Confederate Flag Trump Make America Great Again

(CNN)It matters that they wore "Make America Dandy Over again" hats.

I'm talking about those high school kids in the video that went viral over the weekend, the one that showed the young men laughing and jeering while an older American Indian man drummed and sang. It seemed at outset to be an obvious case of white bros interim shamefully, only so another, longer video showed the same run into with more than context and new characters -- a racist fringe grouping of black men, who identify as members of the Hebrew Israelites, and who seemed to have been the primary provokers of tension and aggression.

This twist in the story gave the whole country a example of interpretive whiplash, feeding frenzied new rounds of argument over who the real victims were, and who was existence disgraceful to whom.

Merely that'due south a pointless debate. Based on contained reporting, those students should share in the blame, despite their denials stating they were innocent bystanders.

The Native American protester could have inadvertently made things worse even if he was sincerely trying to calm things. The Hebrew Israelites hurled insults at just about everyone who crossed their path. We can fifty-fifty enquire why there weren't more developed chaperones to counsel those students to do the only sensible thing: close upwards and walk away. That would have shown real courage and wisdom.

Have at it. Choose whichever facts that will fuel your outrage. But I won't go involved in that because the debate threatens to obscure a broader, more than of import truth, that we are living through what feels like a "back to the dorsum of the bus" moment for many people of color.

That's why those MAGA hats affair.

That's why it matters that they were immature white men representing the Christian organized religion supposedly for a march to accent the sanctity of all life -- while wearing those hats.

It matters that this occurred under a President who won his office past openly spouting narrow-minded rhetoric, who kicked off his campaign saying Mexican immigrants were rapists and bringing crime, after spending several years spreading the bigoted conspiracy that the showtime black President wasn't fully American, and who defended white supremacists in Charlottesville, Virginia, as practiced people.

That context cannot be divorced from the prototype of the MAGA hat any more than the Confederate flag tin be divorced from the brutality of chattel slavery. And nonetheless, every Donald Trump apologist will endeavour to say otherwise -- that it'south simply a hat, or that it is worn by different people for different reasons. How do I know? Because I've listened to similar excuses in my native Due south Carolina about those who wearable or fly the Amalgamated flag. They exercise so to honor their ancestors, I've been told, or to cover Southern heritage, or because they are exercising their First Subpoena rights.

The MAGA hat, like the Confederate flag, wouldn't elicit outraged reactions if it were only a slice of fabric that harkened back to foretime days never to be relived. But it isn't. It is a signifier for those who believe America was cracking during some point in the past they cartel not name, knowing if they do, information technology would reveal a time when it was worse for people of colour. When was America "great"? When millions of black people were slaves? When hundreds of thousands of black men were sold to Us companies via captive leasing? Perhaps during the centre of Jim Crow, the summit of lynching, or when black people struggling with drug addictions were viewed equally criminals to be controlled, not swain human beings needing help?

The Confederate flag wouldn't elicit such outrage if that flag didn't fly on statehouse lawns and in statehouse buildings and in other public spaces for so many decades, even into the 21st century. But information technology did, and does. That MAGA lid wouldn't elicit such outrage if Trump were just a man who used bigotry for his own ends, and a reality TV star instead of President of the United states. But he is President of the United states of america.

That truth was underscored past this past weekend's events, which seemed to have begun with a verbal confrontation betwixt white students from a Southern Christian schoolhouse and a modest group of black men nigh Americans never heard of. The difference between the two: those students represented the demographic that nearly strongly supports Trump -- a homo who had the power to essentially steal people'southward children at the border without knowing whether they would ever exist returned to their families -- while the grouping of blackness protesters constituted literal street preachers shouting into the wind.

There's no way to sensibly defend the Hebrew Israelites. Their ugliness fanned the flames that became a tempest this past weekend. Still, there's an important element to the relative power represented by the Hebrew Israelites and the students from that mostly-white Catholic high school. Only ane of them supports a man who has both spouted hate-filled linguistic communication and has the power to whorl back Obama-era oversight of constabulary enforcement to curtail police brutality and unwanted shootings -- and that's the i those students chose to proudly align with.

That matters.

kennedymushmers.blogspot.com

Source: https://www.cnn.com/2019/01/21/opinions/maga-hat-has-become-a-potent-racist-symbol-bailey/index.html

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