{"id":5074,"date":"2016-07-08T08:28:19","date_gmt":"2016-07-08T13:28:19","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/admin.patheos.com\/blogs\/rhetoricraceandreligion\/?p=5074"},"modified":"2016-07-08T08:28:19","modified_gmt":"2016-07-08T13:28:19","slug":"the-new-american-war","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/rhetoricraceandreligion\/2016\/07\/the-new-american-war.html","title":{"rendered":"The New American War"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

\"dallas<\/a>by Kenneth Vandergriff<\/span><\/p>\n

Stanley Hauerwas <\/a>wrote<\/span> \u201cwar is America\u2019s central liturgical act necessary to renew our sense that we are a nation unlike other nations.\u201d \u00a0Unfortunately for Americans war has spilled into everyday society. \u00a0The most recent police shootings in Louisiana and Minnesota have led to protests in the streets, and rightly so. \u00a0People of all races rising up in the name of peace. \u00a0And yet, violence still erupts. \u00a0On the night of July 7, 2016 police officers in Dallas, TX were gunned down in a violent attack that can only be labeled as terrorism.<\/span><\/p>\n

What happens in the daily lives of too many African-Americans living in impoverished areas of both large and small cities is nothing short of daily warfare. \u00a0Survival at all costs becomes the daily function. \u00a0Much like the war zones of Syria, Iran, and Iraq where daily suicide bombings and terrorist attacks occur, life in the war zone of our inner cities is a struggle to understand how and why. \u00a0How in a country that touts equality (though certainly not equity) are African-Americans still the most impoverished race? \u00a0Why has violence seeped into the daily lives of so many?<\/span><\/p>\n

I do not have the answers to these questions but I would for a moment like to make an observation. Prophet\/Rapper Tupac Shakur famously quipped T.H.U.G.L.I.F.E (The Hate U Gave Little Infants F*cks Everybody). \u00a0It is precisely this hate that has turned violence to terror. \u00a0Terrorism is designed to strike fear into a group of people through acts of violence. \u00a0On the one hand, the tragic shootings of African-American men by White police officers could fit the definition of terrorism. \u00a0To be clear, I am NOT calling the police shootings terrorism. \u00a0I am, however, suggesting that these shootings have created terror in the lives of African-Americans. \u00a0On the other hand, the tragic and senseless shootings of multiple police officers in Dallas, TX during a peaceful protest against the tragic shootings of African-American men in Louisiana and Minnesota is terrorism. \u00a0I AM calling the shooting of these police officers terrorism.<\/span><\/p>\n

To be sure this type of violence is not what Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. would have advocated nor would he have stood for it. \u00a0To be sure this is not what Tupac was suggesting with T.H.U.G.L.I.F.E. as if The Hate was literally to f*ck up everybody through extended violence. \u00a0Violence is a terrorist modus operandi. \u00a0Violence is all that terrorists know. \u00a0It is the way they live. \u00a0Hauerwas suggested that war was the central liturgical act of America and further that wars were fought so that those who died before did not die in vain. \u00a0We have heard this refrain in America\u2019s remembrance of freedom, as if somehow by not fighting in Iraq those brave men and women who died in the previous wars would have died in vain. \u00a0The same is true in this new American war. \u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

We do not want Alton Sterling or Philando Castile to have died in vain, nor do we want the countless other young African-American men who have died tragically and senselessly at the hands of police to have died in vain. \u00a0The irony of this refrain, coupled with war as the central liturgical act of America, is that the war only ends when both sides agree that enough lives have been lost. \u00a0So when will enough be enough?<\/span><\/p>\n

Kenneth Vandergriff is a graduate student at Campbell University Divinity School, a father of four, and a minister. He will pursue a PhD at Florida State University in the fall.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

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by Kenneth Vandergriff Stanley Hauerwas wrote \u201cwar is America\u2019s central liturgical act necessary to renew our sense that we are a nation unlike other nations.\u201d \u00a0Unfortunately for Americans war has spilled into everyday society. \u00a0The most recent police shootings in Louisiana and Minnesota have led to protests in the streets, and rightly so. \u00a0People of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":5075,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[158],"tags":[773,771,190,86,772],"class_list":["post-5074","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-guest-contributions","tag-dallas","tag-kenneth-vandergriff","tag-police","tag-protest","tag-terrorism"],"yoast_head":"\nThe New American War<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"by Kenneth Vandergriff Stanley Hauerwas wrote \u201cwar is America\u2019s 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