We don’t need no education
We can chuckle and guffaw, but I’m afraid that misses the point. The point is that all of those folks that want to teach American exceptionalism in our classrooms are purposely or unwittingly attempting to white wash history before our very eyes. I use the term white wash very intentionally here, because that is exactly what it is.
These folks come in all stripes. There are those that are racists that don’t want to be confronted with their racism. There are those that want to apologize or cover up for the racists of the past. You’ve heard these folks. “I never owned a slave. My family never owned slaves. I’m not a racist. So why should we be bombarded by this message?” I even get that on a certain level.
The reasoning goes back to Mr. Cain. One of two things is going on here. Either he is a racist that is trying to install a racist agenda or he is ignorant of our racist history. I can’t decide which one is worse. In one case, you have an idiot forwarding a racist agenda accidentally because he doesn’t know any better. In another instance, you have a racist that is floating a racist agenda past most Texans because they don’t know any better. Take your pick.
They removed the language from the bill, but much of the bill was intact. It can’t be an accident that all of this is happening after the U.S. Supreme Court watered down the Voting Rights Act of 1965. Apparently, systemic racism doesn’t exist anymore. Except we can literally point to hundreds of bills nationwide that says that it does.
I don’t know Briscoe Cain. I don’t know what exists in his heart. I can’t read his mind or tap into his true feelings. What I can do is judge the impact of his decisions. I can look at this bill and know it will hurt our poorer citizens and people of color. I can’t help but think that if we were taught the history of oppression we would be able to avoid this. Either those that propagate it would know better or the rest of us would more easily recognize it when they tried. Perhaps it would even be both.
Actually, Rachel was a couple of days ahead of El Jefe. Her report was May 7th; his May 9th.
1Not to nitpick, but SCOTUS didn’t “water down the Voting Rights Act of 1965.” They ripped the guts out of it. In order to do so, they had to ignore thousands of pages of fact-finding by Congress, which then passed the VRA extension in 2006 by an overwhelming and bipartisan (!) majority. Republicans used to condemn this sort of thing as “legislating from the bench” by “activist judges” when it was their ox being gored so to speak, but we all know better than to look for consistency from this bunch when white supremacy is at stake.
2I don’t get this argument at all:
“I never owned a slave. My family never owned slaves. I’m not a racist. So why should we be bombarded by this message?”
Having been born almost a century after the Civil War, I’ve never owned a slave, obviously.
But I, just like the majority of whites in this country I imagine, can’t swear that my family never has.
1] At least two of my ancestors arrived on the N. American continent during the 17th century when slavery was practiced in every colony.
32] I was born in NOLA, a product of two families that had lived in Louisiana for generations. They were poor when I arrived, but that doesn’t mean there was never a time when they couldn’t have afforded slaves.
3] Even if I could be absolutely certain no one in my family had ever owned a slave, I would not be absolved from recognizing the systemic racism that is rampant in the country and working to end it.
The GOP is just a lot of White trash, White washing the past.
4Excellent point twocrows and that is kind of the point of education. Most people have a hard time seeing past their nose. The statement about not owning slaves is not likely backed up by fact, but more of a hopeful assumption. Most people think of the slave trade as a rich man’s game and most people like to think of themselves as coming from humble beginnings.
More to the point, whether our ancestors were active participants or not we need better education so that we are collectively aware of the entire past. I know some of us (conservatives) don’t want to hear anything except for the great parts, but we weren’t always great. Many pf those base feelings and inner demons still exist within all of us. If we know they are there we can guard against them. If we assume they are gone or that they were never there in the first place then they can easily sneak up on us and attack us when we are at our most vulnerable.
5Rapture for Idiots ~
True Biblical Account: Heavenly Father cam shows footage of Adam and Eve shot in the back while trying to flee the Garden of Eden with several golden apples from said Garden. The Archangel Michael placed the Father,The Son and The Holy Ghost on administrative leave pending further investigation As The Friends of cherubs and seraphims – FOCS union had clamored for “heavenly qualified immunity.”
***************************************
6Headline: Meet the far-right Pennsylvania Republican who believes that God was behind Trump’s attempted coup.
full testament from the pearly gates:
https://www.alternet.org/2021/05/trump-coup/
On one southern line of my family, there was a certain John Caldwell Calhoun, so I’m pretty sure there were slaves at home. Going forward 150 years, I have a mixed race granddaughter – that is the society we live in today. I’m probably more interested in the BLM movement than most old white ladies for these reasons. We need to know our backgrounds but not be bound to it.
7There’s an old Valley saying which my ex always used to specify when we ordered the Sunday barbacoa [a delicacy probably unknown to most of y’all] at the walkup markets that sold weekend barbacoa:
Sayeth She Who Must Be Obeyed — “Dos libras de barbacoa, sin ojos, sin sesos”.
[I certainly agreed with that, gotta draw the line somewhere, although “mollejas” are super delicious…]
*** The “sin ojos, sin sesos” part now describes all of the GQPeers. It means ‘without eyes, without brains’, perfect.
The ancestor of BBQ/barbeque:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barbacoa
https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Mollejas&redirect=no
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sweetbread
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beef_brain
Pretty much one of the staple Deep South Texas food items, little known elsewhere.
BTW, there was a pretty good PBS program [et al] on recently about the more indigenous [South] Texas foods: iirc, titled “Truly Texas Mexican”, -not- the “tex-mex” that everybody now scarfs down. Barbacoa was covered.
TRULY TEXAS MEXICAN
8“Cuisine and Culture: A New Encounter”
https://trulytexasmexican.com/
GQP = Pendejos sin ojos, sin sesos… verdad.
9When Republicans hear the adage…:
“Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.” –George Santayana
… they not only look on it as an affirmation, they encourage the ignorance, misinformation, & omissions which all but guarantee history will repeat itself.
10What’s the odd’s that little Brisco wears a “1 gallon” cowboy hat?
11My father was a George Wallace supporting racist. We argued about it all the time until I just got sick of it and left home (and town) at age 17, days after graduating from high school. Years later while doing family research, I ran across a tax record from the late 1700s for one of my ancestors in Virginia. Aside from Article I, Section 9 of the Constitution allowing Congress to tax the import of slaves, Virginia had a tithing tax where the head of household paid a tax on each slave 16 and older. I won’t justify what he did by saying that’s just the way it was back then.
While I quietly support BLM and will speak out when someone makes racist remarks in my presence, I have done nothing towards actively ending systemic racism. I think ignoring systemic racism is the easy, lazy route most take but I still often feel shame in my lack of action.
It doesn’t matter if Cain is an active racist or willfully ignorant. His bill is un-American and the work of a troubled mind.
12Yes, slavery was a long time ago and many families immigrated after the slaves were free. But we don’t need to go back nearly that far to benefit from racism. Many of us or our parents made a bundle of money on rising home prices since WWII. There’s a good chance it’s more wealth current than what was created by 250 of slave labor. But of course if you lived in a red-lined neighborhood, you got none of that. We as a country have a long way to go just to pay the racial debt from post-WWII red-lining, much less Jim Crow and slavery before that.
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