There was a bumper sticker that confronted me from the back of a truck a year ago and still keeps coming back for consideration: “Why Should I Have to Press One for English?”
Bumper stickers present an interesting form of communication. You might call them compressed tweets. There is a certain protocol in their structure that needs to be honored in order for them to work. They must be of few words, bold, to the point and with no apologies.
I can think back to the first bumper sticker I had – “If Guns Are Outlawed, Only Outlaws Will Have Guns.” At the time, I didn’t even have a car to stick it to. In fact, I was too young to even drive. It sat for all the world to see on a shelf in my bedroom. Something in the logic of those words seemed indisputable. It was a true phrase that offered no place for argument. Just having it in my possession seemed empowering, like a tattoo on the forehead.
Today – many bumper stickers, buttons with slogans and years later – I have become more private in my sentiments. Now I just observe them on passing cars and say to myself, “Yeah, that is a good one – I’m with you on that” or “You jerk. You are so stupid.” It is kind of like the reaction to reading the variety of vanity plates we see here in New Hampshire.
Excuse the digression. Let me get back to the bumper sticker and the question it poses.
Why should I have to press one for English?
It is perfectly suited for a bumper sticker. It could lead to an even bigger question: Why should I have to press one for anything? But let me just deal with the English button for now. You could say that this is a particularly odious demand to be put upon us here in the United States of America. Assimilate or get out, I’m guessing that is the point being made.
After careful consideration of the issue, Bruce Thomas comes to my mind. You wouldn’t know him, but years ago he was something of a mentor to me when I began working as a community organizer. Bruce was one of the best organizers in the business. He had a saying that I have never forgotten: “The most important person in your organization is the last person who walked in the door.”
The phrase is a little too long for a bumper sticker and lacks the necessary arrogance demanded for a quick read while stopped in traffic. In fact, it lacks arrogance of any kind. But the truth within is indisputable, though in a different way.
For a community organizer, it is lesson No. 1. If you want your organization to grow, to be successful and powerful, it needs to constantly embrace new people. It needs those people to feel welcome, appreciated and safe. There is no room for old and comfortable groupings that lock people out for their lack of familiarity. The last person out the door turns off the lights. But the last person to come in the door should light up the room and be embraced. They are evidence of growing. They are the future. They are going down the same path that you were the first time you came in the door.
Applied in a larger context, it explains why we should push one for English.
It comes down to an opinion as to who we feel is more important. Is it me, or is it you? Are we able to park our own perception of self-importance for brief moments, to allow a spirit of welcome to be embraced? Are we able to see that humanity can exist in ways that are different than our own little spheres of reality?
Bumper stickers are just abbreviated tweets. They feel good for a moment, but sometimes they call for further digestion to fully process. It is like black and white – my way or the highway – absolutes that ignore all the other color possibilities or roads to travel.
Why should I have to press one for English? Because the most important people in our country are the ones who just came through the door. It is as simple as that.
(John Gfroerer of Concord owns a video production company based at the Capitol Center for the Arts.)