The Memorial and Museum calls these kinds of events "Better Conversations," meant to unite Oklahomans despite political differences and prevent acts of political violence like the 1995 Murrah Bombing or Kirk's assassination.
The Standard celebrates Oklahomans' service, kindness and honor in the aftermath of the bombing, and it charges today's Oklahomans to embody those principles.
"Service, kindness and honor — they're so broad, right?" said Tara O'Connell, who spoke on a panel for the event. "But people, I think, are so set in their ways of like, 'Okay, if I'm not doing this, I'm not doing this, then it's not not being kind.' When there's so many different ways you can interpret that."
O'Connell is the Executive Director of Teen Leadership Initiatives at YMCA of Greater Oklahoma City. When she was a student, she watched the aftermath of the Oklahoma City bombing, the September 11 terrorist attacks and Hurricane Katrina on televisions rolled into classrooms.
"But if you think about it, especially in 1995, what we saw on the TV was all positive things from this state, from these people helping," O'Connell said. "And that's all we saw. And so we, you know, growing up in my childhood, like I love that we were able to see people there for people to show up. They all showed up."
O'Connell said the young people she works with aren't seeing as much kindness after tragedies, because that's not what social media algorithms tend to prioritize.
Rev. Wendy Lambert, now a pastor at St. Luke's United Methodist across the street from the Memorial, also spoke on the panel. In 1995, she saw the Oklahoma Standard in action when she rushed to volunteer after the bombing and soon learned her father had been killed in the blast.
"It was incredible to see this unorchestrated-orchestration of people and groups doing everything they could to bring comfort, relief, order in the midst of that chaos," Lambert said.
She doesn't think people are less intrinsically kind today than they were after the bombing. But divisive rhetoric can make people feel like the world is an unkind place.
"I do think it can be something that people, if they're not doing good things, they tend to forget that they are, in essence, a good person," Lambert said.
But after the bombing, and today after natural disasters, Oklahomans rush to aid their neighbors. Lambert said they don't generally ask them who they voted for or where they stand on social issues.
"We don't do that because we know deep down inside, the biggest point is to be merciful, to be kind, to help a person in need," Lambert said. "We practice it in times of tragedy or natural disaster. We need to practice it more often during ordinary time."
For people feeling unsettled by political division and violence, Lambert and O'Connell both recommend civic engagement and volunteering.
"When we help someone else, we are proving the point that this world is a better place than we sometimes give it credit," Lambert said. "We become part of our own solution in the way we become a solution for someone else by showing mercy and kindness."
The OKC National Memorial and Museum's next Better Conversations event will be Oct. 15.
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