Most Reverend Jerome E. Listecki
Archbishop of Milwaukee
 

Recently an influential member of the current United States administration was reported to have commented on the leadership of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Granted, relationships may have been strained between the leaders, despite the protestations of officials. But this was a personal attack on the leader of Israel and it was an “ad hominem” attack (name calling). The comments were that Benjamin Netanyahu was recalcitrant, myopic, reactionary, blustering, obtuse, pompous, Aspergery and chicken****.

Now I believe there are a few words that would make me fighting mad but it is not chicken****. In my neighborhood on the south side of Chicago, the words recalcitrant, myopic and obtuse would have generated fists flying, basically because we wouldn’t have known what those words meant. A guy could get into a fight in my old neighborhood for being called gregarious.

It is strange to me that no ire was generated by the media over “Aspergery,” a derogatory remark about Asperger’s Syndrome, because that was just plain mean and insensitive. No matter what level the conversation, disabilities should be off the table.

But I was mystified by the reaction of the media networks to the word chicken****. What hypocrisy! It was like Hugh Hefner being shocked at the miniskirt. Many of the stations have no problem taking the Lord’s name in vain, all for the sake of art, but chicken**** must have struck a nerve by someone who objects to the fecal matter of poultry.

My mind raced back to that moment in the movie “A Christmas Story,” the wonderful work of Jean Shepherd, when the main character the little boy Ralphie, about nine, was helping his Dad change a tire in the winter snow. Ralphie was holding the hub cap filled with lug nuts when his Dad accidently hit the hub cap with the tire iron and sent the lug nuts flying all over the place. Ralphie blurted out the “F-bomb.” Shocked, his father sent him back into the car. When his mother wanted to know what happened, the father whispered in her ear the word her son had blurted out. Horrified, the parents, totally shocked, asked little Ralphie where in the world he had ever heard that word. Of course, Ralphie lied and said that he heard it in school from a friend. He thinks that he couldn’t tell them that he had heard his Dad use the word as a part of speech almost every day of his young life.

Media takes on this puritanical veneer when it serves its own agenda and then launches into rampant hedonism claiming it is part of freedom of expression. Rarely does it ever examine its own culpability.

Chicken****! Sticks and stones may break my bones but names will never hurt me. Name-calling may be the favorite tool of schoolyard bullies but it doesn’t have a place in the area of international diplomacy. And, if the media is shocked by the term, perhaps they should watch some of the programs that they produce on their networks.

Please! Watch your language, especially when you’re speaking to children or about friends, because remember, our Lord calls us to LOVE ONE ANOTHER.

Note: This blog originally appeared as the November 5, 2014 "Love One Another" email sent to Catholics throughout the Archdiocese of Milwaukee by Archbishop Jerome E. Listecki. If you are interested in signing up for these email messages, please click here.