10/26/2026
Commissioner Fox interrupted Marie’s speaking piece at the County Commission meeting tonight, costing time to finish before the clock ran out. The entire piece is here.
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Good evening, Commissioners.
I am here tonight because it feels like the city I love so much is at a spiritual crossroads.
And before we can build a healthy community, we have to look closely at the spirit in which we treat one another.
This room, and the political organizations represented here tonight, are not abstract to me.
My father was Hobart Rice… a name which some of you will recognize.
Decades ago, he sat in rooms just like this one, serving as a county party chairman and a state executive committeeman.
I am where I am and doing what I do largely because of a long hidden marriage that was literally birthed within the Knoxville Young Republicans… and ended, also quite literally, at gunpoint.
I grew up in the shadow of those two Young Republicans’ decisions, surrounded by abuse and harsh religious fundamentalism - where fear was mistaken for faith, obedience was demanded rather than earned, and questioning authority came at a price. Appearances mattered more than truth. Power was confused with righteousness. And love almost always came with conditions.
That kind of upbringing doesn't teach a child to live freely. It teaches a child to survive. And for far too many years, that's all I did.
Eventually, that darkness became too heavy to carry... and for the sake of my wellbeing and my children’s… I stepped out of that shadow and followed the path of my maternal grandfather, who came from a very, very long line of Quakers.
He was a man who truly understood what it meant to face down fear. He went to Germany in World War II to fight fascism, and he was awarded the Bronze Star for his courage. Yet, after seeing the worst of mankind on the battlefield, he chose the path of peace.
From him, I learned that there is a spark of the Divine in every human being, and that true strength is found in peace, radical honesty, and treating our neighbors with unconditional dignity.
Lately, when I hear the rhetoric coming from today’s Young Republicans, Commissioner Fox, and a disturbingly growing number of others, I hear echoes of the world I grew up in: fear-mongering, dishonesty, and the deliberate use of a small number of people’s actions to condemn entire communities.
One Muslim. One immigrant. One flawed individual becomes an excuse to vilify thousands of good, decent, hardworking people who simply want to live in our community in peace. That is not leadership. It is cowardice. It is weaponizing fear and distorting truth to protect power at the expense of the innocent.
My transition from that world to mine was not easy. I used to think and say all the things I hear and see from you now. And I believed them.
The word WOKE became visceral for me as I transitioned from that world, like the painful rush of blood pouring back to a foot that has long fallen asleep.
And Imagine surviving what I survived, only to be told I have privilege!
Over and over, I was forced to grow. To live by my grandfather’s example of ‘judge not’. Someone once told me that growth happens when you step outside your comfort zone. These days, I'm outside mine more often than I'm in it. But I know I'm doing the RIGHT thing. Discomfort be damned.
True strength… is humility, transparency, and the courage to break cycles… especially those of collective blame.
As in the past, the loud, angry rhetoric of this moment will eventually fade into obscurity. But our children and grandchildren will inherit how we treated one another when the stakes were high. We cannot plant seeds of hostility and expect something beautiful to grow.
To the young people just entering political life: consider the legacy you're building. I survived the path of fear and exclusion you are walking, and I can tell you, it is soul-draining.
So I leave you with a simple prayer for our county:
May we find the courage to reject fear. May we refuse to let the actions of a few poison our view of the many. And may we remember that the only way to truly protect our community is through kindness, light, and uncompromised truth.
Or, as my grandfather used to so simply say: Judge not, and do unto others.
Through it all, I love you.
And I hope YOU can find the love within you.
