A few nice michigan real estate images I found:
The Art of RE-Membering How to Be Human
Image by laudu
*April is Fair Housing Month in the Real Estate Community. Reflections on what this means today.
As the keynote speaker got up to speak during the West Michigan Center for Fair Housing luncheon this week, a projection of a public lynching emerged on the screen. A jarring image in any setting. I wondered where he was going with this…
My gaze was drawn to the two figures who were hanging by nooses from the tree. But the speaker drew the attention of the audience to the crowd underneath the tree. A large group of well dressed citizens, some of them with smiles on their faces. Two young teenagers hanging dead from a tree was a community social event!
This gruesome chapter in American history is one many of us would prefer no to re-read. But beyond the imagery preserved in historic photographs, prints and yes…even postcards, there is an on-going issue of pain and its consequences both for the perpetrator and the victim.
While the American story of opportunity and promise is a shining beacon of hope to many around the world, the underbelly of this story has a dark side. History reveals that fear, rage and the desire to increase or maintain power were often the driving forces behind the most heinous acts of racial injustice.
Pain is something we prefer to avoid. We fight it, medicate it, sometimes ignore it, and often strike out and wound again because of it. However, the pain of the past has the capacity to serve as more than a stark reminder of our failings as individuals within community. The fact that we recoil and want to move on indicates that we know that all is not yet well.
This is the challenge we face as a country today. The pain of racism has taken on camouflage. The refusal or inability to deal with the constraints which tempt us to devalue and deny the dignity of another human being now threaten to undermine our capacity to live as fully human. And to recognize the divine spark that exists in every ‘other’ who exists alongside us.
The reason why we must examine issues of Fairness in Housing and our explicit or implicit participation is that ultimately we cannot afford not to. We cannot afford to ignore the gift and extinguish the hope of others simply because they are not like us. For in doing so, we are denying the basis of our own humanity. We hijack the promise which lies dormant within the potential of every human being.
Awareness is our hope. It is through awareness that we slowly begin to discover who we are and to see ourselves in the likeness of ‘the other’. We re-awaken to the fact that we ARE the other.
Mayor Heartwell and Lola Audu - WCR Luncheon
Image by laudu
More exterior and real estate photography by Ann Arbor photographer, Jeeheon Cho Photography at www.jeeheoncho.com
Image by jeeheon
More exterior and real estate photography by Ann Arbor photographer, Jeeheon Cho Photography at www.jeeheoncho.com
