I hope everyone is holding up okay despite the insanity. I just try to take things day by day, but I’ll be honest: it has been hard. I have found it challenging to stay focused on my daily tasks, since what is going on in the world seems much more urgent and worthy of my attention. But at the same time, we have to pay bills, do our jobs, etc. What has been going on has helped me put my own situations and worries into perspective…what I’m dealing with on a daily basis is nothing compared to the very real terrible things that are happening as I write this, that I can hardly imagine myself.
Though I never want to make this blog strictly about Trump (or as I heard him described by The Root recently, President HitlerBannon), it would be hard to avoid at least a reference to him in a post about something else, since my posts tend to be political/historical in nature, and since this is the world we live in now. I will try my hardest, no matter how much rage I feel, not to write a post solely about Trump, unless I truly cannot help myself. If I write only about Trump, I would probably lose my shit very quickly. Plus, there are many more interesting and worthwhile topics out there that I can explore, and chances are it will be possible to include him in the story somehow. I’ll leave the Trump ranting and raving to the millions of other bloggers out there. Knowing him and how his first 12 days have gone so far, there will literally be something every day to talk about. No shortage of material.
With that in mind, I want to talk about a story that made some waves on the interwebs, which you may or may not have encountered as well. The Internet is so saturated with stuff, both good and crap, that it can be easy for one person I talk to to be all over a story and another to have no idea (both equally informed people overall). I would assume that most of you are at least vaguely familiar with the story of Emmett Till, a 14-year-old boy who was murdered in 1955 in Mississippi (or, as I like to call it, one of America’s Worst States–I’ll make a list) for the supposed crime of whistling (or saying something or possibly just existing) to a white woman. For this crime, the woman’s husband and brother-in-law went to the house where Emmett was staying (he was visiting from Chicago), took him, beat him, then dumped him in a river. His body was discovered a few days later, mutilated and almost beyond recognition.
Till’s murder was one of the catalysts of the Civil Rights movement of the 1950s and 1960s (listening, HitlerBannon? History lesson…will get to that later). At the insistence of his mother, his body was shown in an open casket at a public funeral; pictures of the body were also published in newspapers and magazines nationwide, so many people saw it and heard the story.
If you were living back then and heard this story, your first reaction (besides wow, that is terrible) might be, what could this young boy possibly have done that warranted such a fate? The short (and only) answer is nothing, and more than 60 years later we have found that to be absolutely the case. In an article published in Vanity Fair last week, it is revealed that in a new book published about the murder that (surprise!) the woman LIED. The woman, Carolyn Bryant, who is still with us at the age of 82, confessed in 2007 that she made the whole thing up. Well, not in so many words:
“In a new book, The Blood of Emmett Till (Simon & Schuster), Timothy Tyson, a Duke University senior research scholar, reveals that Carolyn—in 2007, at age 72—confessed that she had fabricated the most sensational part of her testimony. “That part’s not true,” she told Tyson, about her claim that Till had made verbal and physical advances on her. As for the rest of what happened that evening in the country store, she said she couldn’t remember. (Carolyn is now 82, and her current whereabouts have been kept secret by her family.)”
“‘That part’s not true'”…as if there’s ANY OTHER PART that is relevant. It is not at all a stretch to conclude after hearing this confession that this woman is DIRECTLY responsible for this innocent boy’s murder. She may not have physically done it herself, but her words led to some serious and irreversible actions. Shaun King, a writer and activist who I admire, wrote it better than I can, but I will try to explain it in my own words because it (being lying and injustice) enrages me more than almost any other thing in the world. As King concludes in his piece, this woman should stand trial for what she’s done, no matter how old she is or how long ago it took place. Though her location is unknown according to the book and article (hmmm wonder why), I agree with King that she should be located and made to respond to her crimes. What right does anyone in this world have to accuse an innocent person of anything when it is blatantly untrue? Black men all over this country are punished for much less than what she did. It’s a perfect example of the clear double standards that have always existed in this country, a standard that is being proudly perpetuated by our dear leader.
Which gets me into the TrumpHitlerBannon part of my post (you excited?). As today is the first day of Black History Month, Trump did what he does best: fake giving a shit about anyone but himself. He held a cringeworthy event where he read a statement almost certainly handed to him that moment which included vague platitudes about the same important African American figures we learn about in kindergarten. Where it got interesting and especially painful was when he got to Frederick Douglass. Besides having a shaky time pronouncing his name, he made it pretty clear that he had no earthly idea who this man was (or IS?). Because he used the present tense when talking about him. This is a man who has been dead for 122 years, who any third grader could tell you about (though if Betsy DeVos gets confirmed, who knows, that could change, but separate rant). I’m never quite surprised by what this monster doesn’t know or care to know, but each new thing revealed every day eats away at me just a little more. The majority of us didn’t want nor ask for this. Yet we will all be subjected to watching this man make a complete fool of himself and mockery of this country. It’s all pretty depressing.
Despite all that, however, what gives me hope is that I know that most people are with me. Though what I see on the Internet every day often brings me down, just as often what I see puts a smile on my face. The great thing about the era we live in now is that it’s possible to instantly fact check people, which politicians are starting to figure out (or if they haven’t, they better start soon–old and out of touch politicians, another rant for another day). So with Trump the Internet basically has a field day, all day, every day. The memes that are going to come out of this era will be quite something. My favorite thing I’ve seen this week is this, courtesy of my friend Sylvia. From a Wiki article on invertebrates:
And that is what gave me hope this week. I’ll try to make that a regular part of my posts, for all of us. Keep on keeping on…
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