The Deep

What do you see?

What do you know?

What do you believe?

The surface of the ocean tells you nothing about what takes place below.

When you live on the surface, the tides are out of your control.

The waters below hide things moving there.

The sun burns to the horizon.

The gulls gossip with each other.

Above the seas, life there has no contact with what moves below.

Deep water.

To those who live deep under the surface, what takes place up top has nothing to do with their reality.

No matter how much the winds of change may blow up top, the people of the deep are not moved.

They are insulated from the critique of weather.

Life below is steady.

Predictable.

Below the seas, life there has no contact with what moves the above.

What do you see?

What do you know?

What do you believe?

The people on both sides have chained themselves to an ideology that says they are special.

They are the chosen.

They will rule over their enemies in life and after death.

They are in love with their conflict.

It fills them with purpose.

It feeds their prejudice.

And they are hungry.

How do you find a compromise between two opposing people who believe the total destruction of their opposition is required so they may live?

The thousands of children on both sides that have died have not moved them.

The destruction of their community on both sides has not moved them.

The thousands upon thousands who have died on both sides are ignored.

Only the point of contact between the two sides of the conflict has ever been addressed.

The window dressings, the easily understood issues, the things that can be whined about without touching the sea monster at the bottom of the ocean or the dragon circling in the sky.

What aspect of this conflict remains unaddressed?

What is it in the deep waters and in the sky that brings fear to the peacemakers?

Something so profound that, if talked about, would shake the foundations of society?

That which shall not be named.

God.

Religion and its structure are at the core of the conflict.

Either one is right, the other is wrong, or both sides are wrong.

And there's the rub.

The three religions of the West all claim the same spot on earth as theirs and theirs alone.

There has never been any room for compromise within these three groups.

King of the hill or ruler of nothing.

Like blind fish and birds, the faithful follow the voices of hate they were born into.

There can be no compromise with those who oppose us as rulers of humanity.

It's written in the holy books of all three faiths.

The problem is now defined, so what do we do?

We send a message of hope.

We let the people of the deep know that life is possible on the land.

We tell the people of the land that life is possible in the deep.

It's a different life than what they have known, but it is life.

We must ask them as many times as needed to understand we share this world with them.

The people on the land and the people of the deep can live together.

There can be peace only if those who live in the deep want it as much as those on the land.

Otherwise, the oceans will roll, and the sky will thunder.

The storm will continue.

Peace

Daniel J Frey aka Toby

Permanent Record

Guilt.

Guilt is a powerful force in human society.

Guilt will build cathedrals.

Guilt will jump from a bridge.

Guilt keeps the innocent under control by the guilty.

This guilt is not because the person, the society, has committed a crime.

It's not for killing, or stealing, or destroying.

This guilt is used by those who wield it as a hamstring.

A way to stop progress of the emotional and intellectual development of a society and the individual.

It began long ago.

When the gods had to be appeased.

When the gods had to be paid off or, they would get angry and do bad things to you.

A formula was given to mankind by the Gods through the priests.

You can't want a thing for yourself unless you give up something of equal or greater value.

Simply, you can't have your cake and eat it too.

You can have a birthday, but you can't enjoy it.

You can have a career, but you must sacrifice your love life.

You can have the pleasures of earth but give up the pleasures of heaven.

Hogwash.

Bullshit.

We must peel back the layers of guilt to find the origin of the species of guilt.

This kind of guilt was created by the ruling class, the aristocrats, kings, and queens.

Guilt kept them in power.

FYI...

The aristocracy of Europe believes themselves to be the children of Jesus.

They are in his family tree.

Direct genetic inheritance.

They are the physical embodiment of God on earth.

There are not many other positions in our society where change is more of a threat to their existence than to the aristocracy.

You can count on that list the current Republican Party.

Change of awareness, of the removal of the blindfold of ignorance, becomes a direct threat to their power.

Guilt.

Guilt is the weapon of the powerful.

You don't want that because you're not good enough to appreciate it.

That dress won't look good on you; you're fat.

You can't handle the truth.

Your vote doesn't count.

You are not a man.

Not worthy.

Guilt is the slow bleed in the side of hope.

The truth that destroys guilt is that there is no outside bookkeeper.

There is no one keeping track of your guilt.

Only you can measure your guilt.

There is nothing wrong or evil about wanting a better life.

You can have a good job and a living wage.

You can vote for a government that serves all the people.

You can have love and happiness too.

There is no permanent record.

No file keeper is checking off if you sacrificed sufficiently to get your heart's desire.

Have you suffered, bled enough, or died enough to get a better wage.

Who keeps guilt alive?

Who keeps pouring it out?

People whisper dark thoughts into innocent minds, making them hate themselves.

People who enjoy pushing people into the mud so that they can walk on their backs with self-righteous, clean minds.

Break the cycle of guilt by keeping your eyes on the truth.

Truth is a fire, a light against the darkness of ignorance.

It will lead in unsuspected directions.

Truth sets the innocent and the guilty free.

Peace

Daniel J Frey aka Toby

The GOP Today

What controls the modern Republican Party today is hate born of fear.

The hate is directed at anything, anyone, who represents change.

This child called hate is not responsible for its own birth.

This hate is not an immaculate conception.

This hate was born of parents called fear and ignorance.

Fear is the name of the mother of the child of hate.

Fear of the other.

Fear of the stranger.

Fear of sharing.

Fear of truth.

Ignorance is the name of the father of the child of hate.

Ignorance of empathy.

Ignorance of justice.

Ignorance of freedom.

Ignorance of truth

Together, fear and ignorance met long ago in the human story.

Fear, ignorance, and their child hate have been why we don't have nice things in our American society.

