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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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'We Can't Wait Any Longer': Activist Removes Confederate Flag from SC Statehouse
Bree Newsome climbed flagpole in front of South Carolina statehouse early Saturday morning, stating, "It's time for a new chapter"
Jun 27, 2015
An activist and youth organizer named Bree Newsome climbed the flagpole in front of the South Carolina capitol in Columbia early Saturday morning and pulled down the Confederate flag still flying on Statehouse grounds, telling media, "we can't wait any longer."
Newsome, 30, of Charlotte, was about halfway up the 30-foot flagpole when police demanded she climb back down, but she kept going until she was able to remove the flag from its perch. Upon returning to the ground, Newsome was arrested along with another activist, James Ian Dyson, and taken to the Alvin S. Glenn Detention Center on misdemeanor charges of defacing a monument on state capitol grounds. News of their action spread quickly under the hashtag #FreeBree, sparking a petition to remove the flag and drop the charges against Newsome.
"We removed the flag today because we can't wait any longer," Newsome said in a written statement on Saturday. "We can't continue like this another day. It's time for a new chapter where we are sincere about dismantling white supremacy and building toward true racial justice and equality."
After Newsome's arrest, officials ordered the banner to be raised again around 8:30 am--just in time for a pro-flag rally.
The action came just hours before funeral services continued for the third day for the victims of an attack on Emanuel A.M.E. Church in Charleston, South Carolina, in which a gunman shot dead nine black men and women. Dylann Roof, a 21-year-old white supremacist, has been charged in the murders. The attack is being investigated as a hate crime and has sparked a renewed demand by activists to take down the Confederate flags flying on capitol grounds in numerous states.
Watch video of the action below:
"We could not sit by and watch the victims of the Charleston Massacre be laid to rest while the inspiration for their deaths continues to fly above their caskets," the group that organized the action said in a statement.
"The flag represents white supremacy," another activist, 25-year-old Tamika Lewis, told the Guardian on Saturday. "The image alone is used to ignite fear and intimidation, especially among people of color and minorities. This was a long time coming."
South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley called on the state legislature this week to vote to remove the flag. But, as Lewis told the Guardian, "This was a Confederate symbol that ignited an individual to kill and murder innocent black people in a church, and it was still erected. The legislature was just taking too long to act morally and justly. They're dragging their feet."
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Justice After Charleston
If we want to honor the memory of the Emanuel martyrs, we must continue their struggle for transformative action.
Jun 25, 2015
A deeper meaning of forgiveness in the Christian nonviolent tradition reveals a critique that knows when the perpetrator has been caught but the killer is still at large.
There is a scripture that says we wrestle not against flesh and blood but against the powers and rulers of the darkness. Within the nonviolent faith tradition, it has always been clear that hate cannot drive out hate and evil cannot drive out evil. And so the Christians at the Charleston Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church who were able to forgive the murder of nine of their fellow worshipers 48 hours after losing their loved ones are consistent with their faith. Jesus said as he was being murdered by the state, "Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do."
But this forgiveness should not be misinterpreted as a dismissing of the greater evil. The forgiveness in Charleston is also an act of resistance to the attempts to lay the blame for this horror at the feet of one man. If America is serious about this moment, we cannot just cry ceremonial tears while at the same time refusing to support the martyred Reverend Pinckney and his parishioners' stalwart fight against the racism that gave birth to the crime.
The perpetrator has been caught, but the killer is still at large: the deep well of American racism and white supremacy that Dylann Roof drank from. These families are challenging the schizophrenia of American morality, which allows political leaders to condemn the crime but embrace the policies that are its genesis.
Many South Carolina politicians and others around the nation are decrying the killings but steadfastly refusing to quell their divisive race-implying rhetoric. They have condemned the violence but have not ceased their push for policies that promote race-based voter suppression; adversity toward fixing the Voting Rights Act; cutting public education in ways that foster resegregation; denying workers living wages; refusing Medicaid expansion; allowing the proliferation of guns; and flying the Confederate flag, a symbol of slavery, racism, and terrorism against African-Americans, at the state Capitol.
Some even use racial code words to criticize the president, all in the name of taking their country back and preventing its destruction. And they refuse to admit that there is a history of racialized political rhetoric and policies spawning the pathology of terroristic murder and violent resistance.
When they were murdered, Reverend Pinckney and his parishioners were advocating for a better life for people of all races. They were standing with fast-food workers demanding a living wage. They were calling for the Confederate flag to come down. They were fighting against voter suppression and for funding public education, expanding Medicaid to allow the poor and near-poor of all races to have healthcare. They were mobilizing for police accountability and marching for justice in the recent killing of Walter Scott, an unarmed African-American man shot in the back by a police officer in North Charleston.
