Puritans among us.

[ConsAreLiars]

Most people realize that the slogan of "Strength through Diversity" is both a rejection of bigotry and an acknowledgment that "We," as in "We the people," will need to fight for peace, justice and freedom on many fronts, in many arenas, and in many ways. Talks with friends, bumper stickers, letters to the editor and elected representatives, civil disobedience, sit-ins or street actions, strikes, confrontations, teach-ins, anti-WTO blockades, and so on. By any means possible.

Yet a few want to restrict our actions to the narrow limits of what they consider "appropriate." And they vociferously and vigorously denounce those who stray from the narrow path of true virtue they prefer. As for choosing their own form of participation, that is fine. We all do that. But they, as with the Puritans generally, go beyond choosing for themselves and want all others, the heretics and deviants, to stop what they are doing. You've heard their mantra: "He/she/they make us look bad." Well, that might make some sense if the "us" intended was the people or institutions being exposed by those actions, but these people are claiming that Democrats and progressives and the common people's interests are being hurt.

Of course, nothing could be further from the truth. Even a slight familiarity with the history of the anti-Vietnam War and civil rights movements here, or the fight against apartheid in South Africa (there and around the globe) would reveal that those victories were won by the combined effect of fights being fought all across the full range of possibilities in terms of tactics, strategies, and ideologies. What they (we) shared was a common desire for peace and justice, and that basic unity of purpose was far more important than whatever differences we may have had in choosing how to participate. Our views on how we might be most effective dictated how we participated and what we did, of course, but there was a general awareness that others who did different tasks or had different views were our friends and allies.

Although there were some "Puritans" who sought to sow dissension within the broad natural alliances that had formed, sometimes posing as ultra-lefties, more often as "voices of moderation," the movements as a whole rejected those appeals as attempts to divide and conquer. It really did not matter if they were motivated by that goal (many infiltrated for just that purpose) or (more commonly) were just reflecting an innocent susceptibility to some narrow and divisive ideology, or were just acting out some unfortunate personality defect. Why they acted in that way was less important than what they were doing and recognizing the destructive effect of that sort of mentality. Most of us learned, sooner or later, that what we had in common was far more important than whatever differences there might have been among us, and that, more importantly, all of us acting on a wide range of fronts was far more effective than all of us (if such had even been possible) acting on only one.

There are many lessons to be learned from our history. Perhaps the most important is that "We are Many," with widely divergent strengths and talents, and that we are all in this together.