When disagreement equals demagoguery your goals aren't accretive
The first rule of leading worthwhile endeavors: Do not repel individuals or organizations who might help you accomplish your goals.
Thank you for reading and (hopefully) subscribing to my newsletter. Twice weekly I’ll be sharing opinions, news, updates, and happenings related to our city on the hill, Southlake, Texas. You can click the heart button above or below to share the love. Plus, you can reach out anytime at wordsmith42+id@gmail.com. I’d love to hear from you. Subscribers only: If you have a question you’d like me to answer in the AMA, drop me an email at wordsmith42+id@gmail.com and include “ID Newsletter AMA” in the subject line.]
Accretive…
Each January, a word pops into my head and acts as a guide for what I want my family to accomplish for the year. This year’s word was accretive, which symbolized that I wanted us to make a conscious effort to be an additive to everything and everyone we touched.
So, for example, if we were going on vacation, I expected everyone to find ways to, each day, make the trip better, even in some small way. Most important, everyone was expected to never, ever make the experience worse for anyone else. If you aren’t in a good mood, keep it to yourself. The thinking was that individuals should prioritize the needs, goals, and aspirations of the group; this ensured that everyone had a great trip and, most important, was energized to go on the next trip.
I think more of us should spend some time working to be accretive. (Hint-hint ;)
Podcast addressing the Acronym News Co.’s unfair coverage of Southlake
I had the pleasure of being a guest on the WiseGuy Podcast last week, with host Guy Midkiff. I’ve known Midkiff for more than six years, and we’ve done several podcasts and videos together, including two before I was elected to the city council in 2019.
In the latest podcast, Bridging the Gap, we discussed many of the points shared in my last newsletter, What Media Outlets Get Wrong About Southlake.
Please check out the podcast, if you haven’t already. And, if you’re interested in what’s happening in Southlake, become a subscriber, or follow him on Facebook, or his blog.
His takes are always provocative and well-informed.
My response to the Twitter posse
My last newsletter seemed to arouse quite a bit of animus among a small group of folks on Twitter. I found this rather surprising given that I was only sharing the facts related to my own reporting. It’s quite apparent that many of the people taking shots have no real desire to look objectively at the…well, facts, and instead are content to attack me as if that helps their agenda. (Hint: It does not.)
I have been steadfast in saying that I am your advocate when it comes to fighting against any and all mistreatment of kids and families in Southlake. If they would simply listen and not judge me based on their personal feelings about who supports me politically, they’d have heard me say that I do not discount the kids who’ve come forward with complaints of bullying, ostracism, and mistreatment. I’m all for remedying these issues and any others in the community.
What I have always been against is the notion that the plan is the right way to move forward. I’m of the opinion that the plan died on Aug. 3, 2020, and its death says nothing about the willingness of the community to move forward in addressing whatever challenges lie ahead.
People selling the snake oil of false choice that folks are either for the plan or they are against addressing bullying and mistreatment care more about proclaiming their (pseudo) intelligence—in the Twittersphere—than they do about making the community better. They know who they are :)
I have a policy against addressing questions from non-subscribers, but I’ll make an exception for addressing the Twitter thread that follows.
1) Why wouldn’t you agree to speak on the record? … What are you afraid of, scrutiny?
I was very clear in my earlier message when I said I know how easy it is to intentionally misquote someone. I have my own megaphone; I can control the narrative all by myself.
Also, I have no desire to join in the chorus of folks who wish to set the community afire, which is what the people feeding the Acronym News Co. are doing.
2) Did you really blame Black students at @Carrollisd for the “n-word problem?” (Your words) We think that the racism in Southlake goes way beyond just that word. We also think you are flat out, 100% wrong on this point.
Please tell me where I said/wrote that? That’s asinine. My reporting stands on its own. I heard from black, brown, and white residents. Even friends who have kids in school. I was making the point that ANYONE offended by that word had to engage in some self-policing to ensure they were not part of the problem.