These brave family members are telling America that you cannot focus only on Dylann Roof and absolve the nation of its historic sickness. In a profound way, they are saying that giving the killer the death penalty is not going to fix what ails us. Arresting one disturbed young man will not bring "closure" or "healing" to a society that is still sick with the sins of racism and inequality, where too many perpetuate the slow violence of undermining the promise of equal protection under the law, which preachers like Denmark Vessey, Martin Luther King, and Clementa Pickney fought for.
These family members are asking us to forgive the sinner but hate the sin. They are issuing a clarion call born of their pain and loss to create a society that truly embraces justice and equality, that ends the policies of racism and poverty that guarantee there will be more Dylann Roofs and more acts of terror, because only then will we apprehend the real killers.
In light of this, I believe real healing would be writing and passing a bipartisan omnibus bill in the name of the nine Emanuel Martyrs that implements Medicaid expansion, raises public education funding, passes living-wage requirements and new gun-control laws, removes the Confederate flag from the South Carolina Statehouse, and restores the Voting Rights Act.
The very seat Reverend Pinckney held in the state Senate is in jeopardy as long as Section 5 of the VRA has been gutted. And even if it passed, the current reform bill in the US House would exempt Alabama, South Carolina, North Carolina, Virginia, and Tennessee from coverage. If we want closure, let us name a VRA restoration bill after the Emanuel Nine.
We have no choice. We must see transformative action, not temporary ceremonial displays. Until we deal with the issues of race, poverty, and violence that threaten to tear our nation asunder, it is not just America's soul that is at stake, but America itself.
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'The Perpetrator Has Been Arrested, but the Killer Is Still at Large'
Jun 25, 2015
The massacre of nine African-American worshippers at the Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Charleston, S.C., has sent shock waves through the nation and could well blow the roof off the Confederacy. Dylann Storm Roof is accused of methodically killing the congregants, reloading his Glock pistol at least twice. He let one victim live, according to a person who spoke with the survivor, so she could tell the world what happened. This brutal mass killing was blatantly racist, an overt act of terrorism.
Those murdered included the minister of the historic church, 41-year-old Rev. Clementa Pinckney, who also was an elected state senator in South Carolina and who was leading a Wednesday night Bible-study group. Roof actually sat in on the group for an hour before the massacre.
What little we know of Roof's motivation for his alleged crime comes from a website he is believed to have created. A manifesto posted on the site says: "I chose Charleston because it is most historic city in my state, and at one time had the highest ratio of blacks to Whites in the country. We have no skinheads, no real KKK, no one doing anything but talking on the internet. Well someone has to have the bravery to take it to the real world, and I guess that has to be me." A survivor of the shooting said that Roof told a victim begging for him to stop the killing: "I have to do it. You're raping our women and taking over the country. You have to go."
The website includes photos of Roof brandishing a gun, the .45-caliber Glock that is likely the murder weapon, and the Confederate flag, leading to renewed efforts to remove this symbol of racism and hate from flying on public property. For decades, the Confederate flag flew above the South Carolina Statehouse, along with the U.S. flag and the state flag of South Carolina. After the NAACP began a boycott of the state in the year 2000, a compromise was reached. The Confederate flag was removed from the state Capitol dome and placed on statehouse grounds, alongside a Confederate war memorial.
Among those who first stood up last week in favor of removing the flag was a white Republican serving in the South Carolina legislature, Doug Brannon. He told us on "Democracy Now!": "I woke up Thursday morning to the news of the death of these nine wonderful people. I knew something had to be done then. ... Clementa Pinckney deserves this. Those nine people deserve this. Our state Capitol needs to be free of the flag." When we asked him if he would consider a memorial to the victims of the Emanuel AME massacre, he said it was "a wonderful idea."
The Rev. Dr. William J. Barber III is the president of the North Carolina NAACP. He heard about the slaughter on Wednesday night while in jail. "About 10 of us had been arrested in the state House in North Carolina for challenging extremist politicians who have passed the worst voter-suppression law in the country," he said. Barber has led the "Moral Mondays" movement, with hundreds to thousands of people protesting weekly against the agenda being passed by North Carolina's Republican-controlled state government. He favors removal of the Confederate flag, which he calls "vulgar," but suggested that passing policy would be a more potent memorial to Clementa Pinckney and the other victims.
