Grimm
Registered User
Good morning brothers. Pleasure to be here as always.
Today I want to offer insight into what I find to be an interesting situation. Lets start with some background.
I live in the deep south of the United States in Texas. As some of you might guess this is a very conservative area and as my title suggests I am what could be called a progressive but in political theory I'm a social democrat. (Think FDR). I'm also a political activist well known in my local communities. I do not hide the fact that I am a mason openly displaying the square and compasses on my social media as well as wearing a ring because I am a very proud brother.
Now knowing that I am both openly a progressive and a proud Freemason many community members came to me privately to ask how this could be so. Apparently it had become the impression of some that the fraternity in the deep south was both deeply conservative but also racist and would not allow individuals such as myself to join. Of course I cleared up the confusion explaining that masonry like the rest of the world is filled with many different kinds of people and ideas and while certain ideas may be held by one individual or area that does not necessarily mean those things are universal. Initially I did not understand how this impression among some of the community came to be but we'll get to that in a moment.
When I was about to be initiated a couple years ago one of the brothers who was going to teach me the degree work warned me to be very careful about mentioning any politics to most of the brothers of the lodge. He didn't just mean in lodge as is custom not to discuss religion or politics but also in general noting that they were very conservative and very passionate. He believed this would cause contention and I followed his council with the exception of when I am addressed directly.
This is where things start to get interesting. After I was initiated and eventually raised to MM I was connected with many brothers through social media in the general area and they began seeing my posts which of course include many political opinions and my stances on policy and social issues. The younger and some older brothers did not take much issue and to this day we are still able to discuss and debate in civil discourse which I thoroughly enjoy. However, there came to be some who grew increasingly hostile even going as far as to say I was UN-masonic and UN-American out in the open essentially because I was not conservative like them. This is about the time I found out where the questions I mentioned earlier had come from. On another brothers post I saw the use of racial slurs and this was quite troubling as these brothers were long time members and Past Masters.
With that said the greater majority of brothers are some of the kindest sweet hearted people I know. This does however make for an interesting situation as you guys can see. As I understand it not much can be done but I'm curious. How would some of you handle this?
Today I want to offer insight into what I find to be an interesting situation. Lets start with some background.
I live in the deep south of the United States in Texas. As some of you might guess this is a very conservative area and as my title suggests I am what could be called a progressive but in political theory I'm a social democrat. (Think FDR). I'm also a political activist well known in my local communities. I do not hide the fact that I am a mason openly displaying the square and compasses on my social media as well as wearing a ring because I am a very proud brother.
Now knowing that I am both openly a progressive and a proud Freemason many community members came to me privately to ask how this could be so. Apparently it had become the impression of some that the fraternity in the deep south was both deeply conservative but also racist and would not allow individuals such as myself to join. Of course I cleared up the confusion explaining that masonry like the rest of the world is filled with many different kinds of people and ideas and while certain ideas may be held by one individual or area that does not necessarily mean those things are universal. Initially I did not understand how this impression among some of the community came to be but we'll get to that in a moment.
When I was about to be initiated a couple years ago one of the brothers who was going to teach me the degree work warned me to be very careful about mentioning any politics to most of the brothers of the lodge. He didn't just mean in lodge as is custom not to discuss religion or politics but also in general noting that they were very conservative and very passionate. He believed this would cause contention and I followed his council with the exception of when I am addressed directly.
This is where things start to get interesting. After I was initiated and eventually raised to MM I was connected with many brothers through social media in the general area and they began seeing my posts which of course include many political opinions and my stances on policy and social issues. The younger and some older brothers did not take much issue and to this day we are still able to discuss and debate in civil discourse which I thoroughly enjoy. However, there came to be some who grew increasingly hostile even going as far as to say I was UN-masonic and UN-American out in the open essentially because I was not conservative like them. This is about the time I found out where the questions I mentioned earlier had come from. On another brothers post I saw the use of racial slurs and this was quite troubling as these brothers were long time members and Past Masters.
With that said the greater majority of brothers are some of the kindest sweet hearted people I know. This does however make for an interesting situation as you guys can see. As I understand it not much can be done but I'm curious. How would some of you handle this?