Universal health care, a living wage, high-speed rail, paid sick and vacation days, child care, clean food and water.

Fear, ignorance, and their child hate have been the roadblock, the hurdle, the moat, the barbed wire, the wall that has kept society from reaching the promised land.

They have been the crab in the barrel of life that keeps pulling those back who want to escape the cycle of violence.

Fear and ignorance didn't produce just one child.

Every generation, another abandoned sibling of hate is added to the orphanage.

This generation's child of hate finds its refuge in social media.

There, it feeds upon the prejudice with relish and abandon.

Before today, the children of hate had to gather in secret, in the woods, with hoods.

Hide who they were.

Now, they take pictures of themselves as they desecrate the House of the People.

Fear finds refuge in the pulpit.

Every Sunday in America, it is taught that God ordained the White man to be on top of the social economic pyramid.

Every Sunday in America, fear is given shelter when it's declared that the mixing of the races is an abomination in God's eyes.

The White race must stay pure and faithful to God's word.

Every Sunday in America, fear sees the browning of America and the world as the end times.

The time when their savior Jesus will return and kill all the enemies of the White man and make him ruler of the earth forever.

Whites are the chosen people.

Fear finds companionship with those who hate other religions.

The babysitters of fear, like Putin and Trump, use the fear of the Islamic religion to incite violence.

These fearmongers, people who sell fear, create a problem so they can declare themselves the only ones who can fix the problem they created.

The children of hate.

It's what unites the Republican Party, this fear both politically and financially.

The fear that White people and their God will be replaced by brown people and their brown God.

This understanding of the world based on fear is reinforced every time they tune into the news.

The child of fear knows it's right when it sees Black Lives Matter marches.

The child of fear knows it's right when it can't make jokes about a person's race anymore.

The child of fear knows it's right when they can't get a job at a living wage.

Those people took my job.

This fear knows they are doomed if their White savior is not re-elected President.

Is there a way to stop the hate from multiplying?

No.

No, there isn't.

That's the truth, no matter how hard it is to hear.

The child of hate is not the source of the problem.

The source of the problem that threatens to destroy American democracy is fear and ignorance.

The parents of the children of hate need to attend a family planning session.

Their fear needs to be listened to.

Fear needs compassion.

Fear needs to feel safe.

Ignorance is the harder of the two parents of fear to help.

Ignorance will deny they need help.

Ignorance cannot be told what to do or that it's wrong.

If you do, it will lash out and destroy anyone or anything that comes to tell it the truth.

Ignorance can only learn through example and consequence.

Love, compassion, and sharing have to be lived and demonstrated as a path to happiness.

Ignorance needs a step-by-step guide on how to achieve happiness.

Through living a life of love, ignorance will eventually catch on; there is a better way than nihilism and destruction.

It is up to every generation to pick up the torch of freedom and carry on the fight.

Drop hate be love.

Peace.

Daniel J Frey aka Toby

Immune

Walking by a local restaurant, I see people enjoying their immunity. 

Apparently, they are immune not only to the COVID-19 virus.

Our brothers and sisters are immune to society.

Immune to community.

Immune to compassion.

Immune to brotherhood.

Immune to love.

How did these people get their vaccine?

The answer is 'Blowing In The Wind', written by Bob Dylan.

He asked, how many roads must a man walk down before you call him a man?

How many years can some people exist before they are allowed to be free?

How many times can a man turn his head and pretend he just doesn't see?

The answer is that hate is reborn generation after generation.

By people, humans who believe they are doing good work.

Mothers and fathers.

Brothers and sisters.

Churches, schools, governments, police.

All keep the story of hate alive.

The Great White Myth.

I'm telling you here and now if you don't know this in your heart of hearts already.

This is a cold fact of life on this planet.

People have been making up stories to keep them from seeing reality since before recorded time.

Even before there were written languages, people told each other myths about the world.

They have told themselves these stories so many times that these tales are deeply ingrained in human psychology.

In The Hero's Journey by Joseph Campbell, "Myth is much more important and true than history."

Human's capacity to believe in their own myth is limitless.

They will believe in ghosts.

In Leprechauns.

In Golden Gods.

Their team will win a sports championship.

The 2nd Amendment can't be amended.

Tom Hanks eats babies.

White people are ordained by God to rule the earth.

Humans believe their own bullshit.

The only balance to myth is truth.

Yet truth is harsh, and myth is smooth.

Truth sticks in our throats.

Myth goes down like candy.

Truth goes against our expectations, and myth feeds our prejudices.

Some of us are lucky to be born able to see the beauty of the world.

While others have turned down that privilege and have focused their sight inward.

People who only help themselves are selfish.

They don't want to know about the cannonballs flying.

They don't want to see the man beaten down in the street.

They don't want to hear people cry.

Just as hate is seeded every generation, so too must love be grown in every generation.

Any gardener can tell you it's a continuous battle against the weeds.

We have to tend the garden of truth to keep out the weeds that would choke it out.

If you have hands, lift; if you have ears, listen; if you have a voice, speak up.

If you have a mind, love.

Peace.

Daniel J Frey aka Toby

Labor Costs

American businesses have been living in a fantasy world where labor and material costs are negligible…

The root of the fantasy, the belief, comes from the story of slavery.

The belief in the value of one person.

Business has always fought for a discount.

Slavery eliminated the long-term cost of labor.

Slavery maximized profit.

Profit is the God of business.

What does it profit a man to own the whole world and lose their soul?

Ask the average billionaire if they ruined anyone getting to where they are now.

It's all easy money when you don't believe souls exist.

The world over has been manipulated, coerced, beaten, killed, cajoled, bribed, and marketed to believe what's right for business is good for the people.