"Reverend Pinckney was not just opposed to the flag, he was opposed to the denial of Medicaid expansion," Barber continued. "He was opposed to those who have celebrated the ending of the Voting Rights Act. He was opposed to the lack of funding for public education. He wanted to see living wages raised." Addressing state Rep. Doug Brannon, Barber said: "Let's put together an omnibus bill in the name of the nine martyrs. And all of the things Reverend Pinckney was standing for, if we say we love him and his colleagues, let's put all of those things in a one big omnibus bill and pass that and bring it to the funeral on Friday."
Wal-Mart, Amazon and other major retailers have pulled Confederate paraphernalia from their shelves. Alabama has taken down the flag, and other states, including South Carolina, are following. The symbol of the Southern states' rebellion and secession, of waging war to protect slavery, will be less visible. But the fight for equality, waged 200 years ago by the very founders of Charleston's Emanuel AME church, continues. As the Rev. Barber says, systemic change is essential: "The perpetrator has been arrested, but the killer is still at large."
Denis Moynihan contributed research to this column.
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His Soul Wrapped in a Confederate Flag
Jun 25, 2015
At the bond hearing, grieving loved ones forgave Dylann Roof. This was reported as news, but it was so much more than that. It was the light embracing the darkness.
And white America absorbed this forgiveness through the eyes of the 21-year-old terrorist, who watched the proceedings on a video screen from his jail cell. Whatever he heard and felt is unknown, but beyond him, in the world he believed he was saving, something gave. The solidarity of whiteness -- the quiet assumption of white supremacy -- shuddered ever so slightly.
The flag, the flag . . .
The fate of this symbolic relic of the slave era is now the big story in the aftermath of Roof's murder of nine African-Americans. He acted in such clear allegiance to the Confederate flag that politicians everywhere -- even Republican presidential candidates -- are demanding, or at least acquiescing to, its removal from public and official locations, such as in front of the South Carolina State House.
Not only that, "Walmart and Sears, two of the country's largest retailers, will remove all Confederate flag merchandise from their stores," CNN reported.
This is what atonement looks like in a consumer culture.
"The announcements," according to CNN, "are the latest indication that the flag, a symbol of the slave-holding South, has become toxic in the aftermath of a shooting last week at a historic African-American church in Charleston, South Carolina."
A few days later, Amazon and eBay also announced they would remove Confederate flag merchandise from their sites. No longer available, CNN reported, would be such flag-decorated items as folding knives, T-shirts, blankets or (God help us) shower curtains.
Oh Lord. The news so quickly becomes theater of the absurd. Roof's act of terror has forced mainstream America to begin consciously disassociating itself from the lethal margins of white solidarity, to wake up to what it really means. But this waking up, so far, seems limited to the symbolism of Confederate paraphernalia. All our guilt is being dumped here, while the pain that Roof's act of terror has caused ebbs and slowly vanishes from the social mainstream.
In fact, an undead racism still stalks the American consciousness and it will, once again, regroup, Confederate flag or no Confederate flag. What this moment of awareness calls for is true atonement for our history.
"I forgive you." These are the words of Nadine Collier, the daughter of 70-year-old Ethel Lance, one of Roof's victims. "You took something very precious from me. I will never talk to her again. I will never, ever hold her again. But I forgive you. And have mercy on your soul."
Atonement begins with cradling the pain.
"We welcomed you Wednesday night in our Bible study with open arms," said Felicia Sanders, who was not only present in the church during the murders but the mother of Tywanza Sanders, 26, the youngest of those killed. As we cradle the pain, we must cradle this as well: the open souls of the murder victims.
What do we value as a nation? Do we value such openness? The killer -- who was, as he entered the church, simply an unknown young man -- did not go through security clearance as he walked through the open door. He had complete freedom of movement as he entered the historic African-American church, where he was accepted simply for his humanity. Yes, such openness and acceptance are also part of who we are as a nation, but . . . do we value these qualities? Do we have the least faith that they matter now more than ever, now that they've been so violated?
A participant at one of the vigils last week for the murder victims "noted how a church's doors are always open, especially to those in need," a Daily Beast story reported. "She wonders now how churches can square their mission of public service, charity and acceptance with security concerns."
Roof's act of terror has opened a gaping hole in the social fabric. Can we no longer pray together?
But all such questions lead back into the depth of American history and the need for atonement and transformation. A Reuters story, addressing the segregated nature of most American churches (11 a.m. Sunday is "the most segregated hour in the nation," Martin Luther King once said), pointed out: "The story of this division began in America's earliest moments, when slaves and freed African-Americans alike were often expected to pray in the same churches as whites, but in areas cordoned off, often called 'slave galleries.'"
Imagine praying in a setting that defines you as semi-human. Now imagine Dylann Roof walking into Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church with a gun in his backpack. Roof was the self-defined semi-human in the church that night, his soul wrapped in a Confederate flag.
