Thank You, Again

Thank you all for your concern, your thoughts, and your prayers. I am fine and safe. More importantly, I am not in long-term poverty. I have not been dispossessed. And I am not losing services while others show off their wealth all around me. Please direct your thoughts, concern, and prayers to those young men and women whose needs have been ignored through good times and who are condemned as useless in these bad times. And pray for the police who must deal with a reality that the popular narrative doesn't acknowledge. The world could use some peace.

It's not been an easy week here in the UK. If I were a rhetorician living in the US, I'd be having a field day. I'm not, and I'm also an immigrant in a time where anything I say may be misinterpreted. So instead, I want to say two things. Right, I want to say one thing, and I want to repeat another.

I have great faith in the ability of Britons to clean up their neighborhoods, to put out the fires of anger, and to allow the country to grow as a whole rather than as parts. I hope that the leadership to do so will begin to show itself in the next few days.

I've noticed several bloggers asking why those of us in the UK have not begun to speak about this week's events. I would suggest that things are very real for many of us here, especially those in the cities which have been torn by poverty and now by violence. I would suggest that there is no middle ground in the national rhetoric, though there is quite a lot of middle ground on the buses, in cafes, and on the walking paths. 

"We still have a choice today: nonviolent coexistence or violent coannihilation. This may well be mankind’s last chance to choose between chaos or community." MLK Jr.