Silent Sam, 1913

Silent Sam must go

I graduated from the University of North Carolina in 1993. Even then we questioned why any soldier, not to mention one abstracted from a war that divided the country in an effort to preserve the horrible institution of slavery, should be in such a position of honor for all to see.

The purpose of Confederate remembrance is to embrace those principles of white supremacy. This is true of Silent Sam and of other monuments that were erected in an attempt to revise history. Keeping them up does not help us remember our past, but instead creates a false memory in which racism didn’t shape our country.

This fake history prevents us from being able to understand our present, in which racism is clearly alive and well. Putting the statues up was an effort to erase history. Taking them down moves us one step closer to better understanding our past and hopefully making a better future.

New Orleans Mayor Mitch Landrieu said it much better than I ever could. Here are some excerpts of his speech about removing Confederate monuments in New Orleans:

“These statues are not just stone and metal. They are not just innocent remembrances of a benign history. These monuments purposefully celebrate a fictional, sanitized Confederacy; ignoring the death, ignoring the enslavement, and the terror that it actually stood for.

After the Civil War, these statues were a part of that terrorism as much as a burning cross on someone’s lawn; they were erected purposefully to send a strong message to all who walked in their shadows about who was still in charge in this city.”

“To literally put the confederacy on a pedestal in our most prominent places of honor is an inaccurate recitation of our full past, it is an affront to our present, and it is a bad prescription for our future.

History cannot be changed. It cannot be moved like a statue. What is done is done. The Civil War is over, and the Confederacy lost and we are better for it. Surely we are far enough removed from this dark time to acknowledge that the cause of the Confederacy was wrong.”

– http://pulsegulfcoast.com/2017/05/transcript-of-new-orleans-mayor-landrieus-address-on-confederate-monuments

 

Image source: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Silent_Sam_1913.jpg

An African American woman with her fist in the air looks a white man giving a Nazi salute

What happened in Durham

Like many people, a week ago I was feeling pretty down about the state of racial justice and just basic humanity in the United States. But then something happened.

Sunday

In response to the hate and violence displayed in Charlottesville, hundreds of Durhamites came together for a huge vigil on Sunday night. Many friends of mine posted pictures and powerful testimonials to the collective love they felt gathered together.

But I also noticed that some activists had less satisfied responses, including frustration that the mostly-white event marginalized voices of color and those with more radical tactics. Much of that frustration fed into a Monday demonstration, which had already been planned to take place in front of Durham’s old courthouse, where there was a confederate monument with an inscription to “the boys who wore gray.”

Many times I have passed that statue and wondered what on earth it was doing there. Until last year, I really didn’t realize how pervasive these were and what drove their creation. Last year the Southern Poverty Law Center (which tracks hate groups) published a report Whose Heritage? (PDF) that shows that most of the Confederate memorials were erected either during the Jim Crow era or during the Civil Rights movement, as a way to reinforce white supremacy. The Stubborn Persistence of Confederate Monuments explores this history and notes the increase in legislation such as North Carolina’s 2015 law that prevents any local authority from legally removing them.

As New Orleans Mayor Mitch Landrieu said in May:

These statues are not just stone and metal. They are not just innocent remembrances of a benign history. These monuments purposefully celebrate a fictional, sanitized Confederacy; ignoring the death, ignoring the enslavement, and the terror that it actually stood for.

After the Civil War, these statues were a part of that terrorism as much as a burning cross on someone’s lawn; they were erected purposefully to send a strong message to all who walked in their shadows about who was still in charge in this city.

Or as my friend Tony put so well: “Taking DOWN Confederate monuments is not about erasing history. Putting them UP was.

Monday

I knew that protesters planned to rally at Durham’s monument on Monday. I might have joined them but for it being league night, and I also had an obligation to feed a recovering friend. I did not expect just a few frames into the evening to learn that the protesters had actually pulled the statue down! Many of my fellow bowlers were sharing videos of it and talking about how this felt like a cultural turning point. We hoped this would be the first of many dominoes to fall.