The U.S. is enslaved by its past. That's what no one has said yet. One hundred fifty years after the Civil War ended, we're thinking maybe it's time to lower the flag that symbolizes this enslavement.
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What Caused the Charleston Massacre?
Relentless racism and a powerful anti-gun control lobby make for a deadly combination.
Jun 24, 2015
The recent mass murder of worshippers in an African-American church in Charleston, South Carolina raises troubling questions for all Americans. First among them: How could this have happened?
I think the answer to that one is easy.
We live in a heavily armed society. And hundreds of groups in our country still openly proselytize violence against people of color and other minorities.
So perhaps a better question is, how could this not have happened?
Most Americans were outraged in December 2012 when a mentally ill teenager murdered 26 people -- including 20 first-graders -- in an elementary school in Newtown, Connecticut. What happened afterward?
Almost nothing. President Barack Obama signed a handful of executive orders calling for background checks for gun purchasers, but Congress rejected new federal legislation to restrict guns. Indeed, in the year after the shootings, over 20 states passed 70 laws that actually relaxed gun restrictions.
It was a familiar script even then.
Just a few months before the Newtown shooting, a deranged man had opened fire in a packed movie theater in Aurora, Colorado, killing 12 people and wounding 70. Gun sales spiked after the shootings -- not just in Colorado, but in the surrounding states as well.
Charleston is even more disturbing, for a variety of reasons. Dylann Roof, who allegedly carried out the attack, didn't just perpetrate a mass shooting against people in a house of prayer. He committed an act of terrorism.
This wasn't just a case of a lunatic opening fire in a public place. Roof had a political agenda: He told friends he wanted to attack the church to start a new civil war. He specifically meant to kill black Americans. That makes this case different.
By all accounts, Roof grew up in an environment that espoused and encouraged racism. His Facebook page was full of racist rants. Friends recalled that he frequently told racist jokes and made racist comments. He was "big into segregation," according to his roommate.
Why didn't these friends stop him or report him? Maybe it's because of a racist subculture that still exists in the southern United States.
Racist groups can crop up anywhere in America, but they especially thrive in the South. Roof named one of them -- the Council of Conservative Citizens -- as a particularly important influence on his racist worldview.
This racist group came out of the defunct White Citizens' Councils of the 1950s and 1960s. Despite its unsavory roots and its openly white supremacist ideology, many southern politicians still pander to the organization.
For example, Republican presidential candidate and former Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee delivered a keynote address to a Council of Conservative Citizens convention in 1993. High-ranking GOP members of Congress, including Senator Trent Lott and Representative Bob Barr, also addressed the group around that time.
Its leader, Earl Holt, has donated over $65,000 to Republican politicians in recent years, including GOP presidential candidates Rand Paul, Ted Cruz, and Rick Santorum.
Our elected leaders must make a stand. They must condemn not just racism, but racist groups they may consider a part of their base. They must have nothing to do with groups that espouse separation of the races. And they must allow the Confederate flag, that most obvious symbol of racism, to fade into history.
There's no easy way to move on after an atrocity like the Charleston massacre. But this much is clear: Out-of-control racism and a staunch anti-gun control lobby make for a lethal combination. Unless both of these deadly forces are disarmed, Charleston won't be the last bloody tragedy we ruefully remember.
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5 Lessons Charleston Can Teach Us About Race, Guns and Healing
Jun 24, 2015
After last week's massacre in Charleston, South Carolina, there should have been no question of guilt, or motivation. Dylann Roof made it clear what he did, and why, long before his confession. And yet, the media has bungled so much of it, from beginning to, if not the end, then the point at which we continue, which today saw South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley call for the immediate removal of the Confederate flag.
Why did it take this event to lead to that? How can we re-examine the assumptions we hold and expand our inventory of ideas about the way we talk about race in America? Here are five points, just for a start.
1. Everything Slick Don't Slide
Never in my media career have I seen media outlets refuse to show the face of any adult black murderer. Never. Quite the opposite: They loop it. All day, all night. We tend to see black men on television in one of two positions: handcuffs in the front, or handcuffs in the back. So what was with the burst of momentary morality that had certain talk show hosts refusing to show the killer's face? Really? To all of a sudden decide to not show Roof's face seemed not only disingenuous, but racial.
2. If you quote King, Vote King
Can we stop letting pundits and politicians get away with selectively quoting Dr. King when black tragedies happen? Sure, King is the quintessential example of "nonviolence" and "love thy neighbor as thyself," but he was also felled by an assassin's bullet, and six years after his death, his mother was shot and killed as she sat playing the organ at the Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta. Never mind that the black folk for whom he risked his life are still overwhelmingly the victims of gun violence in America.
