Four years ago today, I put the American flag up outside my door to mark the second inauguration of a man who I felt had done the best job possible in very difficult circumstances. Four years before that, I also hung the flag outside, not in celebration of victory – I voted for the other guy, for the war hero – but in hope that the new president could deliver on some of his promises and bring this country together, to build a stronger economy, and build a better future than seemed possible as we struggled deep in recession.
This morning, I did not want to hang our flag. A man whom the majority of us voted against – who has promised horrific things – is taking the highest office of a country I no longer recognize. Hate crimes are flourishing. Nazis are celebrating. The Klan is back in the public eye. All of these things have become socially acceptable. The American flag had always been comforting to me, a symbol of liberty and justice, even when, as individuals and a nation, we fall short of those ideals.
I got to thinking about these symbols that comfort us and inspire us. Back around Thanksgiving, I started seeing this symbol popping up, on Twitter, on Facebook.
Not Just Resistance, Hope
It’s the emblem of the Rebel Alliance, from Star Wars. Luke Skywalker wears it on his helmet at the end of the original film. A symbol of rebellion did not seem out of place a few weeks after that kind of election. But I did not really understand until I saw the trailer for the new film, Rogue One. It was still a symbol of the resistance, but it had been given new context as a symbol of hope.
By that same token, in the wake of the election a coworker began wearing t-shirts every day that bore the same symbol – the Superman ‘S’ shield.
Apparently all this time, it wasn’t an ‘S,’ it was a symbol for hope.
One day after about a week of Superman shirts, I asked her about it. Okay.. okay.. that’s not true. What I said was, “Yeah… I don’t think Superman is going to save us.” What can I say? I’m charming. She rolled her eyes and explained that she’s not an idiot, but that within the comic narrative, it’s a symbol from Planet Krypton for hope, and she described this scene from the new Supergirl television show. Have you ever tried to describe a speech that you didn’t know the words to? It doesn’t really work, but I looked it up on YouTube later. As storytelling goes, it’s a little corny, but I can see why it would work.
In many cases the symbols we bear, the flag, the cross, the Supergirl shield are mostly for ourselves, to find hope and comfort in what can be a difficult world. If we want to truly cut through the pain and the despair, wearing symbols of hope on our lapels and Facebook profiles cannot be enough. We must become symbols of hope ourselves. That doesn’t mean patronizingly telling the young woman in the hijab that everything will be fine or the young mother worried about her healthcare to chin up. We do not spread hope by telling people to be hopeful. Rather, we must take action.
The former President Bush called it “a thousand points of light,” individual people working to make America, not “great again”, but better, safer, more free, more just. Almost thirty years later, it’s going to take more than a thousand points of light to turn back Neo-Nazis and authoritarianism. Every one of us will need to work. That work will take different forms for different people. Some of us will be attending protests. For some it will mean donating money, or volunteering time to help those in need. All of us are able to call Congress and or attend town halls to make our views known, and urge our representatives to stand in opposition to rhetoric of hate. Some of us may even run for office ourselves. This country is not defined by its government, but by its people, and the people themselves can make it better. We can all be symbols of hope.
I don’t know whether I will put the flag out this morning. I do know that I’m going to work to make things better. Not just today but for years to come.
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