Of course in the days following, we learned that the people who did this were being arrested and charged with crimes related to toppling the statues. First was Takiyah Thompson, a young, queer, financially-struggling HBCU student and woman of color (I say all this to show how much she put at risk) who bravely scaled the statue and looped the rope over the top of the confederate soldier. Then the others who helped pull it down were also arrested one-by-one. They looked like a youngish cross-section of Durham – various generations, races, gender identities, and income and education levels.

Many of us were upset to hear that in addition to misdemeanor property destruction charges, the Sheriff was levying felony rioting charges against them. Law enforcement officers were present when the statue was pulled down. It seems to me that if there had been any serious chaos or public danger, they would have stepped in rather than quietly observing and recording the event.

Thursday

On Thursday I attended a protest at the Durham County Jail where about 60 people declared that they also wanted to be arrested for supporting the toppling of the statue. Here you can see them lined up in black, with another 100 or more observers cheering them on.

Panoramic photo in from of Durham County Jail by Ruby Sinreich

Not surprisingly, County officials declined to arrest them so we moved into the courthouse for the planned observation of the the first court date of some of the arrested activists. I have observed trials before, and I find it to be a helpful way to both learn about the criminal justice system and to remind decision-makers that the community is paying attention to their actions. I dressed up for court, and brought my laptop so I’d be able to stay and work from the courtroom as long as needed.

I was one of the first to arrive at the courtroom, and the deputy at the door informed me that the Sheriff had pre-emptively decided that no-one would be allowed into courtroom 4D unless their name appeared on the docket that day. (Later I heard rumors that he was concerned about overcrowding or that people with cases wouldn’t be able to get into the room. Both of these problems seem to have obvious solutions that wouldn’t require violating NC’s open courts law, but there’s no reasoning with a Sheriff’s Deputy.) This left about 200 of us calmly standing around in the hallway wondering what to do.

Eventually we filed out, and gathered in front of the courthouse. After their trial was continued, the defendants of the day came out and made media statements. I came home and went back to work. Later I was interviewed for this Huffington Post article, and helped Now This who made this brief video. Rodrigo’s 20-minute live Facebook video (below) is a much better document of the event. I left feeling great about the message we sent from Durham to the world about supporting the leaders who took this action to rid our community of a symbol of violence and white supremacy. One of my tweets about the demonstration got over 1,000 likes, so I knew people were watching and appreciating us in Durham.

Friday

[screenshot of screenshotted text message]On Friday around 10:30 I was trying to get my head together to write a blog post about all of this, when I got a text (at right) from a friend. I went to Facebook and saw similar messages. People were trying to spread the word, but to keep the rendezvous point secret to avoid attracting negative attention. (It’s a wonderful queer-friendly venue that welcomes activism and has already been targeted by haters.)

The forecast was for a high in the 90s, I was behind at work, and I’m a Buddhist that abhors violence. I knew I had to go.

When I arrived, the meeting point was already overflowing. Outside I caught a brief glimpse of my friend who is an active member of a group called Redneck Revolt. He was carrying a rifle slung over his shoulder and trying to help people get organized. (The gun is an interesting issue. I will have to to address it in a future post.) I worked my way in to find a friend I planned to meet. The speakers (primarily Manju Rajendran and Serena Sebring, two amazing women of color with long records of service to social justice work near and far) were using the human mic to share important tactical and logistical information.

Panoramic photo in front of old Durham Courthouse by Ruby Sinreich

We learned that the police could arrest any group blocking the street without a permit, and that included us! They told us to find a small “family” of friends and always stay within arms length of them during the demonstration. It really hit me then how serious the stakes were. But I also felt the powerful love of everyone holding each other up. Many of us were scared. Some people were crying. But we were ready to put our bodies on the line to keep the Klan out of our city.

 

The time came and we marched down the street toward the old courthouse. When we got there we met an even bigger march that had come from the other direction. They held a huge sign in front that read “We will not be intimidated” with what many probably didn’t know (or care) was an “antifa” logo. The only Nazis we found were a couple of losers lurking around the statue. As soon as one raised his arm in a Nazi salute next to a woman with her fist in the air, they were pretty quickly hustled out of the area by two intrepid volunteer marshals (one of whom happened to be a Durham City Council member).