Let me elaborate further: I grew up hearing the n-word. EVERY. SINGLE. DAY. It was never used as a term of endearment by my black classmates; it was yielded as a weapon by my white classmates, who used it as commonly as they did No. 2 pencils. So, pardon me if I don’t allow anyone to lecture me on the topic.
But, on Feb. 19, 2019, a group of parents in a Facebook group shared an idiotic video from the opportunistic Ta-Nehisi Coates, where he explained why it’s anathema for whites to use the n-word but OK for blacks to use it. Those same parents now attack me for not doing more.
I’m sorry, but if someone agrees with ANYTHING Coates says, especially on this topic, we don’t need to have ANY further discussions.
This is one of the most stupid, most irresponsible, and most hurtful things I’ve ever heard. So, you want one group to be punished for using it in school but the other can freely use it? That’s what was happening at CISD.
3) Did you really make an argument to someone that Southlake can’t be a racist place because its population is growing? Have you no awareness of the history of white flight or redlining? We’d invite you to examine the declining population of Black families in Southlake.
People, including black people, move to and from Southlake for a host of different reasons. To assume otherwise is to reduce blacks to a caricature of your own choosing—people who would ONLY see Southlake as racist and then see their ONLY option as leaving. I know at least five black families that have left in the last year; none of them left because they thought Southlake was racist. I also personally know of more than 10 black families that have moved to Southlake in the last two years.
Besides, every few years, thousands of people move into and out of Southlake for a host of reasons, including employment. Should we assume that blacks are not among this group?
Additionally, affluent members of other minority groups aren’t different from other blacks in their intolerance of racism. If blacks overwhelmingly saw Southlake as racist, so would other, similar groups, including Asian and Latin populations. Those populations are not decreasing.
Also, I spent four years studying White Flight (and Bright Flight) after college with the late Doug Bachtel. Here’s what you might not know: In truly racist communities, you do not see minority numbers increasing, as is the case in Southlake.
What’s more, if white people in Southlake were overwhelmingly racist, they would be fleeing, given the steady rise in Asian and Latin numbers and the current home valuations. Otherwise, you’d have to assume that the so-called racist, white people here would also be stupid.
4) You’ve spoken to 1,000 people and not one thought Southlake had a problem with racism? How are reporters that don’t live here able to find so many examples? For Southlake’s sake, please unbury your head from the ground and pick up a newspaper that isn’t PAC propaganda.
Here’s the rub: When you label Southlake as racist, you’re pointing the finger at everyone. The 1,000 people I’ve spoken to never said we didn’t have concerns, issues that needed to be addressed. They—and nearly everyone else—simply push back against the idea that Southlake as a whole is racist.
5) In 2018-19, you supported a plan to address issues of racism and diversity. So did Mayor Hill and future Mayor Huffman. Now you say none is needed. What changed?
Here’s what you don’t know about me: I don’t, won’t, can’t run and hide from anyone or anything. I stand tall against anyone being mistreated. I proudly served on the DDC, working alongside many, many good people whose work will likely never be known.
To answer your question: The plan that was presented to the board was not written by DDC members and contained inserted elements (equity audit was added by the administration) that, nearly everyone agrees, are either unclear or misguided. (Read: Equity audits, microaggressions, etc. )
You cannot conflate people being overwhelmingly against this horribly flawed plan to “the community being against diversity and inclusion,” as many of the folks attacking me on Twitter have done.
6) Host a town hall. Invite student leaders. Have a conversation with one of the majority of Southlake residents who hates the PAC and ask them why. But please, stop looking anywhere but the mirror for the change needed to make Southlake a better community for all.
I have no desire to host a town hall or any such thing. Everything I have tried to do to help has backfired. I have had more conversations than I care to remember with folks who’ve purposely chosen to be disagreeable. I’ll continue to work to bring the community together, but in my own way: Mayor’s Alliance for Unity & Culture (MAUC), City Councilman, small business advisor, and volunteer for any worthwhile effort that bridges gaps.