Unfortunately, for the sake of the welfare of the People, they have bought what the business has sold.

Slavery teaches that some people have more value than others.

Those at the top of the pyramid, the leaders, have more value than those who support them in their positions.

The needs of the few, the one, outweigh the needs of the many.

Without me, you wouldn't survive.

This sentiment echoes down the hallways of tyranny generation after generation.

This economic slavery has dominated mankind's history.

Capitalism, the pursuit of wealth unregulated, has been at war with the People economically, socially, and morally since the beginning of time.

What has every war been about?

Who has power over wealth creation.

The Punic Wars, The Crusades, the French and American Revolutionary Wars, the American Civil War, the First and Second World Wars, Korea, Vietnam, Iraq, the Drug War, the Immigration Crisis, civil rights, women's rights movements are all about who pays the cost of production.

Or who doesn't have to pay.

Or better…

Who profits.

In America today, the Republican Party has purposefully transformed itself from a conservative, unregulated capitalist business party to a white nationalist fascist party.

They've seen the future, and they don't like the idea of the old business model.

They are done sharing the profits.

They believe in the business model that their white, blonde, blue-eyed God has sanctioned as how to make America great again.

The rebirth of a White America only to dominate the world.

They tell each other this online on social media, at work, at play, and from their pulpits.

They are no longer comfortable with sharing the profit.

They are fighting and willing to burn the American ideal of freedom to the ground.

Who dares constrain the rulers of the earth?

They foment violence, they kick a shit pile, so they can point to the problem of their own creation, telling us they are the only ones to solve it.

Freedom for all means freedom for all.

Suppose we are to turn the corner on this fight for economic and personal freedom in this nation.

In that case, it's up to all of us to make Americans deal with reality.

The fantasy has to stop.

We can no longer indulge the morally bankrupt that there are no costs to labor.

To justice.

Freedom isn't free.

Put the coffee on, walk around the room, stretch, and rub the sleep of indifference out of your eyes.

A new day is upon us all right quick.

Peace

Daniel J Frey aka Toby

Help Not Wanted

Start with the British Red Coats.

They believed they were the good guys.

The Confederate States believed they were the good guys.

The German and Japanese fascists believed they were the good guys.

The Red Revolution in China believed they were the good guys.

The Klan believes they are the good guys.

Today, the Proud Boys, Boogaloo, Q believe they are the good guys.

The Republican Party believes they are the good guys.

Every one of these groups, organizations, and clubs has a sign in their window.

That sign says, help not wanted.

What does that mean?

To want help, you first must come to realize you need help.

You get a flat tire, there's no spare, and you call AAA to get help.

The storm blows the roof off of your house.

You call your insurance because you need that roof repaired.

You have a toothache.

Do you knock it out of your head like Tom Hanks in the film Castaway?

No, you go to a dentist because they have the knowledge on how to help you.

Help not wanted.

Most of us can recognize when we need physical help.

We have a broken bone, a cut, an illness.

However, a significant portion of Americans remain unaware of the need for moral guidance.

They can't see the fairy tales of the 'white hood' have become ingrained in their culture.

They can't feel the emotional temperature rise around them as selfish, tyrannical voices shout allegiance to their great leader.

They can't hear people cry as they deny them the right to exist.

They don't need any help because their god is on their side.

They know power makes right.

They are defending their race.

They are defending their belief.

This is why they can't be helped.

Help not wanted.

The only way to change the course of a river is through real effort.

To redirect to control floodwaters, civil engineering takes decades of continuous effort.

To have a civil society takes decades of continuous effort.

You can't just brush your teeth once and think you're done.

The waters of strife, of dissonance, of anger and hate will always be with us.

The rain will fall on a sunny day.

But we are not predestined to drown in a flood of hate.

We have the ability to control the political climate.

We can build dams of justice so everyone feels safe.

We can build bridges of compassion so everyone feels love.

We can bring the ideal of the big tent to life, making it a welcoming space for everyone.

Not just hope it will happen.

But remember, our help is not wanted.

Many of our brothers and sisters are comfortable like ducks in the rain.

We who live in the sun just have to keep on getting on.

The lost will come to dry off of their own free will.

When they are ready.

Peace

Daniel J Frey aka Toby

Feed The Spirit

Did you feed the cat today?

Did you watch your program?

Did you catch the news?

Did you find that last collectible?

Did you read your book?

Did you water your plants?

Did you meet your friends?

Did you do anything?

What you feed grows.

Did you run in the park?

Did you walk to the corner?

Did you yell at the people you love?

You hate?

Did you give?

Did you take?

What you feed grows.

What didn't you do today?

You didn't listen to your neighbor.

You didn't talk to the lonely old person.

You didn't give.

You took.

You didn't share.

What you feed grows.

Our lives all run in cycles.

There is a time to learn, to fail, to gain.

A time to be born, a time to die.

And yet, in between it all, there is a time to live.

And living means growing.

Rocks don't grow.

Rocks lie there and let the workings of time wear them away until they are no more.

Our spirits are a living thing in each and every one of us.

Each of us is born with a seed of life buried deep in our consciousness.

Through our actions and our actions alone, we are responsible for caring for this precious gift.

We are ultimately responsible for how we respond internally to the world and its inflictions.

It's up to each of us to care for our spirit.

Do you have a green thumb, or are you a deadbeat parent to your spirit?

What you feed grows.

The human spirit is unconquerable.

The human spirit can only wither from within.

If we lower our expectations.

If we stop caring.

If we stop learning.

If we turn from hope.

If we stop listening to truth.

If we only see ourselves in the world.

Consider this…

If you believe you can't see the light, you're just turned in the wrong direction.

What you feed grows.

Turn your eyes upwards, and your life will follow.

