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Thinking about the aggressive/invasive folk walking their dogs on Howard's campus. Black people didn't drink out of "Colored" only water fountains, because they knew bigots urinated in them, or allowed their dogs to do their biz in them. People also spat in them.
A lot of white children begged their folks to let them drink out of those water fountains. Can you guess why? (think about how a small child's mind is wired)
Many everyday aspects of segregation are lost to the dust bin of history. Coca-Cola didn't realize in Jim Crow Coke machines, the machine on the colored side of the wall charged more than the vending apparatus f/ white customers.
Not everyone realizes the Montgomery Bus Boycott began because when the colored passenger would pay their fare in the front, then have to board via the back door, drivers often took off before the patrons could enter that rear section.
Montgomery insurance companies, astounded @ the organization level of the carpooling in The Community, discontinued auto coverage f/ Negro motorists. Lloyd's Of London picked it up f/ the balance of the boycott.
One of the reasons the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. finally resorted to The Children's Campaign during Project C in Birmingham in 1963, is the adults told him if they demonstrated they would be fired from their jobs. He didn't want youth on the front lines.
Lynchings were such a public spectacle, children were released from school to watch them. Adults kept body parts as souvenirs. People mailed postcards of lynchings to friends & fam. Tickets were sold to many.
One of the arguments vs. training Blacks to be military pilots, was that their brains would shut down @ altitude. "Newsweek" conducted a survey for its special issue on race. In 1964, 65% of whites believed Negroes "smell different"
In the late 1950's entire county school systems shut down, rather than integrate. A lot of Black schoolchildren, secondary years, had to find strangers in the North who would house them while they completed h.s.
The tune "Jump Jim Crow" was so popular, many overseas assumed it was the U.S. national anthem
Aspiring Negro voters were asked questions by election officials & poll employees such as "Name the fourth president's entire cabinet", and "How many bubbles will a bar or soap produce", to determine their eligibility
Then there was the high instance of rape of Black female household staff (who risked termination if their husbands confronted the perpetrators). This went on long after the letter linked her was written: historymatters.gmu.edu/d/80/
The aggressive walking of people's pet dogs on Howard U property stems from a tradition of making one feel "lesser than". From transportation to accommodation to movie theaters to parks to libraries to swimming pools to banking to marriage to education to athletics to voting.
...to segregated cemeteries. Places of worship were segregated. There were colored barbers who only cut white hair. Pullman Porters didn't serve the colored cars on the trains. In many regions, it was illegal for Black people to ride on public buses, or interstate buses.
Emmitt Till's mom was so afraid of sending him South, she told him she would take him to Cali on her vacation, & teach him (14) to drive along the way. He insisted on spending time w/ his same aged cousins.
"LIFE" magazine paid his murderers thousands of dollars to tell their account in graphic detail. They said beyond the "I've even had a white girlfriend in Chicago", the kicker was he would not admit to anything, he wouldn't act deferent, he would not say what they wanted.
Some attendees would shoot @ the hanging bodies. The mayor of Omaha was nearly lynched for taking up for an innocent Black young adult, but someone arrived to untie the rope before he died.
A prime reason society believed U.S. Blacks lack aptitude for physical culture, is they felt their levels of malnutrition, illness, poor living conditions, cowardice, lack of critical thinking skills, and sloth, made them ill suited for athletics.
Few today are cognizant of the toll this exacted on Black mental health, nutrition, wealth building, home ownership, education, freedom of worship, travel, romance, employment, access to recreation, matrimony, faith in the system, and plotting one's day.
Understated in all this is how countries follow U.S. influence. Germany was most evolved society. Schopenhauer, Heidegger, Kant, Beethoven, Nietzsche, Strauss, Handel, Bach, Brahms, Mendelssohn. Hitler researched Jim Crow. Didn't matter how elevated or enlightened folk were. Bang
Cubans began to notice how U.S. vacationers reacted to Black folk. Some of it seeped into the culture. Also see "Brexit"
People look to the U.S. They watch your flicks, your tv, adopt your music and fashion. They modeled your sit-ins, your boycotts, your mass marches. So it's important which signals the U.S. sends abroad. Especially regarding tolerance or inclusion.
