Lincoln, Obama & The Importance Of Compromise
I’ve written a lot about the importance of being willing to compromise. In fact, you might be interested in my previous post, The Best Posts & Articles About Compromise.
My interest comes out of my nineteen year career as a community organizer prior to becoming a teacher, and you can find more information about that history and perspective in that “The Best…” list.
I’ve just returned from seeing the movie Lincoln, and — for me — the key moment was a conversation “Lincoln” had with the radical abolitionist “Thaddeus Stevens.” Lincoln is trying to make Stevens see that being ideologically pure can feel good, but won’t necessarily get you what you want. He talks about a compass he had that always showed him the “true north,” but didn’t tell him the swamps and obstacles that would be in his way to get there. In other words, you couldn’t always get to where you wanted to go in a straight line.
I’m not sure how much this story is rooted in fact, but it’s certainly a good illustration of effective community
My interest comes out of my nineteen year career as a community organizer prior to becoming a teacher, and you can find more information about that history and perspective in that “The Best…” list.
I’ve just returned from seeing the movie Lincoln, and — for me — the key moment was a conversation “Lincoln” had with the radical abolitionist “Thaddeus Stevens.” Lincoln is trying to make Stevens see that being ideologically pure can feel good, but won’t necessarily get you what you want. He talks about a compass he had that always showed him the “true north,” but didn’t tell him the swamps and obstacles that would be in his way to get there. In other words, you couldn’t always get to where you wanted to go in a straight line.
I’m not sure how much this story is rooted in fact, but it’s certainly a good illustration of effective community