What a Diet Coke can teach us about CNN, Newsmax and political divides

I confess. I have a dangerously sick addiction to Diet Coke. I know, I know, I know – it’s terrible for me and it’s going to kill me. I’m pretty sure, however, my lung-sucking lung disease is gonna get me first.

But actually, I’m more afraid the way we VIEW Diet Coke could kills us all. As I stared at my beloved DC can the other day, I realized it held a truth that could possibly help us make better sense of the current division in our country and world. This truth, I think, could either save us or, at worst, kill us.

Hang with me while I make the point:

When I was very young – perhaps only 7 or 8 – I annoyed the heck out of my mom with questions she couldn’t possibly answer in a way I’d understand. I asked her if we were white collar or blue collar, Reformed or Christian Reformed, Jews or Gentiles. She always had an intelligent answer and I knew without a doubt she was the wisest woman on the planet. So when I asked her if we were Republicans or Democrats I should have had no reason to question her. But when she replied without hesitation, “Why Republicans, of course!” I pushed back a little and asked:  “But how do we know that for SURE, Mom? I mean, what MAKES someone Republican?” She answered, “Because all Christians are Republicans. Republicans believe life is sacred and should be protected. Democrats think it’s okay to kill babies, take money from those who worked for it and give it to those who didn’t, and make lots of rules that take away our freedoms. Democrats are socialists – as bad as the Russians or the Chinese and they will destroy America – and we won’t be a Christian nation anymore. Jesus would be a Republican.”

I nearly vomited my Cocoa Krispies at the thought of the evil people who think it’s okay to kill babies and destroy America. Yes, of course, Jesus would be a Republican.

So that is what I always believed to be true. My wise mother had told me it is so.

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I made a new friend in college while working the night shift as a phlebotomist in a busy city hospital – the farthest from our conservative rural neighborhood I’d ever worked. She was a fellow nursing student who also loved books and Jesus. We were fast friends. But one night our “downtime” chatter turned to politics and she left me dizzy with new thoughts. She said she was a Democrat! Incredulous, I said, “I thought all Christians were Republicans! Are you sure you love Jesus?” She assured me she did. And went on to explain that while growing up, her mother told her Republicans were rich, selfish and greedy lovers of money who only care about themselves, getting richer, and the unborn. Her mom told her Republicans refuse to help the poor, the widow, the orphan, the refugee or those oppressed – people, she reminded me, Jesus made clear we were to care for. Her mom also said Republicans really don’t care about reducing the number of abortions or they would support public policies proven to reduce unwanted pregnancies – like contraception education and distribution. She told her daughter that although Republicans claim to be the party of life, they all own guns and aren’t afraid to use them on bad people, they have no issue with the death penalty and they don’t feel it’s necessary to be provoked to start wars. Her wise mother told her real Christians are Democrats.

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So this begs the question: whose mom is the liar?

I’d say neither.

My Mom was looking at the Diet Coke can this way:

My friends Mom was looking at the Diet Coke this way:

And both are accurate depictions of the SAME can of COKE (life as a Christian)!!! But because the can is round, rotating it is necessary to truly understand what makes up a can of Diet Coke. One view is simply incomplete.

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Allow me to share another example:

Several years ago Paul and I and our boys traveled to Israel to visit our Israeli friends, the Leifer family. They lived just outside the Gaza strip in a kibbutz (a Jewish communal-living community). We were surprised to learn the factories in their kibbutz had always employed residents from Gaza resulting in many friendships between the Jewish and Muslim employees. However, in 2007, Israel closed off the Gazan borders and tall, electric fences were erected. Palestinians were no longer free to come and go in and out of Gaza. Palestinians who worked in the kibbutz immediately lost their jobs and were out of work – as well as bereft from their Israeli friends. The Leifer family told us they were very sad when the fences went up around Gaza – wishing it hadn’t come to that. They, and many others from their kibbutz, stayed in contact with their Palestinian friends and provided them food, clothes, medicine and other goods now scarce in Gaza by passing it to them through holes in the fence.