Bear in mind this dehumanizaition campaign was all based on something as superficial as the pigmentation of one's skin. Which led to all manner of questions about who should have been subjected. Because, tans, curly hair, et al, not biological indicators of ethnicity.
"Race" is a social construct. Because of this legal fabrication, Vince Lombardi, who tanned during training camp, was stopped from checking into a hotel in N.C. for a Packers exhibition game.
From the moment you woke this morning, everything or everyone you did, saw, rode, ate, discussed, watched, worked with, was informed by the fact Jim Crow endured until Loving vs. Va. 1967, & the Fair Housing Act of '68. Your relationships, neighbors, income, laws, education.
Every morsel of food, informational item, entertainment genre, article of clothing, verbal expression, political sentiment, home value, physical movement, social habit you experienced since waking, was shaped by 103 years of legal Jim Crow. De facto segregation influenced more of
The National Guard was not deployed by Gov. Orval Faubus to assist The Little Rock Nine in enrolling in Central HS. The troops were to keep the nine teenagers out. History in taught poorly in U.S. schools. The president sent the 101st Airborne Division to get the kids inside.
To enroll one man, a USAF vet, in the Univ. of Mississippi, JFK sent 503rd & 716th Military Police Battalions, the U.S. Border Patrol & the federalized Mississippi National Guard. and U.S. Navy medical personnel. To assist 500 U.S. marshals. One. man.
Vivian Malone's parents worked Brookley Air Force Base. Pres. Kennedy federalized the Alabama National Guard to escort she & James Hood to enroll @ the Univ. of Alabama. But we are taught that Watts, Newark & Detroit are the race riots
The race riots were The New York Draft Riots (U.S. Civil War), the Springfield, IL riot that led to the founding of the NAACP, the Wilmington, NC. riots, Tulsa, Homewood, the Atlanta Race Riot of 1906, Ole Miss, Little Rock. Not L.A., Newark, the Cleveland Hough, the L.A. Watts.
Also see "Zoot Suit". And "The Red Summer". The most common targets of Red Summer rioters, were Black WW I vets in uniform. Black uniformed vets were shot by terrorists as late as the 1960's (e.g. Lt. Col Lemuel Penn).
When the Greensboro Four decided to sit-in, Franklin McCain figured wearing his ROTC uniform would help. It only infuriated terrorists more.
And in the category of "Not today, Satan", what you're NOT gonna do is hijack the thread to minimize people allowing their pets to do their business on Howard U property. Or silencing nearby Go-Go music. We get arrested for merely existing on your property. And ours (Skip Gates)
Howard was established for the students to learn. It isn't the neighbors' yard or sidewalk or curb or rec center. Look up what happens to our kids (not our pets, our kids) @ Yale, Mizzou, Brown. You can't downplay folk asking Howard "Well just move then". Was built in 1867
Rodney King was beaten like a wild animal for just being in Simi Valley, please don't lecture me about people taking liberties w/ their canines. I live this daily. I've lived near Howard, Catholic, Maryland, others. I also know a bit about "Man's best friend" in the U.S.
The thing to do regarding Howard, & the Go-Go music piece, & other acts of hipster Jim Crow, is to listen, not lecture. I framed the folk walking their dogs, in a wider historic legacy of people disrespecting our space or bodies, or disallowing them.
These Make America Gentrified Again heads wanna school YOU. If you don't go sit down somewhere w/ your Kombucha & quinoa & yoga mat & Fido...
Go lecture your uncle about that rapist who lost $1.7 billion in 10 years for whom he voted. The main difference between my TL and Howard's campus, is you're not gonna defecate on me. Unlike that store playing Go-Go music, you won't silence me. Silence your voting grandma
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