More Racism: In Jena's Wake

With the Jena 6 controversy still being played out in the courts, including the re-imprisonment of Mychal Bell for probation violation from an earlier conviction, there has been a strange silence from the white community over the proliferation of racist attacks utilizing nooses. Even if the internet blogosphere is hyper-sensitive to any news story involving nooses after the details of the Jena 6 travesty were championed by bloggers into a national cause, there is something very wrong with black/white relations in the increase of noose activity. Consider that over the past two months, we’ve had noose related incidents at the University of Maryland, at a police station in Long Island, at the Coast Guard academy in Connecticut, and now at Columbia University in NYC, where a noose was found hanging from the door to an office of a black professor.

The alarming incidences do disprove a commonly held belief that that Deep South is more racist than the Northeast. Considering that even Ground Zero is free from the hanging of nooses, we have to come to the conclusion that racist use of hate symbols is occurring everywhere. Now, the most disturbing thing to me has not been the return of the noose as the in vogue choice of hate mongrels, but rather the dispassionate coolness of white America to the current climate of racial discord. Instead of outrage over injustice, we have instead a palatable apathy coming from white America broken only by the occasional shrill rant of racist white Americans. Instead of white America joining in the protest against unfair treatment of the Jena 6, we’re hearing a justification similar to the guest commentary posted by Jason Granger on The Current Online. Let’s visit with Mr. Granger’s thoughts and identify a few disturbing trends flowing through white America:

“To be sure, the south is still a hotbed for racial tension. It is an unfortunate aspect of that area. More so than the rest of the nation, southern states provide a haven for racists, most predominantly the Ku Klux Klan, America's own homegrown terrorists. They were terrorists before it was vogue. Oh, and they are idiots. Do not forget that.”

Using the argument that “they’re in the wrong” by pointing out that the South is apparently still firmly in the grips of Nathan Bedford Forrest’s progeny is intellectually lazy. Racism is not isolated to the South, as the disturbing trend of noose hangings in New York, Maryland, and Chicago show that other parts of the country have racial divisive white folks. These are not the acts of the KKK, these are the acts of bored idiotic kids or hate filled ignorant adults. They’re everywhere and they’re spreading.

“The six were charged with attempted murder, an over exaggeration of the situation to be sure. However, the fact remains that these six young men assaulted another human being, battering his face and leaving him hospitalized. And they were caught.”

This paragraph irks me. Preceding this paragraph, Mr. Granger writes that the white students who hung the noose should have been prosecuted, but oh well. Instead of focusing on the injustice of the original perpetrators of the hate crime and amazingly ignoring all of the violence against blacks that preceded the beating of the white student, Mr. Granger instead insists that the crimes committed by the Jena 6 were severe enough for prosecution because it was assault against another human being. Fine, but why add the statement, “and they were caught.” What does that sentence have anything to do with the Jena 6 issue? If they had been wily enough to get away with beating the kid, then we wouldn’t have this controversy? Maybe the white kids who committed crimes against the blacks were somehow less legally culpable because they were ensnared by a biased criminal justice system? I really am confused by the sentence.

“But here is the ultimate question, if six white students had assaulted and hospitalized a black student, applied the beating that Barker received, would Sharpton, Jackson and King, et al, have rallied to their defense? Would they demand the white students charges be lowered, released from jail, given special consideration due to "circumstances?" The answer, most likely, would be no.”

Here is the crux of most of the arguments against the Jena 6 controversy: if a black kid had been beaten by white kids, would there be a controversy? The answer is absolutely correct…no. The reason, though, is not because of injustice but rather because of a historic fact: white kids did beat up blacks without equal prosecution. Like it or not, a white kid has a historical advantage when it comes to racially motivated attacks. Recent reviews of conviction numbers in America shows that blacks have increased jail time and increased convictions resulting in the death penalty compared to whites with comparable convictions in all cases excluding fraud.

Regardless of the historical connection between preferential treatment for whites by the judicial system, there are a number of other arguments I have against the reverse situation. First, there is a fundamental flaw with the situation leading to the assault on the white student. The town of Jena did not prosecute the white kids who left the noose in the tree. This is not surprising from a township that is overwhelmingly racist, as David Duke gleefully notes. The good white people (who disingenuously claim that they are not racist) had no outrage over a simple 3 day suspension from school for the white kids who hung the nooses. They had no ire toward the white kid who pulled a shotgun on black students before the Jena 6 incident. They didn’t bat an eye until the racism brewing on the surface exploded onto the national scene. Conversely, would there have been a similar silence if three black teenagers decided to hang a banner that said “Kill Whites” from the same tree? Would there have been no prosecution if a black kid pulled a gun on some white students? Would there have been a long lag in furor if a black kid had been beaten by white students or would have the good people of Jena cried out that the punishment was too severe for the crime? One cannot simply turn a blind eye to the events leading up to the Jena 6 controversy.

