Sometimes it pays to pay attention to what is going on around the world. Many people that think of Haiti probably consider in the same category our ex-president considers them in. When we get wrapped up in our daily lives we often don’t give places like Haiti a second thought.

We probably remember the earthquake that rocked Haiti back in 2010. Twelve years later and I don’t give it a second thought. At least I can say that was true before watching a video in the World Geography class I support. Haiti shares an island with the Dominican Republic and those countries couldn’t be more different.

The obvious result was droves of Haitians leaving Haiti searching for somewhere to go. A number of them came here and in the United States. So, few if any of us thought to consider the Dominican Republic. We probably just assumed they would do the neighborly thing. In some cases they did, but their reaction also showed the dark side of these events.

It’s hard to view their collective reaction as anything other than racism. Of course, we are only viewing it from the Haitian perspective. The Dominican Republic had been a relatively well run country and they didn’t want a human tragedy to take them down with them. Of course, there were a number of horrible events that led up to that moment.

A bunch of 9th graders probably can’t appreciate all of the implications of such a video. They may think of Haiti as one of those places where you can sponsor a child like Sally Struthers used to do. Just 72 cents a day can feed and educate a Haitian child. However, the deeper you look, one cannot possibly avoid seeing parallels to our situation here.

Those huddled masses yearn to breath free. Haitians wanted a better life. On an individual basis it wasn’t their fault that life was so brutally tough in their home country. Collectively things are never that simple. They were victims of things out of their control, but they also did plenty to create their own problems.

The Dominican Republic’s collective response was to render some aid but ultimately to block as many people from coming as possible. That by itself has some justification. If we allow your crappy country to export all of its citizens to our country then our country becomes the crappy country. At least, that’s the thinking behind it.

Xenophobia has rarely been so fully on display. The ties that bind is the notion of “not in my backyard.” That was a phrase coined by George Carlin years ago in his comedy act. The general idea is that we want what’s best for people and we don’t want anyone to suffer. We see the constant barrage on television of the plight of abused animals, polar bears without ice to stand on, or children with cancer. We see the plight of poor children on the other side of the world.

We will give anything to erase those images from our brains. 72 cents a day (or whatever it really is) doesn’t seem like a lot. Maybe if we all chip in we can really make a difference. That line of thinking stops when the problem comes closer to home. I’m really sorry you are going through so much, but if you could go through it somewhere else that would be great.

So, at the end of the day we really can’t shame the Dominican Republic. They did what we do. They just put an official stamp on it and called it a name. Sometimes, other people far away provide us with a window into our own soul. Looking at life through that window hopefully evokes at least some level of shame. That is the case if we have any ounce of humanity left.

Theologians tell us that God forgives and forgives absolutely. It has taken a lifetime to understand that what they are talking about is really redemption and not forgiveness. Forgiveness is really a human condition. It means we simply drop those negative feelings and move on. That has always been the secret. Forgiveness is more about us than it is about them. We don’t allow that anger and pain to consume us. Yet, it doesn’t mean that the relationship returns to normal or even at all.

Redemption, on the other hand, is a return of the relationship. That’s what the theologians call forgiveness from God. The slate is wiped clean and all transgressions are forgotten. Most of us aren’t capable of that. We have to protect our psyche and someone that repeatedly runs roughshod over our psyche cannot return to the previous condition. We can leave the pain behind and refuse to allow that person’s actions to occupy our thoughts. We can’t treat them the same way as before though.

This is where racism, xenophobia, sexism, and homophobia comes in. It is where the Q nonsense comes in. It is where the anti-vax nonsense comes in. This topic is the one topic that ties it all together. Yesterday, we looked at conservative social media and whether they could have a safe space to spew their hatred. There’s a reason why they want and need that safe space. When we shun that kind of thought we don’t get rid of it. We just drive it underground where it can’t readily be seen.

The question comes on whether someone can let their hate flag fly and then later live to regret it. If they do then is there a path back to redemption for them? We have seen numerous people recant their feelings on the vaccine once they’ve landed in the hospital. Should they survive, can they be forgiven and can they be redeemed? They can be forgiven relatively easily, but that doesn’t mean they are redeemed.

It comes down to recognizing windows of opportunity. Hundreds if not thousands of anti-vaxxers and Q devotees are realizing that they backed the wrong horse. They realize they were lied to. They realize they were duped. The question comes on whether we are capable of extending the olive branch to welcome them back to normal society.

The same is true of racists, homophobes, sexists, and xenophobes. There is that key moment where everything comes tumbling down. I say this because I’ve experienced it myself. Those feelings were more private because I knew they were wrong. I was able to cast them aside and be welcomed in. However, I have to admit that I had not gone out on a limb to make an ass out of myself either.

That’s how I know there are a lot of these folks out there. They feel the way they do, but they are too polite and even too ashamed to be publicly outed. Without a path to redemption they have to stay in that space. They exist in the shadows between everything we know that is good and everything we know that isn’t. It’s the main reason why we are left wondering how some of our elected officials get where they are in the first place.

There is something within ourselves that doesn’t allow us to redeem. In ourselves it is obvious that shame overwhelms us. In others, it is anger and jealousy of a former scourge getting credit for their conversion. For others, it is a lack of trust that the conversion is real. We’ve been burned before. We have to take that chance. Otherwise, it will always be us versus them.