Peace

Daniel J Frey aka Toby

No Justice No Peace

A universal truth is that for every action, there is a reaction.

If there is no reaction, then the action never happened.

You overdraft your bank account.

The bank fines you for your error.

You drive through a stop sign.

The police give you a ticket.

You forgot to buy bread.

You're eating cold cuts with no bread.

For every action, there is a reaction.

Justice delayed is justice denied.

What does that mean?

It means cause and effect.

It means the poor, the minority, the old, the forgotten, the people on the margins who live this universal truth.

When crimes, inhumanity, intolerance, bigotry, and racism are poured out on these groups, nothing traditionally happens.

A black man is shot and killed in the street, and seven years later, with no trial and no justice, the officer who shot them is exonerated and proclaimed a hero.

Nothing happened.

The black man is still dead.

The man who shot him doesn't lose his job; he's moved to another town.

Rinse and repeat.

Justice delayed is justice denied.

We have all seen the videos of the insurrection enacted against our capitol, our congress, our senate, and its employees.

They not only destroyed property through smashing and breaking, but they also filmed their crimes as they ransacked, urinated, and defecated in the seat of our Democracy.

They did this in the people's house.

So you're telling me if a group of people broke into your house, smashed up the place, urinated and defecated everywhere, and left a note saying die bitch, you're okay not arresting the culprits?

You're okay with doing nothing?

As if nothing happened…

No.

No justice, no peace.

Bullies do not respond to timeouts.

Bullies do not care about your feelings.

Bullies only think about themselves.

Bullies respond only to one thing and one thing only.

Consequences.

Without a response to their actions, bullies will do their bullying again, and next time it will be worse.

No matter how hard it is, the bully must be faced and stopped.

Just ask those who appeased bullies in the past what monsters were unleashed when nothing was done?

Ask Chamberlin.

It's strange how the evil side of mankind believes it can get its way until it can't.

Then the darker angels of humanity howl like spanked children, declaring how dare you, you punished me.

You stopped me.

You angered me.

The bully is only stopped when we seek justice over them.

Justice comes right quick.

Let it come.

Let us bring it for the right purpose.

Justice renews hope for those who despair.

Justice lifts the minds and hearts of the lost.

Justice now, justice now.

Justice now.

Peace

Daniel J Frey aka Toby

Gift

Snow pelts against the window.

Rain taps on the roof.

Wind whips over the moon on this clear night.

Young voices carry.

Old voices fail.

The moon chases the sun on this clear night.

Abundance finds joy.

Poverty squeezes a half-smile.

Lights bounce and laugh at the cool light of the moon.

Sharing means participation.

Sharing means giving to others.

Sharing means letting go of your story.

To see through the eyes of a stranger's story.

Stone hearts can't give.

Stone ears can't hear.

Stone minds won't change.

No gift will move a spirit that's given up on humanity.

No gift will lift a spirit that has given up on itself.

Snow pelts against the window.

Rain taps on the roof.

Wind whips over the moon on this clear night.

Build a mighty light that burns with the roar of justice.

Build it high so that all can see its blessed light.

Out of the darkness.

Out of the self-hate.

Out of curiosity, lost spirits will come.

To share with us the gift of hope.

Peace

Daniel J Frey aka Toby

Rescue

You can't save a drowning person if they believe they can swim.

A person's confidence in their belief provides protection from self-doubt.

The enemy of any belief is doubt.

This is why belief is fortified through a structure of rituals.

You daily repeat a ritual to remind yourself of your commitment to your belief.

Any doubt means you have slipped up.

You left the belief; the belief did not leave you.

A daily affirmation, a daily repeating of sacred words, enshrines the structure of belief in your daily ritual.

Consequently, generally speaking, most beliefs do not lose any followers.

They live, worship, and believe within the protection of like-minded practitioners.

Racism is a belief.

Racism is a belief.

People live, worship, and believe alongside their fellow practitioners that the white race is solely responsible for the history of this world.

Racism does not lose many followers.

Racists use words of discrimination against the race, gender, and sexual orientation that they know are not as important as they are.

The believers in white apartheid have no doubt in their correctness.

Their faith has been given to them by their Bible, which is the word of God.

God created Adam, and he was white.

Moses white.

Jesus white.

The devil... Black.

Racists' belief tells them that the Bible is the story of the white race fighting against the forces of evil led by dark-skinned people.

They have no doubt.

You can't save a racist when they know that white equals power.

There is no doubt.

For centuries upon centuries, racism has been fed and grown in wealthy homes and poor.

It is a structure that gives comfort against the harsh realities of life.

Some of us liberals believe we can rescue the racist.

But like a person drowning in a river, if the lifeguard is not careful, they too will be pulled down to the bottom and die.

Racists can't hear us call them back to shore.

Racists can't see that too many people have died.

Racists feel it in their hearts and minds that they are right and we are wrong.

Half this country voted for racism in November of 2020.

Half this country voted for the protection of the Confederacy.

Half this country voted for the separation of immigrant children from their asylum-seeking families.

Half of this country voted for discrimination against women and gays.

They don't want to be rescued because the water they're swimming in is fine.

They see no danger.

They don't see the dark water rising.

They don't feel the riptide pulling them down.

You can't tell a person they're wrong when they believe they are right.

Racism is a belief.

These senators and congresspeople are defending the white power structure in America.

They are willing to burn the Constitution to keep that structure in place.

This is what we who believe in the Constitution's heart are fighting against.

We genuinely believe in the words that all people are created equal.

So what do we do?

We listen to wise words on how to travel together to the beloved community.

We resist evil.

We make friends across the divide.

We defeat injustice that makes victims of both the target and the actor.

