Of course I am, and so are you. We all have our blind spots. On January 1, 2020 there was an article by Dr. John Livingston at the Gem State Patriot News titled Time to call out the Bigots. That title could either mean to draw critical attention to unacceptable behavior, or just to summon someone. (He meant the former.) Dr. Livingston whined about how cutbacks removing athletic programs (baseball, swimming, and wrestling) at Boise State University had eliminated:
“…the single best forum to learn respect and to teach the value of ethnic, racial, intellectual, and physical diversity.”
Blind Spots
What about religious diversity? That is one of his blind spots so it wasn’t on his list. And later in the article he complained about bigotry against a Christian Chaplin (sic):
“…the blatant disrespect for the values that underlie concepts of equality and respect for diversity, was the firing of the Boise State football Chaplin.”
That situation is discussed in another article at the Freedom from Religion Foundation (FFRF) on December 16, 2020 titled Boise State downgrades chaplaincy after FFRF protests.
One way of thinking clearly about whether we have blind spots is called the Johari Window. As shown above, we can divide our behaviors into four groups – those either known or unknown to both others and to self. Our blind spots are unknown to us but known to others. There is also an article at Upskill Coach on November 24, 2020 titled The Johari Window Model – How to Become a Great Communicator.
College football is frosting – not the cake
Dr. Livingston goes on (through rose colored glasses) about his experience playing college football long ago:
“I had the privilege to play for 2 coaches who today are in The College Football Hall of Fame. Not once ever did I hear either of them talk about winning. They talked about what was needed to win, but the winning took care of itself. Focus, effort, work, abandonment of self. Not once did I see or hear about any action by a coach or fellow teammate that could be construed as being prejudicial or discriminatory. In any competitive environment, discrimination is irrelevant.”
But that was nonsense. In an earlier article at the Gem State Patriot News on October 19, 2019 titled Diversity, Discrimination and Discernment he reveals:
“I grew up in Ohio in the 1960s. In Ohio and Western Pennsylvania, football was and remains today a religion. I was lucky enough in the late ’60s and early ’70s to play for two state championship high school football teams and one NCAA Division 3 Championship football team. My high school team was completely segregated—Upper Arlington, and my college team was one of the 1st to be completely integrated—Wittenberg University.”
I lived for seven years in Ann Arbor (University of Michigan) and Columbus (The Ohio State University) and therefore have heard way too many stories about how college sports supposedly build character.
Livingston’s latest Gem State Patriot News article on football appeared on March 13, 2021 and is titled If not now, when? If not you, who? It tells three stories - about West Point, Tuskegee Institute and Texas A & M. He gushes:
“What course of study requires students to get up at 5 AM, 4 days a week all winter long and lift weights and run before even going to class? These students come from all races and nationalities. By working toward a common goal, sweating and suffering side by side they learn to respect each other and themselves. And what keeps them together? What makes them not want to quit? Ans. They don’t want to let their fellow teammate down. Isn’t that the ultimate form of respect? You don’t learn that in sensitivity training. What class is this? Football.”
He continued:
“I reread a book last weekend called THE JUNCTION BOYS about a 10-day summer practice session at Junction Texas that Paul Bear Bryant conducted his first year as head coach at Texas A&M, 120 boys started camp, and 32 came back—the rest quit…. It didn’t matter if they were white, Hispanic, or Native American.”
Back at that camp in 1954 there were no black students, and the first only arrived in 1963. Livingston ends his article by whining:
“It is time for Christian Conservatives to get back to the work of teaching and practicing virtues. We must take our country back from the ‘regressive’ narcissists.
If not now, when? If not you, who?”
But “if not now, when” has nothing to do with Christian Conservatives. It comes from the Jewish sage Hillel in the Pirkei Avot. One translated longer version of that quote (there are others) begins:
"If I am not for myself, who will be for me? And being for myself, what am 'I'? And if not now, when?"
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