Our Israeli friends saw this view of the Diet Coke can:

However, since I started paying attention to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict nearly 20 years ago, my perception of the situation as an American living in America was this: all Israelis and Palestinians hate each other. And because the media highlights every single attack between the two territories, to outsiders looking in it seems like the skirmishes happen every day. After a while, it’s easy to believe both parties just have an insatiable bloodthirst in general.

It seems the only narrative we hear here in America is this view of the Diet Coke can:

But, again, the can is ROUND and depending on your position relative to the can, you will see a very different perspective of the SAME CAN! However, the can (the Israeli/Palestinian conflict in this case) is real, complicated and difficult and if we don’t rotate the can to get all the different views, we’re not considering the whole story.

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I anticipated (as had most of the country) there might be some “issues” on January 6 when the joint session of Congress met to certify the electoral college votes for president of the United States. I planned my day allowing a few hours to watch the news. However, I’m always conflicted on which news source to watch. My daughter and I decided to do an experiment and we put CNN on the TV and beside the TV we mounted my laptop live-streaming Newsmax. We watched in awe and even took notes.

On January 6, for the 2 hours I watched things unfold, these two news sources reported it like this:

CNN immediately labeled the events an “attack” and called those involved “insurrectionists.” They focused on the most aggressive protestors and showed footage of very violent attacks on police officers. Audible cries from police officers could be heard. They repeatedly showed the footage of a window to the Capitol being broken and protestors climbing inside. They estimated the numbers who breeched the walls of the Capitol and entered the building to be in the “hundreds” and that the crowd outside numbered in the “thousands.” CNN aired interviews of participants using obscenities, giving the camera the finger, and wearing emblems of the Proud Boys and Qanon. Protestors declared they were there to “kill Pence” and “use whatever means necessary to take their country back.”

Newsmax referred to those involved as “protestors” and early on suggested they could be “Antifa.” They did not show the footage of attacks on officers or the breaking of the window and instead interviewed multiple peaceful protestors who said they came to DC that day only to pray and express solidarity for an election they felt was stolen. At the exact time CNN was declaring “hundreds” had entered the Capital, Newsmax said there were “approximately 6 people who have entered.” Newsmax showed a group of people standing in a circle together praying. For most of the broadcast, Newsmax cameras were on the opposite side of the building than CNN’s cameras. CNN had chosen the side where the crowds were the biggest and most aggressive. Newsmax had chosen to broadcast from the calmer side of the building.

My daughter and I just shook our heads. Neither broadcast was lying outright – just choosing to only report one perspective. It’s no wonder our nation is divided. It’s no wonder no one knows who to trust anymore – because some of the most watched news networks refuse to rotate the can of Diet Coke.

The biggest problems occur between us as a society, and indeed, even as individuals when our preferred news sources go so far as to claim any other perspective of the SAME CAN OF COKE either does not exist, is fabricated, or is distorted.

Because they want your viewership, they’d rather insist the Diet Coke can is NOT ROUND instead of ROTATE the can.

Lovers of God, of truth, of sanity and all that is good – please let us never forget TO ROTATE THE CAN!!! This, I believe, is the only way forward in love – is to do the hard work of learning to understand one another. Because only when we’re able to love each other – even those who see the can from another perspective – can we live in the wholeness and freedom and unity that God longs to give us.

When we refuse to ROTATE THE CAN we build up a disbelief, a false narrative, a distrust – which often then bends toward hate – of those who are simply looking at another perspective to the SAME CAN OF DIET COKE.

The thing is, we’ve been warned. The most reliable of sources (the Bible) made it very clear that the enemy of our souls would do everything he could to “steal, kill and destroy” us and he does this by his one and only tool: deception.

Hey friends – let’s not let that wicked, wily enemy take us down with a stupid can of DIET COKE!!!

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