white – Page 4

After the civil rights era, white Americans failed to support systemic change to end racism. Will they now?

4Apr

By THEIRL1ADMIN01No Comments

IN OTHER NEWS

After the civil rights era, white Americans failed to support systemic change to end racism. Will they now?

The first wave of the Black Lives Matter movement, which crested after the 2014 police killing of Michael Brown in Ferguson, had the support of less than half of white Americans. Given that Americans tend to have a very narrow definition of racism, many at that time were likely confused by the juxtaposition of Black-led protests, implying that racism was persistent, alongside the presence of a Black family in the White House. Barack Obama’s presidency was seen as evidence that racism was in decline. The current, second wave of the movement feels different, in part because the past months of protests have been multiracial. The media and scholars have noted that whites’ sensibilities have become more attuned to issues of anti-Black police violence and discrimination. After the first wave ...

African Americans have long defied white supremacy and celebrated Black culture in public spaces

12Aug

By THEIRL1ADMIN01No Comments

LIFESTYLE

African Americans have long defied white supremacy and celebrated Black culture in public spaces

From Richmond to New York City to Seattle, anti-racist activists are getting results as Confederate monuments are coming down by the dozens. In Richmond, Virginia, protesters have changed the story of Lee Circle, home to a 130-year-old monument to Confederate General Robert E. Lee. It’s now a new community space where graffiti, music and projected images turn the statue of Lee from a monument to white supremacy into a backdrop proclaiming that Black Lives Matter. This isn’t a new phenomenon. I’m a historian of celebrations and protests after the Civil War. And in my research, I have found that long before Confederate monuments occupied city squares, African Americans used those same public spaces to celebrate their history. But those African American memorial cultures have often been o...

Urban planning as a tool of white supremacy – the other lesson from Minneapolis

27Jul

By THEIRL1ADMIN01No Comments

SOCIAL JUSTICE

Urban planning as a tool of white supremacy – the other lesson from Minneapolis

The legacy of structural racism in Minneapolis was laid bare to the world at the intersection of Chicago Avenue and East 38th Street, the location where George Floyd’s neck was pinned to the ground by a police officer’s knee. But it is also imprinted in streets, parks and neighborhoods across the city – the result of urban planning that utilized segregation as a tool of white supremacy. Today, Minneapolis is seen to be one of the most liberal cities in the U.S. But if you scratch away the progressive veneer of the U.S.‘s most cyclable city, the city with the best park system and sixth-highest quality of life, you find what Kirsten Delegard, a Minneapolis historian, describes as “darker truths about the city.” As co-founder of the University of Minnesota’s Mapping Prejudice project, Deleg...

Protestantism’s troubling history with white supremacy in the US

4Apr

By THEIRL1ADMIN01No Comments

IN OTHER NEWS

Protestantism’s troubling history with white supremacy in the US

In the long-overdue discussions taking place over the legacy of slavery and racism in the United States, few appear to be addressing the relationship between religion and racism. This comes despite notions of white supremacy being entwined with the history of religion in the United States. As a scholar specializing in issues of religion and identity, I argue for a deeper introspection around how white supremacy permeates all parts of American society, including its religious institutions. Race and religion In 1835, French philosopher Alexis de Tocqueville described the character of the U.S. as the result of “the spirit of religion and the spirit of liberty,” which he argued, “elsewhere have often been at war but in America have somehow been incorporated into one another and marvelously c...

Latest legal hurdle to removing Confederate statues in Virginia: The wishes of their long-dead white donors

19Jun

By THEIRL1ADMIN01No Comments

POLITICS, SOCIAL JUSTICE

Latest legal hurdle to removing Confederate statues in Virginia: The wishes of their long-dead white donors

A controversial statue of Robert E. Lee will remain in place in Richmond, the former capital of the American Confederacy –- at least temporarily. On June 18, a judge extended an injunction barring the removal of the Confederate general’s statue, stating that “the monument is the property of the people,” not the state of Virginia, which seeks its removal. In early June Virginia Gov. Ralph Northam vowed to dismantle the prominent Lee statue in Richmond, the state capital, following sustained, nationwide protests over police brutality and racism. That plan was blocked by a 10-day court injunction – now extended through late July – based on the petition of a man whose ancestor, Otway Allen, gave Virginia the land the the sculpture sits on. In his petition, William C. Gregory claimed that di...