We suffer hate with dignity and grace.

We love, not hate.

We know that the universe bends towards justice every time.

Every time.

That's what we will do.

Peace

Daniel J Frey aka Toby

To Feed Evil

The comfort food of evil is fear.

There are three types of people in this world, with a varying degree of mixture between the types.

There are evil people.

There are good people.

There are those in the middle who are neither.

The majority of people throughout our collective history are those who pack the middle way.

Their primary goal is to be left alone.

To be insulated from the hot and cold weather of life.

Their choice is not to choose.

To maintain this choice, they have to believe in fear.

Evil is happy to provide the fear on which the fearful feed.

In America, this food is equal.

The founders of this nation were afraid to make everyone free and equal.

The fear was fed upon and made black people 3/5's of a human.

The fear was fueled when states declared they did not have to obey the federal government.

The fear was fueled during the Civil War, which was fought to unite a nation but ultimately failed to quell the fear of equality.

The table of fear was now set after the failure of Reconstruction.

Reconstruction was that brief time when black people were given equal rights.

But the terror stalked the streets in white hoods, in whispers of protect your white women.

Hope was burned away by flaming crosses.

Middle America fed.

Middle America was comforted by its fear of the other.

Those people who live on the bad side of town are different from me, they told themselves.

We're different, we're good, we're blessed by God.

We humans like to feel superior.

We like to feel we are doing better than others.

The fear-mongers know this.

The fear-mongers who profit from feeding the racial fears of this nation gather to themselves great wealth and power.

These fear-mongers are not just in government, in industry, in boardrooms, but they're in your home.

In your circle of friends.

They keep the heart of racism beating.

Once upon a time, the home of the racist in America was the Democratic Party.

But once President Kennedy and President Johnson pushed for the Voting Rights Act, the Dixiecrats felt uncomfortable with the main course set out by these progressive liberals.

They did not like where the nation was going.

The racists wanted the old bone they had been chewing on since Reconstruction.

Nixon and his election team saw an opportunity. 

They called upon the racists to leave the Democrats and come over to the Republican whites-only picnic.

Since Nixon, that's where the racists of America find their daily bread at the table of the Republican Party.

Trump did not create the menu that feeds fear in our nation.

He is the latest head waiter to take advantage of racial hate and hunger in our country.

Racism, at its heart, wants us to believe that other people are to blame for why we don't have nice things.

Racism is a way of deflecting personal responsibility for the problems we face.

Blame the other guy.

I can't be to blame for why jobs moved away.

I can't be blamed for the decline in wages.

I can't be bothered to vote.

I can't be evil, can I?

The Republican Party is happy to feed the fears of Americans.

It's the easy thing to do.

It's hard to get people to do the right thing.

How easy is it to floss your teeth every day?

Get enough steps in?

Read a book?

Talk to a friend?

Doing good is not easy because if it were, everyone would do it.

So here we are in a plague that is killing thousands every day.

Half the nation believes in the racism of Trump.

But more than half don't!

Got to keep your eyes on the prize.

If it were easy to get to the Brotherhood of Man, all of us would be there already.

Peace

Daniel J Frey aka Toby

To Be Blind

No morning.

No night.

No afternoon sun.

No fog in the trees.

No rainbow in the dew.

No leaves saying goodbye.

No ocean waves.

No fields of grain.

No light on.

To be blind.

Tears not seen.

Despair not seen.

Dreams broken, not seen.

Hearts emptied, not seen.

Innocence is not seen.

Love lost.

Not seen.

To be blind.

Fear.

Fear put out the eyes.

Fear killed compassion.

Fear revoked equality.

Fear drove the heart of evil into the Republican Party.

Their fear grew in a sheltered darkness.

Fear.

Racism was and continues to be used by the GOP to maintain power.

65% of eligible voters voted in the 2020 presidential election.

79 million people voted for Biden.

73 million people voted for Trump.

73 million people shut their eyes.

73 million people closed their minds to the truth that Trump represents.

73 million people agreed that white privilege trumps the American ideal of equality.

73 million people agree that immigrants, black and brown people, women, gays, and liberals are not welcome in their vision of what America is supposed to be.

To be blind.

To be blind.

When we shut our eyes to our brother's plight, we shut off the possibility of our own happiness.

When we turn our backs on injustice, that same prejudice will rebound upon us.

When we refuse to do the right thing, we become small, something that place and time will forget.

Neglect.

To blind oneself on purpose leaves oneself vulnerable to falling off a cliff.

You can't see the future coming.

Americans are afraid.

Fear blinds people.

Blind people are easily led by those with a dark destination.

Fear.

This is why we must keep the watchfires burning.

This is why we must stand in the door with the lamp of truth held high.

This is why we will keep a seat open on the freedom train.

But this train is moving out.

We all have a place to go, and it's called the future.

This old world is not slowing down for any party or anyone.

Drop hate, be hope.

Peace

Daniel J Frey aka Toby

Possible

The rain falls.

The rain falls and gets everyone wet.

A yellow glow of light in a window tells you mom is still awake.

Drawings on the refrigerator.

A young man waiting in a car for a girl to come out.

My test results.

Possible.

Dad is angry.

Where is the money coming from this week?

He's on the wrong side of town.

God is angry.

God is silent.

Possible.

Will they care?

Will they listen?

Will they feel the things that I feel?

Possible.

The comfort that darkness brings is that it covers us up, so we don't have to be responsible.

We can't see the way things are.

We only see what we imagine.

The irresponsibility of comfort.

That's one of the discomforting realities of life in America.

Comfort shortens vision, curtails possibilities, and deadens responsibilities.

This past election, only slightly more than half of Americans were made uncomfortable.

