Everyone in elementary school knew me as “Eckel the elephant.” Before I grew six inches in one year, I was a rolly-polly kid who couldn’t climb a rope in gym class to save his life. The fact that I remember how I felt over 40 years ago, gives credence to the fact that name-calling hurts. Sticks and stones do break bones and words will always hurt me.
My childhood came flooding back to me as I read a report in The Washington Times that The Tea Party was being characterized as a terrorist organization. Listeners remember the grass roots Tea Party movement; it was primarily responsible for a 65 seat shift of power in the House of Representatives after the 2010 election. Tea Party folks spoke out against higher taxes believing that American government no longer spoke for them. Well, it seems that some opponents of The Tea Party were recently using the term “terrorist” to describe the organization. Such characterization is outlandish. Well-meaning Americans who voice a point of view should be applauded for being involved in the political process, not called a terrorist. An Iowa congressman said it best: name-calling is the last refuge for those who have no argument left.[1]
Name-calling sometimes becomes the name by which is group is known. The term “Jew,” for instance, is a short form of Judah, a famous Hebrew tribe from the Old Testament. We think nothing of using the title “Jew” to indicate a person from a people group. The word, however, has awful connotations when used disparagingly of Hebraic origins. Anti-Semitism is how we define name-calling against Jewish people; yet the name Jew is claimed with pride by Jewish people. The word Christian is another example of name-calling gone awry. Unbelievers during the First Century used the word Christian literally meaning “little Christs” as a slur against believers. Yet the term was claimed by believers in Jesus as the term which would define their belief. So-called “little Christs” followed Jesus who died on the cross for world sin, rising from the dead for world hope.
Names meant to hurt others, sometimes become a help. I doubt very much that name-calling in politics moves individuals to change their views. I suspect the opposite is true: when attacked, people have a tendency to become immovable maintaining political postures no matter what. But beyond deepened commitments, the very name that some use to vilify others becomes the very word that rallies folks to a cause. Sure, being called names when I was a kid hurt. Being called names made me commit to physical exercise; more importantly it conditioned me to call out the name callers.
For Moody Radio, this is Dr. Mark Eckel, no longer “Eckel the Elephant,” personally seeking truth wherever it’s found. To be broadcast on Moody Radio, September, 2011.
[1] “Tea Partyers Exalt in Democrats’ Name-Calling,” The Washington Times 5 August 2011.
I am told that the term “Jesuits” has its origins in that the phrase means “Little Jesuses” – meant to be derogatory. Ironically, a few years ago in Indianapolis, Brebeuf High School began proudly insisting to media outlets that they be called Brebeuf Jesuit. How things change.
I have been impressed lately by how the names we give to things shapes our reactions to them. The old sticks and stones bit seems to have left us with too little care for the words we choose and how we apply them. To call someone stupid is more than an insult or a taunt, it is to define them both in the mind of the name-caller and in the minds of listeners and definitions like that are remarkably powerful!
Still, another older thought is stirring now because I have remembered how the first man was the first earthly name caller because God had given it to him to name all the animals and Adam even took it upon himself to name his wife. How fascinating and wonderful that must have been to get to name something new, just like parents today do with their children. And how wonderful it was to have been named first, by God, when He called all of us his “children” and “beloved”.