Can any of us know the terror and ultimately the grief of a family, of loved ones, of a congregation, of a community, of a people which has experienced such a racist murderous act? It’s unimaginable, AGAIN!
South Carolina governor, Nikki Haley, speaking for the citizens of that former confederate state, voiced what some believed to be her grief. Yet, it’s not what Governor Haley said; it’s not her tears which express the true sentiments of her adopted white supremacy; it’s what she didn’t say.
South Carolina governor, Nikki Haley, speaking for the citizens of that former confederate state, voiced what some believed to be her grief. Yet, it’s not what Governor Haley said; it’s not her tears which express the true sentiments of her adopted white supremacy; it’s what she didn’t say.
In a statement Haley publicly released shortly after the murders, she proclaimed her surety of only one thing, that “we do know that we'll never understand what motivates" people to commit acts of violence such as this. Really governor? When a group of black people gather to pray in the Emanuel AME Church which stands eloquently on its nationally prominent foundation of freedom fighting and equal rights, and when a white man joins this prayer group later murdering nine innocent members while announcing that he has “to do it . . . You rape our women and you’re taking over the country. You have to go,” Governor, do you really wonder what motivates people - while you fully support the continued flying at full mast of a confederate flag on capital grounds?
The overt, de jure practice of slavery, and the dehumanization of human persons of color, may have vanished in its material substance, but its ghost lives on in this covert de facto Spector of intolerance and hatred. To reduce this terrorism to a question of an unknowing motivation is reprehensible and inhumane.
Haley’s solution? Let’s murder the murderer even though state endorsed murder has never been a solution or a deterrent to hatred. However, it’s far more comfortable than a dialogue in South Carolina on racism.
As reprehensible if not more so is what Lindsay Graham, US Senator from South Carolina offered as his observation. “There are real people who are organized out there to kill people in religion . . . There are people out there looking for Christians to kill them.” What part of Roof’s statement does the esteemed Senator not understand? Was it that CHRISTIANS were raping our women and CHRISTIANS were taking over the country that motivated these murders? It’s about race, Senator; it’s about hatred of BLACK people and not about people who are Christian. Your integrity Sir, is raped by your cowardice.
AGAIN, I ask, Is there no end?
JAS
JAS
“One hundred years of frustration and battle have not resulted in victory over Jim Crow and racism.” (Freedomways, XIII, 1973)