Seventy million people were comfortable with darkness.

They were comfortable with the way things are, resentful, fearful of the way things could be.

Their comfort stopped them short in their journey of life.

They have stopped asking themselves what is possible.

None of us likes to admit when we are wrong.

It makes us uncomfortable.

Too many of us rely upon our own ego, which tells us that we can never be wrong.

We don't look at ourselves in the mirror and ask, "Who is that?"

We find ourselves at odds with the universe.

Impossible?

Justice is impossible.

Freedom is impossible.

Equality is impossible.

Love is impossible.

At the core of this impossible view of life, we will always find fear.

Fear of being wrong.

Fear of being right.

Fear of allowing ourselves to be happy.

Fear of being who we are.

Fear of sharing.

There are no magical words to stop this fear.

No magical incantation or phrase will turn our lives from darkness and seek the light.

For those of us who live in the light, all we can do is keep the door open.

Redemption is always possible.

It is as it has always been.

The world turns, and a new day comes.

The world stops for no people, no person, no government office.

Life lives; it does not bury itself alive.

We all want love and happiness. 

I know I'm not the only one…

Peace

Daniel J Frey aka Toby

Home

Home is where you are, not where you're going to be.

Where are you today?

Are you on your way to work?

On your way to the refrigerator?

On your way to despair?

To hope?

Everyone is seeking meaning.

Meaning of life.

Meaning to sadness.

Meaning to circumstance.

Home is where you are.

What does that mean?

Ideas are given power by the people who believe them to be true.

The idea of home, for many, is an external dwelling.

A place where four walls come together under one roof.

Yet whether you own a home or want a home, you can only rent that home.

All of our lives are a trek from one home to another.

We don't own it.

We are only caretakers.

The current occupant.

Renters.

Life.

Home is where you are, which means you are home.

You are home already, right now, this very second.

Where you are, so is your home.

You are the precious dwelling of the infinite.

Your life is the meaning of home.

Wherever you are, there will also be life.

Where are you going?

If you are looking for happiness, a home outside of yourself, what are you looking for?

Unless and until you are happy within yourself, you will never find contentment outside of yourself.

Life is the journey, not the destination.

Life is now.

Life is in you now.

Your life is in your home, which is you.

But our lives are not tied to the ground.

All of our lives are mobile.

Each person is in their own recreational vehicle, traversing the world.

Each is gaining experience and building a collection of memories.

A scrapbook.

Where are you taking your home?

What is your destination?

Are you ignoring the signs on the road?

Are you drowning out the sounds in the streets calling for justice?

Have you pulled the curtains so that you don't have to see children caged?

Have you put up a fence to keep the neighbors off of your property?

If you have, you have forgotten you're a renter like the rest of us.

You're a renter.

We are all given only so much time in this world.

It is up to each of us to do our best with the time we have.

Not to waste our home.

Our life.

Our time.

Our responsibility to each other.

Our love.

On November 3, we have a responsibility to ourselves and our neighbors.

Vote to save our democracy.

Vote to save your home.

Vote for peace.

Vote for love over hate.

Peace

Daniel J Frey aka Toby

Masks of Hate

Slave Masters.

The Church.

The Klan.

The Anarchists.

The Nihilists.

The Fascists.

The Neo-Nazis.

The Skinheads.

The White Supremacist.

The Proud Boys.

The Boogaloo.

Pepe the Frog.

Q-Anon.

The history of the masks of hate.

The masks of hate that people wear.

People, yes, people wear these masks for a reason they believe in.

People wear masks of hate to cover their fear.

A fear planted into their spirits by people they trusted.

A fear of a world they do not want to see come into existence.

People fear a world where everyone is equal.

Because in an authentic sense of fear, equality means personal responsibility.

If everyone is equal, there is no one to blame when things go wrong except for yourself.

When life doesn't turn out the way you expect it, who is to blame?

Whole societies, whole industries, and whole religions base their existence on blaming the other.

The other guy, the other stranger, the other foreigner, the other unrighteous asshole.

Scapegoats.

A person, a people, to blame for why we don't have nice things.

I certainly can't be to blame because God is on my side.

I'm not the asshole.

My friends believe the same way; we can't be wrong.

My parents wouldn't lie to me.

Masks of hate.

And who maintains these masks of hate?

Who has built empires of wealth on the destruction caused by these masks?

People with wealth and power.

Ever try to take a bone away from a hungry dog?

A hungry dog will bite your hand.

It will let you die so it can have just one last chew on its bone.

It won't listen to reason.

Its only concern is that the bone belongs to it.

The bone is believed to be the dog's only means of survival.

If the dog hasn't learned how to share, trying to take a bone away from it will bloody your hand.

People wear all kinds of masks.

The mask of hate covers the fear of reprisal.

That inevitable future that is coming, we can all see it now.

A brotherhood of man where blacks and whites live together.

They judge each other by the content of their character, not the color of their skin.

People have a fear of this future becoming real.

They imagine the same horrors that they allowed to happen to black and brown people to be reciprocated.

They are fighting for a false way of life.

Just like that dog fighting for that last piece of gristle on a bone.

So, as we prepare to vote out the White House's chief hater and creep, keep in mind the prize.

A world where children are no longer taught to wear masks.

A world where children can be who they are.

Free, living in truth and justice for all.

Peace.

Daniel J Frey aka Toby

Wait

The sun at dawn.

That coffee in the pot.

A red light.

Wait.

In line for a meal.

In line for a job.

In line to vote.

Wait.

To be seen.

To be recognized.

To be respected.

Wait.

Freedom.

Equality.

Justice.

Peace.

Wait.

It's easy to sit back and not do anything when you have everything.

