A Black President Is Like A Tornado In November

Today my daughter was called “baby killer” at her junior high school because she voted for Obama in the classroom election. Yesterday, she was told (by a student) that “CHANGE” stood for “Come Help A Nigger Get Elected”. A kindergartener got off the bus today crying and told the principal that she was sad because “Obama is going to kill all the babies”. The jr. high librarian was verbally assaulted by a parent for squelching a conversation in which a student told other students that, “people who voted for Obama were going to hell because Obama is the anti-christ”. Another student remarked that he and his father were going to get their guns and “go get Obama”.



I’ve cried. I’ve shot off angry, but civil emails to the principal. I’ve talked to friends. Now I write. I don’t even know what I’m writing about. Anger? Frustration? Racism? Meanness? Ignorance? Hate? Fear? All of the above?



I admit, this is extra-white Missouri and we live in a very red part of the state, but isn’t there some level of responsibility that accompanies being a parent? How does one go about teaching their child to hate and demean? What in us empowers racial superiority and begs it to be taught to children? When and where will there be a place that is safe for ideas and compassion and progress?



This town is melting down over the election of Barack Obama. The black Barack Obama. Muslim, anti-christ, baby-killing Barack Obama. And my young, intelligent, thoughtful daughter is under fire for echoing my political philosophy. She is taking a social “hit” for believing in what I believe in. Her identity is being torn down because she is open minded enough to have faith in the same man that I believe transcends the nightmarish environment in which we live. I tell her to be proud of her clear mind and intellectual choices and yet I sit here crying out of guilt for my role in her situation.

Last night, in bed, I cried with Oprah and Jesse Jackson. I cried with hundreds of thousands of Americans who could finally see the light at the end of the tunnell. I went to bed feeling like today was the day … the new day I’ve been waiting for. Today is a terrible day. Now, as I sit here watching the big red blobs push my way on the weather channel radar map, and see the tornado warnings pop up on the television, my mind wanders back to all those hideous emails about the “end of days”. A November tornado … oddly fitting with the storms brewing in my head and in my heart.