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How Bree Newsome Allowed Me to Breathe (When Nothing Else Did)
She showed us that we liberate ourselves through our actions. She reminded us, in the midst of deep sorrow, that we, who want to see a better America, must keep living, fighting, breathing, doing.
Jun 30, 2015
On Friday, June 24, I turned on my television to watch the funeral for Reverend Clementa Pinckney, one of the nine people shot dead at the Emanuel AME church in Charleston, South Carolina.
President Obama sang "Amazing Grace" at a time when many in the nation are mourning not only for the lost lives of the Emanuel 9 but the loss of black life that is stitched into the fabric of this country.
But then Bree Newsome allowed me to breathe.
I have heard "Amazing Grace" many times in my life. Black Americans singing, in moments of deep despair, is too familiar. I did not need to hear those sounds at this moment in our history.I needed something, but that was not it.
I switched to C-SPAN and, instead of seeing the funeral, I saw the news instead and learned that the U.S. Supreme Court had legalized same-sex marriage in all 50 states. I felt a surge of joy because I am truly invested in human rights for all in this country.
Yet I wondered if the many who were celebrating the Supreme Court ruling were feeling the death of the Emanuel 9 with the same depth as they felt this victory. As a black American, it is becoming increasingly difficult to maintain a sense of joy. These days, I am afraid to look at my social media feeds because, inevitably, I will see news of another murdered, unarmed, black person. It takes everything I have to not get crushed under the weight of the deep sorrow that many black people and our allies are feeling in this moment.
So I was not sure how to feel, how to be joyful for this forward movement in the country.
Fortunately, social media exploded with another story. On Saturday, June 27, I turned to my social media feeds and there, like a beam of light, was Bree Newsome taking down the Confederate flag from the Capitol building in Columbia, South Carolina.
"We removed the flag today because we can't wait any longer," Newsome said in a statement she sent out by email.
A graduate of New York University who has directed films and played in a funk band called Powerhouse, Newsome's action has already garnered more than $115,000 on an Indiegogo campaign.
(Update: Newsome released a detailed and passionate statement about the event on June 29.)
The singing of "Amazing Grace" felt like a familiar trope.
Until Newsome's action, I had been imploding with rage at the fact that South Carolina did not have the decency to take down that flag as the body of Clementa Pinckney--who was a South Carolina state senator as well as a preacher--was brought to the state house. There was a lump in my throat, in my heart. The presence of that flag, with every wave, laid salt in the wound of the tragedy.
But then Bree Newsome allowed me to breathe. The anger and hurt disappeared, for a moment, because she let us know we are still powerful. She showed us that we liberate ourselves through our actions. She reminded us, in the midst of deep sorrow, that we, who want to see a better America, must keep living, fighting, breathing, doing.
Her act spoke to me in a way that the president's singing did not. The singing of "Amazing Grace" felt like a familiar trope in the narrative of black America: We suffer, we sing, we forgive. Newsome's actions were different and more inspired. They addressed white supremacy directly. When many were arguing that the Confederate flag could not be removed because of legal reasons, Newsome removed it. In that act, she reminded us that Americans who want to see change, can write a bolder narrative.
We must maintain a sense of love, joy, hope, and movement as we grieve. But that is hard to do when black America and our allies are suffering through a constant stream of murdered black Americans, together with symbols of our oppression like the Confederate flag.
Newsome demonstrated that it is possible to hold two conflicting emotions in balance. Out of her grief came an action that challenged racism and brought joy to me and to thousands of others. Joy is essential to struggle. Within the joy, planning, strategizing, hand-holding, falling in love, and caring for one another, we extend the legacy of the murdered. I do not let them go when I am caught up in a moment of folly. I do not let them go when I am at the botanical gardens, talking with a friend about our suffering. They are walking with me, in my life, with every step. I remind myself of that. I remind myself that I am here to keep their memory alive and to work so that others do not suffer a similar fate. I still feel the ache of their loss, even as I celebrate the victories.
I am trying to balance sorrow and joy. These days, I seem to experience the former more than the latter. I need something to be done about white violence, and I mean something substantial, on the order of the Supreme Court ruling on same-sex marriage. The president singing "Amazing Grace" was not that thing.
Bree Newsome reminded me there is a legacy in black America that joins singing and spirituality and action. She reminded me that what I really need to see is the Confederate flag--and everything it represents--taken down.
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Charleston Massacre Draws Attention to White Supremacist Backing of Politicians
Jun 27, 2015
This week, The Guardian reported that the leader of a right-wing group which apparently influenced Dylan Roof's extremist views on race before the Charleston church shootings had donated tens of thousands of dollars to leading Republicans.
