I have been doing a lot of thinking about the Tea Party Movement and their rhetoric over the last few months. Let me start off by saying that I don't think it is a bad thing to be passionate about the things you believe in, whether it be politics, religion, Lebron James or any combination of those. There are things that we are all passionate about, and I am not exempt from this feeling. But, on the other hand, I do think there are times when we misplace our passion and go down a dangerous road of ridiculous rhetoric and actions that we ourselves aren't even sure that we believe. For me, the Tea Party Movement has become the epitome of misplaced passion. For example, the picture to the left of this illustrates a slogan I have heard being pronounced by multiple self-proclaimed Tea Party activists. When I say 'misplaced passion' this is exactly what I am talking about. Do people actually believe that Barack Obama is the anti-christ, or do they in a fit of anger and irrationality proclaim it to be true. Being that Tea Partiers are proclaimed to be more educated than the rest of society, I would like to give them the benefit of the doubt and go with the latter. Obama being the anti-christ is just one of the many other irrational slogans of the Tea Party Movement, such as, "Obama is a secret Muslim," "Obama is not a U.S. citizen," or "Obama is the next Hitler." All of these, I hope, are the Tea Partiers way of expressing their anger, and not what they actually believe.
So what is the point? If I understand the Tea Party Movement correctly, its most basic principles are smaller government and little or no taxation. Now, if Tea Partiers are supposed to be the most educated portion of society, wouldn't they see that Obama being the anti-christ or a Muslim or Hitler have nothing to do with government or taxes? Do they not also realize that by making these claims actually hinders their credibility when actually trying to bring light to their otherwise legitimate (I disagree with them, but they are nonetheless legitimate) principles. This is what I call misplaced passion. Don't get me wrong, I do not think misplaced passion is a characteristic of all Tea Partiers, just the ones who get the most attention. If I were a Tea Partier, I wouldn't want those with misplaced passion distorting the message that I was trying to get across (but alas, I am not a Tea Partier).
I think this has bothered me so much because the idealist in me sees the potential for misplaced passion to be turned into useful passion for the benefit of humanity. What if the people who get so heated that they are moved to make ridiculous claims about the president and others got passionate about feeding people? What if instead of spending their time coming up with provocative slogans for signs for their next rally they used their creativity and artistic ability to paint a mural in a dilapidated neighborhood? What if instead of perpetuating the myth that any person who is homeless or jobless and collecting unemployment is a "freeloader" they actually spent time learning about the root causes of homelessness and poverty? What if instead of spending time claiming that Obama was the anti-christ, they spent time living as instructed by Jesus Christ? I think the answer to these questions is that we would live in a country where we wouldn't have to be so angry at the government for spending, where we wouldn't have to attempt to divide our country with the rhetoric of hate, where we would act out of love instead of out of anger. That is the kind of country I want to live in, and I hope it is the kind of country you want to live in as well, no matter what your political affiliation is.
