Thread by @FreedomFriesInc

(1) I'm terrible. I can't resist commenting on this viral Lake Lanier video in historical and political context. It's also not particularly hard on the eyes.😉

https://twitter.com/GAFollowers/status/1412451336239542278

(2) People enjoy videos like this because of the schadenfreude, especially when college-age kids are involved. A further subset of the schadenfreuders are those who enjoy the misfortune of white people, esp. in GA. Now, hear me out...

(3) I'm just a commentator. I have no axe to grind on behalf of white or black people, or for / against GA. I'm not on the Democrat or Republican side in these things. My focus is always on saving lives. And I don't mean any drownings were likely. It's broader than that.

(4) Clearly, the weather and shallowness of the lake today meant that jumping into the water in one's bikini was hardly a hardship. The video is a great opportunity to parody a group of people and was cleverly done.

(5) I'm about to get all boring now. Lake Lanier was constructed in the 1950s for all the usual reasons such lakes are constructed: hydroelectric power, water supply, and flood control. Since then authorities also built-in ecological work like supporting endangered fish species.

(6) I live in a part of New Zealand that generates most of the country's electricity through dams and lakes. I love hydro power, I really do. It's not as safe, cheap & sustainable as nuclear power but that's a whole 'nother story.🙂

Americans should love hydro, too.

(7) I noticed a lot of Twitter responses to the video that talked about "white people" having "driven black people out of their town" in order to construct the lake. Naturally, I started a DIY factcheck.

That event occurred in 1912. The lake was built in the 1950s.

(8) NZ had to stop building hydro dams in the 1980s after public opposition to the flooding of inhabited areas that is usually necessary.

It happens everywhere. NIMBY (not in my backyard) stops a renewable generation method that's better for the planet than most others.

(9) Those who want to bring race into every issue can easily claim that a necessary part of a humanmade lake project affected a majority-black town and was motivated by racism.

Can I make a suggestion? Pick your battles.

(10) It's clear to me that there is racism against African Americans & other POC in the US (just like other countries) & esp. in the South. There is also racism against white people, but not as much. IDC about any racism against me for being white. Sexism harms me more, tbh.

(11) Lake Lanier was named after "poet of the Confederacy," Sidney Lanier:

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sidney_La…

(12) I suspect that the reason people to this day claim that Lake Lanier is "cursed" has more to do with it's size and therefore higher number of accidents and accompanying news stories.

People in general cause boating accidents, but esp. those who are drunk, and/or young.

(13) There are much better ways to show your audience that in the US, an intolerable level of racist practices have been allowed to remain in place, when they should've been addressed in earlier waves of change eg the 1860s.

Note I didn't say beliefs, attitudes or ideology.

(14) You cannot change a belief by force. You must use persuasion, which does not necessarily mean using words. For example, changing a law can eventually lead to changing beliefs. This has happened throughout history.

Enforcing existing law is also an excellent strategy.

(15) My focus is always on saving lives.

It's the most important thing. The US Declaration of Independence says "life, liberty, and happiness" in that order for good reason.

All three are important but once you're dead they don't matter much.

(16) The dead cannot speak to us, except through their life.

Too many Americans rn talk about death in a rather casual fashion. I'm referring to the 25% or so who believe armed force in politics is or is about to become morally justifiable.
thehill.com/homenews/news/…

(17) Those who refuse to accept the facts about 1/6 talk up a big game about willingness to die for their country in another armed uprising.

Many of them would in practice stay out of harm's way. Others, buoyed by the talk, will go into harm's way, taking opponents with them.

(18) Poking fun at kids for overloading a barge in shallow water might be fun for a while. But needlessly making it about race is the kind of thing that contributes to the peril the country is in.

In no way do I defend any R who encourages, enables or condones violence.

(19) The same goes for any of those practices among Democrats or anyone else who opposes the Republican party.

My strong stance on this has made my online life... interesting. But that's of course nothing compared to folk whose lives are at stake.

(20) I wrote about #Juneteenth at the time and was very clear about the potential of a new public holiday to raise awareness of historical facts that I believe we all need to be more aware of.

It's a succinct analogy explaining how we got here.

https://twitter.com/FreedomFriesInc/status/1405770860472897554

(21) Today's Rs LOVE pointing out that Lincoln was a Republican and freed the slaves but most of them don't even know that if you were black and lived in Texas, you weren't freed for 2 and a half years after President Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation.

juneteenth.com/history/

(22) I studied a bit of American Civil War history in college, and a lot of that history since.

Civil rights for African Americans had to be fought for at every step, including the postbellum period, the 1910s, during WWII, in the 50s and 60s &, arguably, every day since then.

(23) I've now seen factual evidence (through my DIY factchecks) that obvious literal racist members of congress pervaded both parties well into the 1990s. Some say they still do.

I see a lot of similarities in the rhetoric of today's far right politicians eg Paul Gosar.

(24) If you see your own side as largely blameless and you claim that all the baddies are on the other side, then you instantly lose credibility with me, and with many others.

I can work with a moderate D or R.

I can't with the far left or far right.

(25) Six months ago, the majority of R congressmen and women crossed a line.

I had not realized before 1/6 how close they were to crossing it.

IMO Rep Kevin McCarthy is more of a danger to the US Constitution rn than Donald Trump is.

(26) I started this thread to say that mocking a random group of white people for being white, isn't helpful if you want to help lower the temperature & reduce future violence.

I will conclude by saying that both Ds and Rs have a duty to enforce the law & save the country.