Earl Holt, president of the Council of Conservative Citizens who once stated that African Americans were "the laziest, stupidest and most criminally-inclined race in the history of the world," has spent $65,000 backing GOP candidates including presidential hopefuls Ted Cruz, Rand Paul and Rick Santorum. In a manifesto attributed to Roof, the accused Charleston shooter credited the CCC with informing his views about race and African Americans in particular.
The Washington Post further reported that Holt, who is based in Longview, Texas, has also contributed to numerous other campaigns, including the 2014 Senate bids of Tom Cotton in Arkansas and Thom Tillis in North Carolina. Once the contributions were made public, many of the candidates announced they will be returning the funds. As Sen. Cotton said in a statement:
We have initiated a refund of Mr. Holt's contribution. I do not agree with his hateful beliefs and language and believe they are hurtful to our country.
This isn't the first time a donor tied to white nationalist and white supremacist groups has drawn attention for supporting conservative politicians. In recent years, there have been several instances of individuals linked to fringe groups making political contributions, especially in support of candidates popular in the Tea Party movement. In many -- but not all -- of the cases, candidates have returned donations and distanced themselves from known extremists once the contributions have been brought to light.
MICHAEL PEROUTKA
A Maryland-based lawyer, Peroutka identifies as a Christian Reconstructionist who believes there is "no such thing as a civil right." For years Peroutka was closely involved with the League of the South, a neo-Confederate group that favors secession and has defended the Council of Conservative Citizens in the wake of the Charleston massacre. Peroutka was a member of the League's board and was a featured speaker at their 2013 conference, "Southern Independence: Antidote to Tyranny." (Peroutka quit the League when news about his ties to the group surfaced during his 2014 campaign for Anne Arundel County Council.)
Peroutka and his law firm have been generous political donors for conservative candidates. According to election spending data compiled by the National Institute on Money in State Politics' FollowTheMoney.org database, Peroutka has contributed more than $300,000 over the last 12 years, including $2,500 for Sen. Ron Paul as a write-in candidate for president in 2012. He also contributed to at least two U.S. House candidates: former Rep. Steve Stockman (R-TX) and current Rep. Andy Harris (R-MD). In addition, FollowTheMoney.org shows more than $200,000 in contributions from Peroutka's law firm since 2000, including to the campaigns of Rep. Harris and Rep. Alex Mooney (R-WV).
By far the biggest beneficiary of Peroutka's political giving has been judge Roy Moore, chief justice of the Alabama Supreme Court. All told, records show Peroutka and his firm funneling $180,000 to benefit Moore and his organizations between 2006 and 2012. In February, Judge Moore earned national attention when he ordered judges and state employees to ignore a federal court ruling legalizing same-sex marriage in Alabama.
In this video from Right Wing Watch, Peroutka addresses a 2012 League of the South conference during which he led the crowd in singing "Dixie," the de facto anthem of the Confederacy, which he called the "national anthem."
CARL FORD
A bankruptcy lawyer in Laurel, Mississippi, Ford is the former lawyer for Sam Bower, the imperial wizard of the White Knights of the Ku Klux Klan who died in prison after being convicted of the murder of civil rights activist Vernon Dahmer. Ford is also active in the League of the South and was active in the Mississippi Klan in the 1960s.
In 2014, news surfaced that U.S. Sen. Chris McDaniel, a Tea Party favorite from Mississippi, received an $800 donation from Ford, who said he especially appreciated McDaniel's position against "so-called immigration reform." Federal campaign finance records show the McDaniel campaign ultimately returning $1,800 worth of donations from Ford.
As reported in The Daily Beast, campaign finance records also show Ford donating to former Rep. Ron Paul (R-TX), Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY), Rep. Alan Nunnelee (R-MS) and the 2006 campaign of Sen. Jim Webb (D-VA).
RON WILSON
A businessman and politician in Anderson County, South Carolina, Wilson for many years was an active member of the League of the South and Council of Conservative Citizens, where he was a columnist for the group's publication "Citizen Informer" from 1989 to 1993. He also was part of an extremist wing that gained control of the Sons of Confederate Veterans, rising to the level of commander-in-chief from 2002 to 2004.
Wilson was also a leader or spokesman for three groups in South Carolina dedicated to defending the Confederate flag: the South Carolina Heritage Coalition, which he directed; the Palmetto League; and Americans for the Preservation of American Culture, a political committee he founded in the early 2000s.