Why are white supremacists protesting the deaths of black people?

3Apr

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IN OTHER NEWS

Why are white supremacists protesting the deaths of black people?

As protests about police violence among black people continue and become more widespread across the U.S., certain individuals and groups have begun to stand out – including anarchists, agitators and members of a variety of far-right groups. With the country’s long history of racist killings, it may be confusing to think that racists and white supremacists are among those objecting to the killing of people of color. But people affiliated with far-right groups aren’t trying to be part of the overall protest movement. Having researched these groups, we think it’s likely that they are attempting to hijack the event for their own purposes. As researchers of street gangs and far-right groups, we see that in this case, they want to stoke a civil war between the races – one they think they can ...

There’s a history of white supremacists interpreting government leaders’ words as encouragement

18May

By THEIRL1ADMIN01No Comments

SOCIAL JUSTICE

There’s a history of white supremacists interpreting government leaders’ words as encouragement

White supremacist and militia organizations are exploiting the government’s chaotic response to the coronavirus for recruitment efforts. Whatever his intention, these groups interpret President Donald Trump’s tweets to “LIBERATE” states and calling armed protesters “very good people” as support for their cause. Recent research by the Tech Transparency Project into social media accounts of white supremacists, a nonprofit that researches “the influence of the major technology platforms” on politics, policy and people’s lives, found that “some members of private … Facebook groups reacted to the president’s rhetoric (about lockdown protests) with memes of celebration.” The white supremacists’ response reflects the United States’ history of local, state and national political leaders encoura...

Why are white supremacists protesting to ‘reopen’ the US economy?

29Apr

By THEIRL1ADMIN01No Comments

POLITICS

Why are white supremacists protesting to ‘reopen’ the US economy?

A series of protests, primarily in state capitals, are demanding the end of COVID-19 lockdown restrictions. Among the protesters are people who express concern about their jobs or the economy as a whole. But there are also far-right conspiracy theorists, white supremacists like Proud Boys and citizens’ militia members at these protests. The exact number of each group that attends these protests is unknown, since police have not traditionally monitored these groups, but signs and symbols of far right groups have been seen at many of these protests across the country. These protests risk spreading the virus and have disrupted traffic, potentially delaying ambulances. But as researchers of street gangs’ and far-right groups’ violence and recruitment, we believe these protests may become a w...

Slave Cabin Sleepovers Are Helping Black And White Participants To Create Healing Conversations

24Feb

By THEIRL1ADMIN01No Comments

LIFESTYLE

Slave Cabin Sleepovers Are Helping Black And White Participants To Create Healing Conversations

By 1860, more than 40,000 plantations in the United States each had 20 or more enslaved Africans. Today, hundreds of those same plantations operate as museums, but only a handful tell the stories of the enslaved who lived, toiled, and died there. Meanwhile, lifestyle magazines tout plantations as a destination—weddings have become the latest trend—emphasizing their idyllic verdant settings and stately architecture. The Whitney Plantation is the only plantation, of the 375 existing locations, expressly designed to center the narrative of slavery, but Black conservationists and historical interpreters such as Joe McGill are collaborating with plantation owners, government agencies, and the public to center the history of enslaved Africans at those historical 46,300 plantations, and broade...

Lynching preachers: How black pastors resisted Jim Crow and white pastors incited racial violence

10Feb

By THEIRL1ADMIN01No Comments

Journalism

Lynching preachers: How black pastors resisted Jim Crow and white pastors incited racial violence

White lynch mobs in America murdered at least 4,467 people between 1883 and 1941, hanging, burning, dismembering, garroting and blowtorching their victims. Their violence was widespread but not indiscriminate: About 3,300 of the lynched were black, according to the most recent count by sociologists Charles Seguin and David Rigby. The remaining dead were white, Mexican, of Mexican descent, Native American, Chinese or Japanese. Such numbers, based on verifiable newspaper reports, represent a minimum. The full human toll of racial lynching may remain ever beyond reach. Religion was no barrier for these white murderers, as I’ve discovered in my research on Christianity and lynch mobs in the Reconstruction-era South. White preachers incited racial violence, joined the Ku Klux Klan and lynche...