To quote King about the "beloved community" and not get serious about gun violence in America is, at best, empty rhetoric, and at worst, a malignant mangling of his message. If you're going to quote King, then vote King: Get serious about gun control.
3. To Do Nothing, One Excuse is as good as another
It didn't take long for partisan politicians and the chattering class to start manufacturing excuses about this tragedy. First it was an attack on faith. Then it was an "accident" that might have had more to do with drugs than guns, bumbled former Texas governor and Republican presidential candidate Rick Perry. Or it was all about quickly casting Roof as "mentally ill" and "unstable," not a thug, criminal or terrorist. (Sidenote here: For all our handwringing, we are no more serious about adequately addressing America's mental health crisis than we are about addressing the gun epidemic.) Truly unbelievably, a board member of the NRA actually blamed one of the victims of the shooting for his political position on concealed-carry gun laws. Finally, the media seized on Roof's statement to police investigators that he "almost didn't go through with it." But he did.
Any excuse to do nothing, any route to circumvent the ugly truth! And what is the ugly truth? Lack of gun control. Personal and systemic racism. A political system undermined by corporate interests. Politicians who put personal gain and fleeting support above the needs of the citizens.
4. The Terrorist Test
When is a terrorist not a terrorist? Apparently when he's a 21-year-old white male in America. Were he a 21-year-old Muslim attacking a sacred site in America, the media would have declared him a "terrorist" sooner than right now and quicker than at once.
Jim Naureckas, editor at FAIR.org, said it best:
If media are going to use the word 'terrorist' they need to have a single standard for its application. By applying the word to a [Boston Marathon] bombing with initially unknown perpetrators, and largely declining to use it in connection with a massacre allegedly perpetrated by a white supremacist hoping to spark a race war, media failed that test.
The media is a runner coming off the blocks. How it frames a breaking story is critical to both initial public perception and eventual public policy.
5. The Power of Love
The most important message to come out of this tragedy is, sadly, the lesson that we will likely forget soonest: forgiveness.
Maybe it's just me, but given our society's unconscious biases about black men, I have a hard time believing that a 21-year-old black male in the South could just roll up into an all-white prayer circle, cop a seat next to the pastor and be welcomed like a Christian brother, no questions asked.
I was at a dinner party after Roof's confession, and even the black folk at the table thought it was strange and abnormal that the black prayer warriors let this out-of-place white male just randomly stroll up in the church.
I didn't agree. That's love. Growing up in a black church, I've seen it happen countless times with all kinds of random visitors. Indeed, our church's welcome, uttered in unison, went like this, "Welcome to the church where everybody is somebody, nobody is a stranger, and you belong here. Welcome!"
Sadly in this world, sometimes trust makes you vulnerable and love can get you killed. And, yet, love is the only antidote to hate. What else is there?
For a true Christian, there really is no more noble way to die. Refusing to judge folk, meeting them where they are, and sharing the Good News. Black America has learned to love this country in spite of, not because of. Even when the victim of the most heinous of assaults, at our best, we forgive so that we might live.
The next time this happens, the media won't likely remind us of the extraordinary grace we're witnessing. So, remember Charleston.
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South Carolina Governor Calls for Confederate Flag to be Removed from State House
Confederate flag 'does not represent the future of our great state,' Nikki Haley says
Jun 22, 2015
South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley on Monday called for the Confederate flag to be removed from the Statehouse grounds in the wake of last week's racist murders of nine people at a historic black church in Charleston.
The flag, a divisive symbol of South Carolina's racist history, "does not represent the future of our great state," Haley, a Republican, said during a press conference on Monday. "Today, we are here in a moment of unity...to say it's time to move the flag from the Capitol grounds."
Dylann Roof, 21, who has been charged with the murders of nine black men and women attending a Bible study last week at Charleston's Emanuel A.M.E. Church, was seen brandishing the Confederate flag, among other racist symbols, in photographs ahead of the killings.
Civil rights activists, as well as several politicians and President Barack Obama, have called for the flag to be removed in the wake of the murders, a demand which grew after it remained at full mast during a national day of mourning for the victims.
Flanked by several members of the state legislature, who applauded her statement, Haley said on Monday, "By removing a symbol of hate that divides us, we can move forward together in harmony."
Those who wish the fly the flag on their private properties would still be able to do so, she added.
"On matters of race, South Carolina has a tough history. We all know that," Haley said. "Many of us have seen it in our own lives...we don't need reminders. In spite of last week's tragedy, we have come a long way since those days and have much to be proud of. But there's more we can do."
This story is developing. Watch reactions on Twitter.
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