As reported in the Independent Mail, Americans for the Preservation of American Culture raised $22,900 between 2002 and 2008, the year it got involved in national elections:
During the 2008 Republican primary, the group produced radio ads and YouTube videos that attacked both U.S. Sen. John McCain and former Mass. Gov. Mitt Romney for failing to support the Confederate flag, while getting behind former Ark. Gov. Mike Huckabee for supporting Southerners' rights to determine whether to fly the flag.
Eighty percent of the PAC's money came from Wilson and his family.
In 2012, Wilson was sentenced to a 20-year prison term for operating a Ponzi scheme that federal investigators determined had defrauded investors of more than $59 million.
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Re-Naming as Decolonization
There has been an important hashtag -- #knowtheirnames -- circulating through social media recently that encourages us all to say out loud and remember the names of those murdered by a white supremacist in Charleston on June 17, 2015.
Jun 27, 2015
There has been an important hashtag -- #knowtheirnames -- circulating through social media recently that encourages us all to say out loud and remember the names of those murdered by a white supremacist in Charleston on June 17, 2015. Just a few months ago, the Guardian launched an interactive project, "The Counted," that names all of the victims of police violence in the United States in 2015, with a running toll in the left-hand corner (the toll was at 528 as I sat down to write these words). Saying the names of people who have lost their lives to white supremacy is something we need to remind ourselves to do, while at the same time large segments of the population generally have no problem with swimming in a lake named after proponents of slavery and Native American genocide, entering buildings named after Ku Klux Klan leaders to earn our college degrees, or spending and earning money with the faces of slave owners on them. The names of the people responsible for the deaths and oppression of large numbers of Americans are often on our lips and at our fingertips in the United States.
Popular arguments in the South, where I live now, are that buildings named after former Klan leaders and Confederates reflect the history of the South and re-naming them would "erase" or "sanitize" the past. As a scholar who studies and teaches history, I often hear students (as well as fellow academics) write off these contested names, excusing the benefactor because "everyone was racist then," "everyone owned slaves then," or, in the context of 20th-century Europe "everyone was anti-Semitic." Of course, this is categorically untrue once you take into account the enslaved, the Jewish targets of 20th-century Fascism, and the many allies who fought for the abolition of slavery and for the National Socialists in Germany to be stopped. History has the power to establish the status quo, but it also the duty of historians to expose the cracks in the monotonous facade.
While a lot of media attention has focused on South Carolina and the reckoning with the confederate flag in the past few days, the controversy over re-naming has made it to the "great white North". Recently, in my home state of Minnesota, there has been a call to rename Lake Calhoun, one of the chain of lakes that is at the center of some of the most expensive property in Minneapolis, as well as a public space that attracts thousands of visitors to its beaches and running trails. Before white colonialists settled the land, the Dakota people called this body of water Mde Maka Ska, or White Earth Lake. In the early 19th century, it was re-named for John Caldwell Calhoun (1782-1850), a man who promoted slavery, owned slaves, and was as U.S. Congressman from South Carolina, Secretary of War, as well as the seventh Vice-President of the United States, under Presidents John Quincy Adams and Andrew Jackson. Calhoun supported the 1850 Fugitive Slave Act, and was himself a slave owner. As Jon Schwarz of the Intercept has pointed out, the names and voices of the many slaves Calhoun owned, abused, and profited from have remained "voiceless" in the history of the United States, while Calhoun is remembered throughout the country, from this lake in Minneapolis, to a statue in Marion Square in Charleston, S.C., not far from the Emmanuel AME Church that was attacked. Following the massacre, the Calhoun was spray painted with the slogan "Black Lives Matter."
The terrorist act in Charleston that left Sharonda Coleman-Singleton, Rev. Clementa Pinckney, Cynthia Hurd, Tywanza Sanders, Myra Thompson, Ethel Lee Lance, Rev. Daniel L. Simmons, Rev. Depayne Middleton-Doctor, and Susie Jackson dead, opened the eyes of many Minnesotans for the first time to who John C. Calhoun was - leaving many confused as to why there was a Lake Calhoun in Minneapolis. In the wake of Charleston, a petition was started by Minneapolis resident Mike Spangenberg to rename Lake Calhoun: according to the Minneapolis Star-Tribune, the petition had over 2500 signatures by the end of the day on June 23rd.
