"I wasn't elected to be pushed to the back of the room and silenced."
 | By Tenzin Tsagong Editorial Assistant, Special Projects, Opinion |
Last week, as the story of the Tennessee Three unfolded — the Democratic legislators Gloria Johnson, Justin Jones and Justin Pearson standing up to the Republican legislators who expelled Jones and Pearson from their state's House of Representatives — I thought of the Pearson I knew from Bowdoin College, where we both went to school. |
While I didn't know Pearson well, he stood out on campus for nearly always wearing business attire, no matter the occasion. He wore suits to the dining hall and to class at a small college in Maine where students usually settle for their coziest sweatpants. He always had a smile. He'd nod greetings to strangers. When I saw him on the quad, I had the sense that he was working toward something important. In 2014, Pearson campaigned for student government with the exhortation that "failure to move toward perfection leads to stagnation." |
In the wake of yet another horrific school shooting, Pearson delivered stirring words with the cadence of a preacher. (Perhaps unsurprising for the son of a pastor.) He comforted a mother from Nashville's Covenant School, where a shooter had killed six people, including three 9-year-old children. Pearson gave many of us hope that a new generation of leaders is stepping forward, whose lives have been marked by one mass shooting after another. |
On Wednesday, the Shelby County Board of Commissioners voted unanimously to reinstate Pearson to his seat in the Tennessee House. As Pearson made clear in a guest essay for Times Opinion, despite his expulsion, he had no intention of backing down. And he's bringing my generation with him — one that already knows that failure to move toward perfection leads to stagnation. |
What Our Readers Are Saying |
Mr. Pearson, I witnessed your humility and strength at the Tennessee capitol. You and Mr. Jones have created the moment we've desperately needed in this country. You have momentum in the palm of your hands. So many of us are ready to help you create change. Keep telling us what we need to know about the problems with our democracy — microphones being turned off by Republican leaders, the inability to contribute your voices in committee meetings, etc. Speak loud and often about these injustices and we will hear you. We are finally really listening. — Angie, Nashville An unfortunate and detrimental aspect of our polarization has been the loss of civility on both sides. Reasonable people can disagree, but we are now in a time where some believe that anyone who disagrees with them is not only wrong but evil, and that gives them the right to shout down others in any gathering. Such behavior does not lead to a change in the other side's opinion, only reasoned debate does that. Why were you unable to provide your arguments in such a manner? Inappropriate behavior, as recently demonstrated by others at Stanford Law School, may lead to cheers from progressives, but does nothing to advance one's cause. — William, San Francisco |
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