We live in a culture addicted to blame. It happened this summer when floods in central Texas killed over two dozen children. Questions began before the waters receded about whether the owners of the camp were negligent. Once upon a time, such natural disasters were written off as “acts of God,” presuming no human liability (though still strangely blaming the Big Guy). We now seem bent on finding fault.
Recently, I’ve watched blame be cast like a net over whatever group an individual might represent – a political party, the mentally ill, a gender, a race, an ideology, or a religion. We used to call this prejudice and bigotry. An intelligent person could distinguish an individual from a group. Pointing to the worst case was understood to be a straw man that was avoiding dealing with the best case, or even the average case. For some reason, a cross-section of Americans now defend broad-brush demonizing.
The History of Blame
It didn’t used to be like this. About a lifetime ago, there was a dramatic shift in the way legal cases placed culpability. Through the 1800s, if you were hurt by a product or service, it was generally your problem. The policy of caveat emptor reigned – buyer beware. In the wake of the Industrial Revolution, a suspicious eye turned towards companies and their wealthy magnates. A decisive case was the 1916 MacPherson vs. Buick Motor Company, where the New York Court of Appeals allowed a man who had been injured by a defective wheel to hold the company liable. Thereafter, contracts were no longer required to prove culpability.
A court ruling in the 1960s then declared that companies could be held liable for defective products even if they hadn’t been negligent.
By the late 20th century, lawsuits abounded – asbestos, medical malpractice, tobacco, and even spilt hot coffee. Blame snowballed. Blame was a multi-billion dollar industry.
Modern neo-liberal, post-civil-rights-era activists and thinkers, particularly in elite universities, have advanced blame to the ideological realm. The recognition of ancestral land ownership, the tracing of longstanding structural inequities to a modern beneficiary, the attribution of explanation for crime to structures rather than individuals, the attribution of health issues to a food industry rather than choice – all of these are modern manifestations of a blame culture stretched to ambiguous ideological grounds. They bring out the wounded and the disingenuous capitalizers alike.
The Spirituality of Blame
Jesus said, “What you loose on earth, you loose in heaven.” When we loose a culture of blame on the earth, we invite a spirit of blame to take spiritual power over our society. I believe we are there.
In the wake of the assassination of Charlie Kirk, blame is an odd thing. The person who shot him was clearly responsible. Given a cogent, functioning mind, that person’s ideology must have been the motive. The culture that created his ideology seems to be the garden that grew it. There must have been gardeners.
But the eagerness to blame Democrats, liberals, or what have you for a violent culture will only go so far. Who murdered Democratic Representative Melissa Hortman? What motivated the shooter in the Buffalo shopping mart? Who has been responsible for abortion clinic bombings and LGBTQ-directed violence in America? The extreme right blames the extreme left and vice versa. The common thread is extremism.
A Way Out
Today, I’m inclined to turn the spirit of this age back on itself. The blame goes to a seething culture of blame. Polarization is a product of the extremes pulling us away from the middle, pulling us away from dialogue and communication. In this landscape, the enemy is clearly “over there” with the guilty and can be attacked from a distance. We need not find common ground – we retreat and leave scorched earth behind us.
One of the things I like best about Jesus of Nazareth is that he was always on the bad guys’ side. When the religious right formed a rock-throwing hoard, Jesus went and stood by the woman caught in adultery. When the nationalists gathered to evaluate Jesus’ loyalty, he went and had lunch with the traitorous tax collector, Zacchaeus. When zealots sought to kill Roman sympathizers and Romans sought to kill rebels, Jesus put Matthew the Roman-employed tax collector and Simon the Zealot in his inner circle of twelve. When he could have been a member of the Sanhedrin, Jesus was counted among sinners. When Creation staged a rebellion against its Creator, Jesus incarnated among the Creation.
Jesus of Nazareth didn’t seek to destroy us when we became his enemies. He sought to win us back. When we crucified him, he did not flood the earth and wash us away. He began, one by one, to win us over to his side. He also didn’t tell us to destroy our enemies. He showed us how to convert them. When I realize what he did for me when I hated him, I can do little more than bow and submit to his Way. It is the way of acknowledging my own guilt rather than finding a group to scapegoat. And rather than throwing rocks, I seek to stand alongside the sinful and broken the way he stood alongside me, with the hope we will forsake sin.
America has submitted itself to a spirit of blame, and we are spiraling in it. Peace will not be found by finally driving out one end of the political spectrum. It will be found by exorcising the spirit of the age and choosing grace instead.
Hardwired 