People in the Northern United States tend to view racism and racial segregation as a Southern problem. There is a certain air of moral superiority that comes with the cold air in Minnesota - a state that has a history of progressive politics, and a pride in being well north of the Mason-Dixon. As I've followed the comments on social media around the Lake Calhoun naming question, I've noticed a lot of Minnesotans - white, middle-class, educated Minnesotans - urging caution on the question of re-naming. Some people think it doesn't really matter who John C. Calhoun was, and are loathe to change something that is familiar. To these individuals, it is immoral to "erase history" by re-naming. "Why not keep the name and use it to educate?" some have asked. They argue that re-naming is not that significant; that energy could be better spent other places. Others still note that it is a "slippery slope," and ask, "What is next - renaming Fort Snelling?"
Just as large swaths of Minnesotans had never stopped to think about who John C. Calhoun was while enjoying the lake, many of these same people have been oblivious to a struggle not just to re-name but also to raze Fort Snelling and mark it solely as a site of genocide. Dakota activists, scholars, and their allies have occupied Fort Snelling, led marches to Fort Snelling in protest of its imperialist history, and published editorials calling for its removal. The indigenous people involved in this struggle are no stranger to John C. Calhoun -- Calhoun was not only a promoter of slavery in the South, he also founded Fort Snelling, the site of U.S. military occupation used to control the Dakota people who lived in the Upper Mississippi River Valley, using it as an internment camp during the US-Dakota War of 1862.
The truth is, as indigenous scholars and activists have been telling us for at least a century, that the majority of streets, towns, lakes, forests, schools, and other government institutions are named after white men (and sometimes women) who achieved fame for colonizing the land, establishing a system of white supremacy, and annihilating indigenous people, culture, and language. The indigenous peoples of the United States have never been allowed the opportunity to decolonize, which stems from an inability of a great number of Americans to recognize they are part of a colonizing class. As many important indigenous and African-American thinkers have reminded us, communities of color are still under occupation in the United States today.
Language and naming are important tools of colonial control. In colonial India, for example, British administrators controlled the population by naming everything in English - from encouraging local people to give their children proper English names to insisting that English education was modern while learning in Sanskrit was outdated (as for the hundreds of regional and vernacular languages, those weren't even worth thinking about, except to control local populations). Buildings, streets, and schools were named after the heroes of colonial conquest. After a long struggle for independence from British rule that ended in 1947, there was a massive movement to change the names of these institutions that had once born the names of the masters. Part of the decolonial process meant that street names lost their British character, giving way to a multitude of streets named after the heroes of independence, such as M.K. Gandhi and Jawaharlal Nehru. These name changes all have, however, a particular history and politics that tell us about both the current political moment and the historical past. The changed street names are often printed above or on top of the old names - traces of the colonial past are all around the subcontinent, and have certainly not been forgotten.
India is not the only post-colonial country to engage in massive renaming campaigns. After the fall of the USSR, statues of Communist leaders were toppled all over Russia, Eastern Europe, and Central Asia, and thousands of streets named for Stalin and Lenin were either restored to their original names or given new ones. Countries throughout Latin America and Africa have also moved away from colonial names.
In contrast to the many countries once ruled by European imperial power, the United States has never had a decolonial reckoning as a nation, despite calls from movements such as the American Indian Movement and Idle No More, amongst others. Today there are numerous indigenous, African-American, and Latin@ activists and groups working to dismantle colonial language, but are held up not only by conservative groups who actively promote maintaining white supremacy, but also by mainstream and even left-of-center Liberals nostalgic for the past who are certain they can improve the conditions of the "wretched of the earth" while maintaining the status quo.
People not involved in social movements led by people of color often ask, should we really rename every one of these streets and lakes? Isn't that just asking too much? To this I reply - of course we should! Will this dismantle white supremacy? Of course not, but it will create an important note in the historical record that at this point in time a significant number of people in the United States came to understand that the history of this country is not in the official names we see on government signs, but is in what is buried underneath. The year 2015 could be remembered because Wal-Mart banned the sale of confederate flag items, South Carolina removed the confederate flag from flying in front of the state house, activists at the University of North Carolina - Chapel Hill fought successfully for the name change of Saunders Hall to Carolina Hall (though their proposed name was Hurston Hall, Carolina Hall the choice of the Board of Trustees), and all across the United States, people removed the name "Calhoun" from monuments, lakes, streets, buildings, and schools.
Calls for re-naming are happening all over the United States right now - it's not a Northern issue, a Southern issue, or a Western issue. The United States, as a nation, is past due for a conversation about what decolonization will look like. Re-naming never erases history; it only makes the historical record richer. Many involved in the petition to rename Lake Calhoun have suggested changing the name but including a historical marker that explains the legacy of the name and the movement that arose amongst the people of Minnesota to change it. That is, in my opinion, one excellent way to make history.
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