I had the good fortune this Thanksgiving holiday to spend time with family, enjoy a traditional holiday meal and rest. I hope you did as well.

I also had the good fortune to see the film, Precious.

Set in 1987, the movie draws us into the life of a 16-year-old, Clarice Precious Jones, who lives in Harlem with her mother.  I won’t go into detail about Precious’ life…. as I urge everyone to see the movie. All I will say is that the film is a deeply honest and moving look at the degradation that people endure. It depicts how people, through their own strength and a little bit of support, find a way to some hope, and maybe some change for the better.

It is enough to say here that as we fortunate ones go about our daily routines, working and worrying to build some security for our families, this remarkable story draws us deep into a broader social reality. I am reminded of Dr. King’s critique of the influential 1960 book, The Other America, by sociologist Michael Harrington.  Harrington made a good effort to show the more fortunate members of American society that there was “another America,” one of institutional poverty and hopelessness that required attention by policymakers. Dr. King’s response to the book was that “there is only ONE America,” an America that we must all take responsibility for, not two Americas with one that somehow needs to be fixed, while the other continues to be better off.

Yes, 22 years ago, when Precious takes place, some in Washington shamelessly and emphatically blamed many of our nation’s ills on what they called “welfare queens.”  Politicians were elected and re-elected with such cynical language. Today, we can see a great film whose central character is hardly to blame for the nation’s ills. Rather, this movie holds up a broken mirror that reflects the face of a nation. Too many millions have been completely forgotten in our cities and in our rural areas. Somehow as people move to suburbs, ex-urbs and beyond, a culture of haves and have-nots blurs. And with the economic disaster that is the reality for almost the entire working class and much of the struggling middle class in our nation, it is even easier to be blind to the despair of those who are the most vulnerable.

I have been writing about how we need to change our language if we really say that we believe in change. A film like Precious can help do that.  It shows any viewer that indeed we are really born the same, and how almost immediately the social-economic environment that we grow up in determines almost everything else that happens to us.

We can change our language by seeing our society as one whole, as one system.  We must mean what we say when we quote our Constitution which is based on building a society that “guarantees life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness for all.”

See Precious. See it soon.