By BaxterPlease allow us cats to attempt to contribute to President Obama's teachable moment.
Like the commentators we heard on NPR yesterday, we don't understand why the whole encounter between Professor Henry Louis Gates and Sergeant James Crowley didn't change the instant Professor Gates showed his ID.
Because — and perhaps it hasn't dawned on people not frequently detained by authority figures — in America, it is not actually against the law to be rude to a police officer.
But we don't want to get sidetracked, when it's crossed our little cat minds that perhaps more people than "just" African Americans could relate to Professor Gates' situation.
Any one of us who has been humiliated because of something we cannot help — who we are — can empathize with this Harvard scholar. The sissy kids in grade school who suffer taunts of "faggot." Women whistled at by construction workers. Hispanic children ridiculed for their accents. Native Americans, Asian Americans, the disabled.... the list goes on and on.
Get it? This isn't solely about black and white. It's about all people, needing to show respect to one another, all of the time.
We cats didn't mean to go squishy on you all of a sudden. But sometimes, the simple lessons our mothers taught us really turn out to be the best.
And if the President would be kind enough to invite us to his beerfest with Mssrs. Gates and Crowley, we'll be happy to tell them so.
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