An African American woman with her fist in the air looks a white man giving a Nazi salute

Rachel Alexis Storer being harassed by a Nazi. Photo by Michael Galinsky

Michael Galinsky, who took the wonderful photo above, also made this excellent 10 minute video, but I have to add a caveat to it. The video overemphasizes the high-energy moments of excitement and tension – of which there were plenty – but it is almost entirely missing the other dynamic that was just as present, which was hours of alternately mundane and joyful moments of solidarity, warmth, and connection. People were greeting old friends and making new ones. Everyone was glowing with pride at the tremendous power we had to collectively fight hate.

After it was clear that we had secured the entire block from any potential noon KKK march and were not in immediate physical danger, we learned that there was a chance they might come back at 4pm. People immediately resolved to continue holding the space, and so we did. Brazilian drummers came and sparked an impromptu dance party. We eventually grew to over a thousand people, all mobilized with just a few hours notice.

After a lunch break I returned and stayed until I had to go pick up my son from his last day of summer camp. At this point, police were attempting to re-open the street, but many activists were not having it. Eventually, what was left of the group joined the weekly demonstration against poor conditions and treatment at the County Jail a few blocks away. (I wasn’t there of course, but have attended in the past.)

The extra momentum carried the protesters from the jail and up the street toward the Durham Police Department, where the community finally saw the hostility that some of us had frankly been anticipating all day. There was a lot of confusion when photos like this hit social media and many people took them to mean that the Klan had finally showed up. What else would explain cops in riot gear and aggressive formation?

Fortunately only one protester was arrested all day long, and it was for failure to disperse at the police department. I have had many anarchist friends and comrades over the years, and I know that there are some who thrive on conflict and simply were not going to feel like they had their say until something like that happened.

This amazing day was capped off by hearing the surprisingly thoughtful statement from the Durham District Attorney, making it clear that any charges against the statue topplers would take into account the political context in which they acted.

Whew

The past few days have been intense. (Plus Steve Bannon resigned. Holy what!) But each time people ask me how I’m doing, I tell them about this strong sense of community love that has emerged. Under a dehumanizing autocratic regime like the current Republican administration, it’s easy to feel powerless. Lacking epic leadership and organization, it seems there’s not much we can do in this moment. But building solidarity is the best way to keep us human and connected in an era where those in power want us to be alienated, weak, and angry.

A few pundits have argued that taking statues down doesn’t help to fight this fucked up government that is literally trying to kill us, but I don’t agree. These events, these victories, and this organizing is very much building the movement that will also demand voting rights and that will mobilize voters in 2018 and 2020. It’s all part of one effort.

This week was a great start. Let’s keep the love flowing.

Oh and, Silent Sam, you’re next. You stand for racist brutality and you always have. It’s time to stand down.

The first day of Silent Sam's last semester, 8/22 7pm

 

Lakoff's Taxonomy of Trump Tweets

Stop allowing a greedy, childish, narcissistic loser’s pathological lies to control the news cycle

The media is still continuing the same behavior that normalized Trump and allowed him to walk right into office with less qualifications than a 9th grade class president. They are helping Trump block out rational conversation about real issues by treating his insane tweets as real news. Yesterday they spent all day talking about his crazy “wire tapping” story! (It’s either totally invented or proof that a court found reasonable suspicion of him last year. If the latter, let’s talk about the many suspicious ties to Russia.)

Stop reading his tweets. Stop sharing his tweets, even to criticize them. Stop treating them like they matter or like he matters. He is an unhinged loser and a complete puppet of the White supremacist Steve Bannon. Stop acting like his childish rants are the most important news of the day.

Great reminder from my favorite cognitive linguist George Lakoff:

Remember: @realDonaldTrump’s use of Twitter is strategic.

Trump Tweets

More-Popular-Than-Democracy-An-American-Coup-Detat

Wake up! Democracy is on life support.

We’re not just facing a constitutional crisis. Diabolical mastermind Steve Bannon is laying the foundation for a total government takeover by Trump, Inc. Please read “Trial Balloon for a Coup?” by Yonatan Zunger for just the latest developments of this.

If you still think we can fight back in midterm elections or 2020 you are intentionally avoiding the facts. It’s awful, but please expose yourself to the truth. We have to move past our shock and start putting ourselves directly in the way of this fascist kleptocracy. (I’m still figuring out how.)

