Lessons

To the editor:

I wonder if humans will ever move past our tribal origins. Riots in the U.K., led by far-right thugs, following the July 29 mass stabbings at a dance school in Southport, Merseyside, doesn’t provide much hope that we can. 

The unrest began when the suspect was falsely identified, on social media, as a Muslim asylum seeker; he is a British-born Christian of African ancestry. Regardless, nothing can justify the violence that ensued.  

Populist demagogue Nigel Farage played his part in the violence by posting a video to social media, before the riots, questioning why the incident wasn’t being treated as terrorism and asking “is the truth being withheld from us?”

Elon Musk, who is himself becoming a demagogue, used his platform to further incite violence by tweeting “civil war is inevitable,” calling a public prosecutor “The Woke Stasi” and re-tweeting fake headlines claiming the U.K. is building detention centers for right-wing protestors in the Falklands.  

This far-right disinformation campaign forced a judge to violate long-standing British law by unmasking the underage suspect.  

I’ve seen tribalism firsthand, being called every imaginable slur for an Italian-American as early as kindergarten, often by kids I regularly played with. I might well have retreated into my tribe had I not met an extraordinary man, Robert DeSena. Mr. DeSena was my 10th grade English teacher at East New York H.S.  

One day after school, I had a conversation with Mr. D that I never forgot. Without judging or scolding, he gently showed me the damage prejudice causes, including to oneself. It took a while, but I moved past such small thinking. Mr. D transferred to John Dewey H.S. and founded The Council for Unity which focuses on bridging divides through understanding. We could all use a little of that about now. 

Joseph Cannisi