To protect democracy, let’s be honest

If we are to survive as a democracy, it is essential that we admit who we are and, just as important, how our current attitudes align with the beliefs and behaviors of those who have come before.

There have always been those who thought war — even genocide — an acceptable response to cultural and political disputes, while there have always been those who found this notion reactionary and barbaric.

Similarly, there have always been those who thought only “certain” people should have the right to vote or belong to a club or who thought women were less than men. And there have always been people who rejected these assertions as small-minded and backward.

And, there have always been those who thought immigrants, the homeless and trans people to be creepy degenerates.

At the same time, there have always been those who renounced these narrow attitudes outright.

In other words, there have always been those willing to bully, ban, dehumanize, marginalize, even erase vulnerable groups, right alongside those embracing kindness and the general belief that all individuals deserve basic dignity and respect.

In broad terms, we are all, in various forms, the most recent versions of one of these two traditions. Drawing the line from our cultural-political ancestors to ourselves today takes no real effort.

Of course, many of us argue that we never would have been the kind of person who stood idly by while neighbors were being carted away to death camps. Nor would we ever have joined the screaming racists in Little Rock blocking Black children from attending Central High. Perhaps.

But now more than ever, let’s be honest about the trendline connecting the dots from our political predecessors and who they were then, to ourselves and who we are now. It looks like the survival of our democracy might depend on it.

Bill Littell

Naperville