[If you have a question you’d like me to answer, drop me an email at wordsmith42+id@gmail.com and include “ID Newsletter AMA” in the subject line. ]
The Illogic of ‘Why don’t you do more’?
(I wrote this more than one year ago for another newsletter; I’m sharing it here since the kids on Twitter love to call attention to how little I supposedly do to promote diversity and inclusion in Southlake. Maybe they need to remove the beam from their eyes.)
“Why don’t you speak out against the negative voices spewing vitriol in the community? The political attacks are personal and have gone way too far.” —Anonymous
Hi Anonymous,
We can all agree that there are certainly a number of stressors putting pressure on the individuals, families and businesses in Southlake. I spend more than 15 hours each week meeting with residents to hear their concerns and, often, work to allay their fears that the community is fracturing, possibly permanently. My approach has been and will remain that of removing the obstacles that prevent us from talking, listening and, most important, hearing one another.
I don’t believe in publicly preaching to folks about the need to simmer down. In my experience, those exhortations do more harm than good. No one cares to hear me say "please stop" if the issue that's causing the bitterness and contempt remains in place. After all, most of the noise you’re no doubt referring to comes from people who are responding to other loud, discordant voices they disagree with.
AND,
“Your lack of support for CCAP is disgraceful. You were, after all, a sub-committee co-chair involved in the drafting of the plan. Seems to me that you didn’t get religion until your conservative friends came out against it and you. I’m appalled someone like you is making decisions for my kids and kids like them. ”
Hi Dragon Parent,
I do not support the CCAP. It contains proposals that are simply bad, or, must be clarified. [Eds. Note: I’m of the opinion that CCAP is dead and gone. The best anyone can hope for is that whatever the plan was intended to be address can be taken care of as part of another community-involved effort. Could parts of the plan be salvaged at the same time? Maybe.)
I, however, fully support the well-meaning citizens of our community who worked on the plan.
As I have had to remind folks on the Left AND the Right, I didn’t walk into this process blind. Since late-2018, I have spoken to dozens of friends on the Right who made me aware that CISD has a number of challenges with regard to ethnicity, religion, gender and race, and they felt, as one friend said, “that [I] was uniquely qualified and capable of helping.” Also, I have heard no less often from folks on the Left who, while they love CISD, feel that there are certainly challenges the administration needs help with, Including bullying.
I took very seriously the task of being chosen to serve on the DDC; I don’t apologize for it.
As I wrote here, no matter which side of CCAP you’re on, CISD must now focus the lion’s share of their energy on creating the best educational experience possible. It’s obvious they cannot do both simultaneously.
What’s more, as a leader in the community, I must and will disavow any plan or effort that tears apart the community.
Also…
Is it now impossible to have the conversation without the media being alerted? What good reason was there to add a national news organization to a tweet addressing me? There is no good reason, other than a desire to continue to fan the flames of division and to incite more media attention to this city.
I put my name and reputation on the line to run for office and to be a benefactor to the kids, families, and businesses in Southlake. Attacking me is foolish.
What I’m Reading
I’m hoping to wrap up these two books before month’s end: The Prosperity Paradox and Nine Nasty Words, both of which were written by two of my favorite authors.
Best Things I Saw in October
This tweet/video is for all you Aggies. The excitement was real and hilarious.
And…
Man plunges nine stories from NJ high-rise, lands on BMW — and survives
And let’s hope none of us has a November that begins as badly as this man’s October.
Finally
I plan to write here more frequently—at least twice weekly. I’d enjoy reading your comments, and if you find the content worthwhile, please share. There is too much negative, inaccurate, and downright vindictive news online. I hope to be a strong, positive, accurate voice for those who know that our community isn’t perfect, but it is OURS, and many of us are working daily to make it an even more inviting, welcoming place. And, we’re not going to let the “alert-the-media” … “burn-it-down” crowd destroy what we’ve built. #KeepSouthlakeSpecial