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Jim Crow was VERY popular with a lot of people still alive today, many of whom had many children and grandchildren.
As a white kid watching a movie after movie in which Jim Crow etc was (rightfully) an assumed evil and its opponents assumed good, it was very easy for me to forget that the reason the heroes had institutionalized racism to contend with was because it was EXTREMELY popular.
The United States of America LOVED Jim Crow. It LOVED redlining. It LOVED segregation.
The only reason the past tense is even slightly appropriate isn’t because people stopped loving it.
It’s because we made it illegal and started publicly shaming people who loved it.
The only reason the past tense is even slightly appropriate isn’t because people stopped loving it.
It’s because we made it illegal and started publicly shaming people who loved it.
There are millions of people alive today who still LOVE Jim Crow.
They know they’d be shamed if they admitted it.
They voted for a guy who wants to bring modern tools of systemic racism, which they also love.
We know the remedy. It isn’t getting them to stop loving it.
They know they’d be shamed if they admitted it.
They voted for a guy who wants to bring modern tools of systemic racism, which they also love.
We know the remedy. It isn’t getting them to stop loving it.
We aren’t going even begin the process of stopping this new version of the same old national nightmare until we stop pretending that any of it is even remotely acceptable on any level.
And that’s what I think of all these modern centrist calls to compromise.
And that’s what I think of all these modern centrist calls to compromise.
We didn’t get rid of Jim Crow (to the extent we did) by compromising with people who loved Jim Crow with all their hearts, but by taking it away from them, and paying absolutely no regard whatsoever for how they felt about it.
It was one of our country’s finest moments.
It was one of our country’s finest moments.
We didn’t get rid of slavery (to the extent we did) by compromising, but by being willing to fight traitors who loved it so much they opted to murder their brothers rather than give it up.
We took their property away and gave it to the humans they’d enslaved. Our finest hour.
We took their property away and gave it to the humans they’d enslaved. Our finest hour.
The finest moment in our nation’s history was a massive government redistribution of wealth, which also happened to redress one of our nations most egregious and massive generational thefts.
That theft was very VERY popular with a lot of people.
And to hell with them for it.
That theft was very VERY popular with a lot of people.
And to hell with them for it.
The people we elect going forward had better not only be willing to disregard the inhumane desires of uncaring people, but have a plan for how to enforce needed changes against those who won’t accept modifications to their beloved unacceptable injustices unless they’re forced to.
They had better not just have a plan, but the resolve to enforce that plan.
Systemic injustice is VERY popular in this country. Those who love it call it “freedom.”
It’s unacceptable. We won’t begin removing it until we stop accepting it.
If we stop, it can be our finest hour.
Systemic injustice is VERY popular in this country. Those who love it call it “freedom.”
It’s unacceptable. We won’t begin removing it until we stop accepting it.
If we stop, it can be our finest hour.