That is to say, the administration is testing the extent to which the DHS (and other executive agencies) can act and ignore orders from the other branches of government. This is as serious as it can possibly get: all of the arguments about whether order X or Y is unconstitutional mean nothing if elements of the government are executing them and the courts are being ignored.

[Saturday] was the trial balloon for a coup d’état against the United States. It gave them useful information.

Trial Balloon for a Coup? by Yonatan Zunger on Medium, 1/29/17.

Image source: More Popular Than Democracy: An American Coup D’état, 9/15/15. (Warning: kind of crazy.)

Welcome to 1984. Trump is more dystopian than Orwell.

Three different Orwell experts find massive and unmistakable parallels between the Trump administration and the dystopian nightmare of 1984.

This part quoted below struck me the most because so many of us cried out about lies, fake morality, and deception during the Bush administration, but there were never any social or political consequences. So of course the post-truth war on the reality-based community has continued and intensified.

But this new world has been a while coming. Trump adviser Kellyanne Conway’s “alternative facts” were foreshadowed by the George W Bush adviser who said in 2002 that the new American empire was “creating [its] own reality”. As in the 1930s, war has been at the heart of the corrosion of trust in politicians. The lies over Iraq and the quagmire of Afghanistan were followed by the financial crash of 2008, and bankers’ bonuses – making people far more willing to disbelieve the remote metropolitan media and be drawn to the false dawn promised by Trump.

Read more in The Guardian today:  Welcome to dystopia – George Orwell experts on Donald Trump.

Image source

“Mother of Exiles”

The New Colossus

Not like the brazen giant of Greek fame,
With conquering limbs astride from land to land;
Here at our sea-washed, sunset gates shall stand
A mighty woman with a torch, whose flame
Is the imprisoned lightning, and her name
Mother of Exiles. From her beacon-hand
Glows world-wide welcome; her mild eyes command
The air-bridged harbor that twin cities frame.

“Keep, ancient lands, your storied pomp!” cries she
With silent lips. “Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!”

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_New_Colossus

Photo: First Lady Nancy Reagan waves from the Statue of Liberty after she re opened the structure on its 100th birthday, 1986.

Same as it ever was

16 years ago today I was wearing warm sturdy shoes I had bought the night before with a friend just for the occasion, and was being harassed in the streets of DC confused, scared, and angry with my fellow young-ish people in hoodies. Today I appreciated being able to watch these live videos from Black Lives Matter of the movement continuing. (Embedded below.)

Although I think everything about Trumpism is more dangerous to humanity and to the planet than the craven, corrupt, cynically ideological, and illegal Bush administration was, this is definitely a continuation of the many strategies popularized then, especially by Karl Rove who knew he didn’t even have to bother trying to listen to or govern the “reality-based community.”

I am truly happy to see how many millions of people are now mobilized against Republicans’ agenda of ignorance and fear. But I am also feeling really melancholy about how much it takes to get people to WAKE UP. If this many people had been marching with us 16 years ago, we might have limited their disastrous policies and maybe never even been attacked on 9/11. We would not have been sending troops to protect US oil interests, destabilize governments, destroy infrastructure, and give people reasons to hate us. We might not be dealing with ISIS today.

Once again those of us that are dismissed as “hippies” when we try to prevent violence and militarism were right. Will anyone ever listen to reason? Will our country ever get it right? Is it even possible?

Earlier:

Republcan NC GA leaders Moore & Berger

Republicans hate democracy and fair play, part eleventy million

So in case you have better things to do than watch #democracy being dismantled by the #NCGOP at unpredictable hours in Raleigh, here is an important #NCpol update:

After closing the emergency #NCGA session for hurricane (and wildfire) relief funding, the Republicans opened a new session in which Democrats are not permitted to submit any bills, and are now proposing surprise legislation to limit the powers of the governor since the people of North Carolina rejected their incompetent leader. They plan to vote TONIGHT.

Please spread the word so they know we see them, and follow these accounts for updates:

twitter.com/NCPolicyWatch/lists/nc-policy-watch-updates
twitter.com/hashtag/ncpol
twitter.com/ludkmr
twitter.com/lisasorg
twitter.com/binker


https://twitter.com/hashtag/ncpol

Photo credit: Charlotte Observer