?” Agnes Cheek, Mittan’s co-host and producer, recounted how at one point a bagpiper appeared, playing the familiar melody “Amazing Grace,” to which the crowd began to sing softly in waves. “You could feel the ground vibrating,” Cheek said, calling the entire experience very heartfelt and moving.
Dr. Johnson doesn’t state in his editorial whether he was in attendance–though he refers to having watched the program “from beginning to end”–hence we might assume from his tone that he was not (Editor’s Note: As a matter of clarity, nor was the author of this piece, having attended a prior engagement at a convention in South Carolina). Johnson complains about Beck having planned the event on the anniversary of Dr. Martin Luther King’s famous “I Have a Dream” speech. Even worse, Beck exemplified disrespect, according to Johnson, by delivering his own speech on the same steps where Dr. King stood (albeit a bit further down). “How gracious of him!” Johnson notes with odd sarcasm.
Despite Johnson’s apparent uncertainty in the matter, I have no question in my mind why people went to such trouble to turn out for this event, in spite of my own disappointment at having to remain absent. It wasn’t because, as Johnson surmises in his article, the people in attendance supported Beck and his “schlock-filled conservative suburbanite dream of convenient multi-culturalism and half-baked ideology.” Nor was it was because Beck is “a joke and a coward, an example of the weak-willed nature of a spoiled and petulant strand of the Baby Boomer generation that has always been desperate to prove their virility.” If anything, I don’t think that even Beck would disagree that it had far less to do with him than the media would like us to believe. Instead, it’s because, fundamentally, people who attended felt that being there connected them with something bigger than they, or any of us, are capable of being alone.
Writing for National Review, Kathryn Jean-Lopez wrote with certain neutrality about Glenn Beck’s involvement, summarizing his presence as what might be likened more appropriately to being a catalyst of sorts, rather than a leader or organizer:
Glenn Beck has done some good things with his voice, focused on foundational things, deconstructing some conventional manipulations. It’s to be encouraged. And not as a celebrity thing. We needn’t put him on a pedestal or run him for anything. These things he talked about and the rally focused on are to be encouraged because they are things we’re all called to do here, together.
In a sense, this invokes Rousseau’s idea of a “social contract,” exemplifying what could almost be described as a sort of hive-mentality that has proven, over time, that getting along as a species is conducive to survival. But it also illustrates something deeper–nearly intangible–which is felt more as an extension of our humanity, rather than being perceived with the five senses.
God, perhaps? Or maybe this represents instead the same unity that accompanies the realization of one’s spiritual potential, prevalent throughout countless cultures since time began. It has come and gone under many names, and yet whatever this thing is, it remains with us–existing just beyond the realm of tangible perception–yet embodying the summation of the human experience. For those who attended the rally in Washington this past weekend, this purpose, however nebulous it may seem peripherally, was no doubt very clear, illustrating lucidly that when people come together, the human spirit is capable of far more than anything one man alone can say or do.
That said, it is fortunate for those who read the commentaries of Dr. Jason Johnson that the spirit of this weekend’s rally also extends far beyond the perceptions one commentator can commit to paper. Though I can commend his intellect and respect his opinions, I trust that the good doctor would share similar criticisms–in good faith, no less–toward my present assessment. Together, however, we are each only small parts of a greater whole, and in the grand scheme of things, I think we’d agree we’re preaching to the same cosmic choir. Who knows; maybe they’re singing Amazing Grace along to bagpipes, too.
Photo by Matt Mittan courtesy of Take a Stand.
