Blog 645 – 05.27.2017
Response to: “No American Kid Should Be Taught To Bow…”

From time to time on Social Media I have seen statements made that I would like to have responded to but it would take an entire blog to clearly make my point. I have tried to pick the ones that I just could not resist responding to. Here goes: With a picture of a little Muslim boy standing, arms folded, looking at the camera as a crowd around him is kneeling, the caption read: “No American kid should be taught to bow to Islam.” I assume this person thinks all American kids should be taught to bow to a cross or like John Wayne’s cowboy character, to bow to nothing or no one. The Founding Fathers thought and wrote that no U.S. citizens should every have to bow to any king or political leader.

I think parents have a right and a responsibility to pass on their religious and political beliefs to their children. Now whether their children accept or follow their parents beliefs is every child’s choice at least when they are grown. If you chose to bow to Islam, the Cross, or any number of religions or to nothing or to no one you have that Constitutionally protected right as an American or actually a U.S. citizen. But in my opinion “Namaste” says it best. It is a word that means, “I bow to the divinity in you.” Many of us even white, Anglo-Saxon Protestants, WASPS, were taught in dance class as children in public school to bow and curtsy to our partners. Performers love to take a bow to an adoring applauding crowd. (Disclaimer: I no longer claim or profess to be a WASP, I aspire to be just The Encouraging Word Guy.)

In the song from Beauty And The Beast called Tale As Old As Time the line is:

“Barely even friends, then somebody bends unexpectedly.”

No two ever get together till somebody bends. So let us put away our silly notion about making the other person “blink first” and follow the custom of the United States’ once great enemy but now best friend, Japan, and begin all our meetings not with just a hand shake but a true salute, a bow in recognition of our divine brothers and sisters who do not have to believe or teach their children to believe exactly like you or I do to be real people or Americans.

I am not your enemy, neither are they. Take a bow, not for what you have done, what you believe, or where you were born but to acknowlege to yourself and others who you and they truly are. We are all children of the Universe and as such deserve to take a bow and can and should bow and or curtsy in recognition of the deity within each of our brothers and sisters – Namaste.

Your friend and fellow traveler,
David White