It's easy to dismiss the tears, the fears, the anguish of people not like you.

It's easy to live in fear of change.

It's easy not to see, not to hear, not to feel when doing so means sharing this world.

It's easy to do nothing.

It's easy to tell others to wait when you are in power.

It's easy to wait.

Wait.

Why should we wait?

This nation of ours has wrestled and fought over the timetable of freedom that it laid down in its foundational documents.

It has fought every step of the way to allow those words of freedom to ring true.

All are created equal...

You would think that a People whose credo is freedom for all would be cheerful and grant this to be true.

Yet here we are today in the first part of the 21st century in America, and a good 40% of Americans do not agree with the Constitution.

My freedom is more important than your freedom.

If you have to have freedom, I'll do away with my freedom before I allow you any of mine.

My power is sanctified; I will not share my abundance with you, the takers.

It's bizarre that a People who declare themselves defenders of liberty and justice only mean themselves.

No one else need apply.

Wait?

No, we ain't waiting anymore.

The Freedom Train is pulling out of the station.

We've got a few more weeks until this election, and we're moving on.

Freedom won't wait.

Freedom, like a falling rain, will change with the season.

In the Winter, it will fall like snow, slow and beautiful.

During the Spring, it was long and drenching.

In the summer, hot and fast, the thunder rolls across the hills and echoes in the valleys.

There is no need to wait.

Everyone has a ticket to get on the Freedom Train.

It's up to each of us to get on board or not.

To get your ticket punched, all you have to do is vote.

Don't wait.

Vote.

Peace

Daniel J Frey aka Toby

Racism

Racism is a belief.

It is founded on a biblical principle in Western society.

More specifically, in the evangelical interpretation of what the followers believe is the divine word of God.

The following is the foundation of White racism in America: The Bible.

The Old Testament, taken from the Jewish faith, the Torah, was plagiarized by Christians.

After centuries of debate and internal genocide of its followers, Catholic Christianity introduced its Bible in the late 1500s.

Pissing off the Protestants in England who, in the early 1600s, introduced their King James Bible.

The King James Bible is the official racist text for racism, not the ungodly Catholic one.

The King James Bible.

The word of their White God.

The Bible is the literal, actual truth.

So Yahweh, Jehovah, God laid down the rules for a Bronze Age society, which was for the Jewish people.

The word of God is a guideline for everyday living.

Everything has a place and a place for everything.

Each person is born into a set of circumstances that God has prescribed for their life.

To wish for and to want anything better for your life is a sin against the will of God.

A poor person wants to have money.

Sin.

A woman who does not want to be beaten by her husband.

Sin.

A slave wanting freedom.

Sin.

To change your life is to declare the will of God is in error.

Which is a sin.

Punishable by death.

We are not to 'want more' than what we are given.

This is why in the Charles Dickens tale of Oliver Twist, when the orphan boy Oliver asks for 'more' gruel, he is seen as a sinner.

He is depraved, going against the will of God.

No matter if he is hungry, starving, or wanting more than what God has given you, it is evil.

So, the Protestants took the holy text of another culture.

People copied it word for word, gave some sizzle to some of the text, and presented it as their own holy book told to them by their White God.

This is the origin of the Old Testament in both the Catholic and Protestant Bibles.

Not the New Testament, which is a collection of letters written to the members of the early Christian Church some 150 to 300 years after the death of Jesus.

But that's for another day...

Racism.

Racism is a belief.

To paraphrase Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., the most racist hour in America is that hour in church every Sunday.

The second most racist time is the hour that proceeds in Sunday school. 

I was raised Evangelical, a Quaker.

I can affirm what Dr. King has said.

The tenets, the foundations of racism, are taught in our protestant, evangelical houses of worship to the faithful as the foundation of society.

White makes right.

More than once, I listened to the following tale from the pew.

Noah built a boat.

He and all the animals, including his family, his sons, and their wives, rode out the storm.

When the land was dry, Noah was thirsty and decided to make wine.

He planted the seeds, grew the grapes, made himself some new wine, got drunk, and passed out.

While he was passed out, his sons performed some unnatural acts upon the sleeping Noah.

God got upset.

He visited a curse upon the three sons of Noah.

Upon Ham, he cursed him for being black.

That's why we have black people today.

Their blackness is an outward sign of their inherited sin.

That is why black people are considered lesser in the eyes of God than white people.

Dogs will have a better chance on judgment day than a black.

Do you understand the problem?

Racism is a belief.

It's a religion.

White religious people are defending their faith in God and the order of the universe when they are standing up for racism.

To present any kind of rational argument before a racist is useless.

Have you ever tried to get someone to give up their religion?

Give up drinking

Give up drugs?

Unless they see their problem, it's impossible to elicit a change in mind and heart.

Once a person is a racist, their fate is set in granite tablets.

Like weeds in a garden, racists will always be with us.

But we don't have to let the weeds take over the garden of humanity.

We can keep racism in check.

We, the people, have that ability.

That power.

Because together, we are stronger than any Bronze Age story.

Together, we have the power to demonstrate a better way of life.

A life where harmony makes the very stones sing.

As night is to day, the light of justice, of freedom for all, must rule our lives.

Why?

Because love is easier to live with than hate.

There is a philosophical idea that we need opposites to understand what is right.

As night is to day.

As hot is to cold.

The beauty of life is to see the wonder, the miracle of the diversity of humanity.

All want the same things.

Life, liberty, freedom, and love.

Love asks more, never less.

Add love, and find hope.

Peace

Daniel J Frey aka Toby

Say Her Name

Breonna Taylor's death and subsequent charging only of the officer who shot into other apartments and not the two who did and who shot her and killed her is a blatant cover-up.  

Covering for bullies.  

