We had moved into a new area and with the kids starting school, I had some extra time on my hands. Absently reading the local newspaper I ran across an announcement for a local branch of a national women’s group that was featuring a program that sounded interesting to me. It was called Teaching Tolerance.

That fateful moment when I decided that I could take the time to attend this meeting was a pivotal point in my life. I joined the organization, which held the event, and I also learned to appreciate and support the work of the Southern Poverty Law Center.

This year will make the 40^th anniversary of the Southern Poverty Law Center. On April 30 there will be a celebration. I was invited to attend the celebration, along with many others; I received tickets to the event and a formal invitation.

I am not able to attend, my responsibilities that weekend cannot be changed. I do regret not being able to be a part of this celebration.

Two Alabama lawyers, Morris Dees and Joe Levin, founded this organization to help insure that the promises of the civil right movement became a reality for everyone. Most of us probably take for granted what the civil right movement brought to America. We who were young, or not born at the time of the critical struggles have perhaps little or no considered emotional attachment to those marchers, those struggles. What we can appreciate is the fact that we are still in a civil rights struggle and that this organization is there to help even the playing field and inform us, and go to court for the benefit of all of us to fight hate groups, and win federal lawsuits that continue to end discrimination on many fronts. Their work continues. Most of us are extremely aware of efforts at this time in our history of those who would like to turn back the clock on many of our civil rights.

Some of the important victories that SPLC has won on our behalf include issues of racial fairness, integration, sex discrimination, exposure of evidence tampering and being withheld in racially charged law suits, protection of vulnerable inmates against violent guards, the end of unconstitutional conditions in prisons, the end of forced sterilization in the US, and the end of discrimination against women in hiring regarding jobs formerly, traditionally held by men in law enforcement. Most of these cases were fought in the 70’s at the beginning of the work of the SPLC, however, many other cases have been launched, fought and won.The work of the center has also encompassed the identification and suing of hate groups, the methodology to reach children in the classroom through programs that teach tolerance and the protection of those who are being exploited. Of the over seventy landmark cases filed beginning in 1969 through this month, this year, many of have changed the way you and I live. They have changed how our neighbors live and have protected the civil rights and equality that was elusive, missing or prevented for all of us as Americans; sometimes wholly based on our gender or race.

To view the list of all case docket filings click this link: http://www.splcenter.org/get-informed/case-docket

So I stumbled across this organization by pure accident. The relevance to me had not been lost on a person like myself, based on my race, my social situation, my location in the United States. My first awakening to tolerance was my interest in World War II and how the systematic destruction of nearly a whole group of people could be possible and what role the general population had in supporting the hatred being multiplied into a deadly conclusion for 6 million Jews. The years I spent learning about this and studying it brought me to an idea that I had drawn through other parallels and research, that prevention, while often not measurable, can be the determining factor in the elimination or the stunting of hatred, prejudice and violence, the same conclusion I had drawn by looking at prevention programs for youth at risk for violence. If the programs were struck, there was no line of defense for the at risk youth, if they were in place, there would be a percentage of youth whose benefit from them would outweigh their potential risk to themselves and society as a whole. Some, many would be helped however, it would not be possible to measure specific impact as many other factors might be at play.

That same principle, which I had studied briefly in our school districts with at risk youth in mind, played again before me in the description of the Teaching Tolerance programs that SPLC was seeking to promote amongst teachers. These programs, after careful development and implementation, could change attitudes and therefore lives. I could see the relevance, the success potential and the need.

In the years since that turning point for me, I have heard people quibble about the use of the word tolerance, and how it might not be the best word used to describe what they are are trying to teach or promote. I still find it the most effective word. My answer is that sometimes, understanding begins with the notion of tolerance. If you can hold prejudice and hatred down long enough with a measure of tolerance, it is the fertile ground where understanding can begin to take hold. We are all very different, and what we bring in the way of our orientations, our religions, our cultural identities, our experiences, and our socio economic identity is very diverse when held against someone else’s, someone who might be different in some or many ways. To begin with a deep sense of pause, to tolerate that which is so foreign, can help us identify the common ground where heretofore we did not think one existed.

If you are not familiar with the SPLC, please check out the website at: http://www.splcenter.org/

It is my fervent hope that you will join me on the Wall of Tolerance, taking the step reaching out and supporting this fine work. When the Wall of Tolerance was first developed, I could point to it and tell my children who were then small, see, this what we stand for. We are the people who will work fighting hate, teaching tolerance and seeking justice. If you believe in these things and this work, reach out and share that with others, share that with your children and your grandchildren; help to spread the resistance of hatred.

http://www.splcenter.org/civil-rights-memorial/wall-tolerance

Hate groups are alive and well in the United States where SPLC has identified 1000 of them. That number reflects the surge and explosive growth of the radical right. The radical right is not, and will never be your friend folks.

It is not, nor has it ever been something contained within our own borders, the radical right is alive and well in Europe too.

Many of you know that my son is studying abroad in Lubeck Germany this year. What you may not know is that for the last few years the Neo Nazi have marched in Lubeck on the anniversary of the British bombing of that city in WWII. Many Nazi from all over Germany and some Danes were in the city that day to march. Church leaders and counter protestors met them with opposition and the police were out in force with water cannon, soldiers, tanks, helicopters and presumably snipers. The leader of the neo Nazi movement was on hand to speak.

The government and police closed down bus services, bridges, roads blocked and train services were greatly limited and vehicle and pedestrian traffic was blocked, all in an effort to contain and conclude the demonstration as early and peacefully as possible. German students had warned my son to stay in doors. The neo Nazi apparently throw rocks, start fires, break things and fights can break out during their demonstrations. Above all if he ventured out, he was told do not wear a hooded sweatshirt, least he be mistaken for a Nazi. Below are a few links relating to the event, and other links, from the same local newspaper, which had the days events, hour by hour, complete with pictures no longer have the information posted. I think that is called, ‘putting the lid’ on it.

A historian friend of mine in Austria told me that this kind of activity had increased with the reunification of Germany. Most Germans and Austrians are completely disgusted by it. The German Parliment in advance of this demonstration had requested citizens to counter protest in a peaceful manner. The Teaching Tolerance program might have a positive effect worldwide, if only enough nations were willing to participate. 

Copyright 2011 by SheilaTGTG55

http://www.hl-live.de/aktuell/textstart.php?id=67991

http://www.hl-live.de/aktuell/textstart.php?id=67989 

 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tVC01SrvVJ0

This video could not be embeded by request. It shows the police and demonstrators, tanks, etc. You hear some breaking glass, but over all there is no violence seen. 

There are many neo nazi versions of you tube videos with Lubeck as the subject, especially from prior years.