Covering for racism. 

Covering for a white apartheid that says one race gets justice while everyone else doesn't.  

Racism is not something that will smoothly go away.

No one answer will empty the hate of racists. 

Racism is a belief, and like any belief, it has its promoters and followers.  

It's priests, and it's laypeople.

It's policing of policy.

Ultimately, we will never get a leopard to willingly change its own spots.  

Ain't going to happen.  

Which is why we move forward, why we march, why we shout, why we talk, why we listen.  

Why do we work together?

Why do we get into good trouble? 

We believe in justice for all, which will lead us to that better world where the brotherhood of man awaits us.

Justice is not just for the opposed but also a freeing of the mind and soul of the oppressor. 

Justice comes in ways we do not always expect.  

Yet justice will always answer for those who ring the bell of freedom.  

Peace.

Daniel J Frey aka Toby

Forgotten

Rural America and urban America, are they really different?

Both are underserved by their elected leaders.

Both suffer from the absence of economic investment.

Both see the absence of real jobs.

Both are forgotten by educational institutions.

Both lack 21st-century infrastructure.

Both have stagnated wages.

Both shop at the only store in town, the Dollar Store.

Both cash their checks at a Payday Loan.

Both have lost hope.

If they are both so alike, what keeps them from seeing each other's plight?

Racism.

Racism.

Racism.

I am white.

I was raised in the middle of white, racist, suburban, rural America.

Where everything, including God, is defined as the head of the white race.

The first question you ask is, Where is that person from?

What is their race?

A queer reality permeates the community of white America.

White Americans believe the thing that keeps them from being in the same economic boat as black and brown people is their whiteness.

Somehow, whiteness grants a boon, a step up, a benefit of the doubt.

A buffer keeping them from the bottom of society.

Given the right circumstances, the rich, the wealthy, the aristocrat, the ownership class will invite them to their cash orgy.

It's their 'whiteness' that grants superiority even in the face of their apparent poverty.

The poverty of ideas.

The poverty of faith.

Poverty of spirit

The poverty of honor.

The poverty of community.

The poverty of empathy.

The perverse fear of reverse discrimination is real.

If equality were somehow made real, it is firmly believed that black and brown America would take revenge on white America.

As it was told to me over and over by my racist relatives…

Universal health care is only for the niggers…

If I had a broken leg and a black guy had a broken leg, the black guy would be treated first, get their treatment for free, and I would be told to go elsewhere.

Socialism is communism is a plot of the coloreds to take over our America.

The idea that justice for all floats all boats is a fairy tale to racist America.

You are either on top or on the bottom.

This real fear keeps racist America from seeing its reality.

They have been forgotten, it's true.

They have been forgotten just as much as black and brown people have.

The problem is that it has been, and will ever be, the wealthy who ignore rural and urban America.

The wealthy have gone by other names: aristocrats, the rich, the ownership class.

However, they remain the bane of humanity.

The takers.

Racism continues to blind us to the simple truth of the wealthy's greed.

If only the plight of racism could be waved away overnight.

But it can't.

It is as much a fact as it is a belief in the human racist heart.

If we are to come together, somebody has to reach out a hand of compassion.

Somebody must be strong and say, Welcome, friend.

We hear you.

Let's work together.

Someone needs to say my table is open; come eat and be joyful.

That someone can be you.

You can be the bridge where the forgotten will meet.

You and I can be hope.

It begins today.

Now.

Peace

Daniel J Frey aka Toby

Sports

There is nothing like taking away the bottle from those who indulge in indifference to bring attention to what really matters.

Indifference is a kind of drug.

Indifference numbs our sense of responsibility.

It numbs our compassion.

It numbs our hope.

It blinds us to brutality.

It makes us deaf to the sounds of injustice.

It cripples our will to stand for what is right.

Sports is the novocaine injected into the jaw to keep you from feeling the pain in society.

Have you ever heard of sports called the Great Distraction?

A pastime?

What are we being distracted from?

What are we passing over?

The answer has always been to keep us happily gelded and not question why things are the way they are.

You give a child a toy and tell them to go play so you can do the thing you want to do.

You do this because you don't want to make the effort to engage with the child.

Boring!

You don't want to take responsibility because it's inconvenient.

You have better things to do.

You. You. You. You.

Distraction.

Sports play their part in our society.

In and of itself, it is not evil or good.

Except for that worldwide territorial organized crime online gambling thing...

The Fix is in...

It is a thing that can be enjoyed.

But ask yourself why this President and his supporters were so gung-ho to get sports back?

Distraction.

Today, right now, the NBA leads the way to stop the distractions.

They have the power of their members, as does the rest of sports, to focus the attention of a nation.

They have the power to break the stalemate of indifference.

They can address our broken police force.

They can be more than a distraction.

Distractions...

COVID came along and removed some of our distractions.

George Floyd's brutal death and the indifference of the officers who killed him burned into the hearts and minds of all those who saw the video.

Enough is enough.

Time and time again, the integrity of our police force has been demonstrated to be broken.

Broke.

When a thing has been repaired over and over again and still doesn't work?

Is it time to get a new thing?

Am I right?

Rethink what is possible.

Responsibly, our old, broken police forces should be set aside.

And in its place, a new force created.

A new force reimagined.

What it should be.

A clean slate.

Some things that broke can't be fixed; you have to get new ones.

This time, genuinely based on justice for all.

Our current police force will no longer be the de facto guardians of white supremacy.

To truly protect and serve all.

No longer should they see themselves as the Marshall in a lawless territory to be judge, jury, and executioners.

But to serve and protect a diverse modern society.

Some things that broke can't be fixed.

You have to get new.

Peace

Daniel J Frey aka Toby