Second, there is a truthful perception that Rev. Al Sharpton and other black leaders are biased in their leadership for many racially controversial situations. There is some serious truth to this argument. I have found myself distrustful of some of the black leaders in this day and age of political corruption. I find it distasteful for Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson to jump on any situation and exacerbating a tense conflict with such a broad, non-tactful approach (the Duke lacrosse players case was especially egregious). However, you can’t expect them to lead a march against black people. That’s just a illogical argument based in absurdity. When, if ever, would you find a case where Dr. Martin Luther King or Malcolm X would cry against a black person? Why would they waste their times when there are so many other issues for them to tackle? The sad fact is that more hate crimes are committed against blacks by whites versus the other way around. There are so many race related issues out there that black leaders would not spend the time defending black criminals. Conversely, I don’t see any major white leaders out there marching for the Jena 6.

Third, the protest against the Jena 6 has been mostly a grassroots operation that Sharpton et al jumped onto after most of the groundwork had been performed. The key to the rise in the national attention has been the work of college students who carried the story through the internet to media outposts who, at first, ignored the story. The new generation of news savvy individuals with internet access is at the forefront with this story. I’m sure the counterpoint is true, as a simple perusal of white power websites like Stormfront shows a large percentage of young racists at the front of the attack. Even looking at the ignorance that’s daily spewed on Yahoo! Answers shows that racism isn’t being battled at the big, grand media scale anymore, it’s the one-on-one fights between web-connected individuals where the real action is.

The truth of the matter is that the argument posted by Mr. Granger is fundamentally flawed because of the limited viewpoint. He continues:

“Why does a double standard exist? For so long, we have heard that minorities want to be treated equally. Does that not extend to racism or crimes?”

Equality is such a double edged sword. The fight for equality, from a white perception, ended with the passage of the Civil Rights Act and the end of Jim Crow. Unfortunately, black Americans have not and will not be treated equally in this country until arguments like Mr. Granger’s are no longer pervasive in White America. Equality has not been bestowed to blacks by penitent, benevolent whites; rather it was stripped away, rusted and worn away from reluctant politicians through the increasing discontented blacks tired of their second class citizenship. The equality won has never been equal: starting from a point of inferior economic assets, a society destroyed by institutionalized inferior educational, societal, and cultural assets, blacks had to start running the race fifty years ago with a significant disadvantage. Simply being told, “Now, you’re equal,” does not equality make. We as a country need to realize that there is not an equality in existence. Blacks are still marginalized in our society, as are other minorities, compared to the comparable head start by white America.

Additionally, when white America finally begins to extend an equality driven viewpoint toward jurisprudence, then perhaps there will be an end to racially divisive criminal cases. Unfortunately, the Jena 6 situation is a hot bed issue not because a guilty black kid is getting his case heard by the media at large, but rather because it is indicative of the problem that whites and blacks are judged by the color of their skin.

Mr. Granger then makes a move that I’ve heard many times from my guilt-free white friends, who have intellectualized that the racism issue is something of the past:

“Recently, an editorial in the Post-Dispatch by Bernard Pitts Jr. (an excellent writer and columnist from the Miami Herald), said white people must understand that blacks in this country have 388 years of mistrust built into them. Yes, slavery is the darkest chapter of our nation's checkered past, but here is the question: is Pitts currently, or was he ever, a slave? Doubtful, as slavery was repealed 14 decades ago. This is not to make light of the plight of America's black population. To be sure, racism still exists and more than likely always will.”

How dare you…yes, Abraham Lincoln repealed slavery over a hundred years ago. So what? When were the civil rights activists facing the brutality of institutionalized racism? Was it 1850? No, it was in the lifetime of those still with us today. What has white America done for blacks since then? Consider that there is still a ghettoization among African-American communities and a system that already wants to do away with affirmative action, what do blacks have to base any level of trust toward an uncaring bureaucracy and a white population that wants to hurriedly forget the past atrocities. Remember, Mr. Granger, you live in a country that never made reparations to a people group who were enslaved due to the color of their skin. Your race never apologized for racism. They never apologized for the lynching, the murdering of their leaders, the rape of their loved ones, the destruction of their civilization, the wholesale debasement of a whole people group. Yet, you want to trivialize all of this because you’re mad at the protest in Jena? How dare you.

“Racism exists, that is true. It exists in the Jena area, and any racist, any, should be ashamed of the self and their foolish attitude.”

If only racism were concealed and isolated in the Jena area. Unfortunately, Mr. Granger’s thoughts are shared by many of his fellow intellectual whites. Frashure, on Vinewire, writes: “I am hereby calling for an end to this new reverse discrimination and double-standard put forth from many in the black community. If you commit a crime, you should be held accountable and suffer the legal repercussions. Discrimination is no longer your scapegoat.” How thoroughly illogical that the white students who committed the original hate crimes were never held accountable.

The problem, people, is that there isn’t an upswell that there are continual crimes occurring against black America. The increase in racial slurs and noose usage, as well as the almost endemic scrawling of swastikas on any surface, is being allowed free reign without any prosecution. Only because a professor at an Ivy League school was a target is there any sort of serious attempt to solve the problem. White Americans who traffic in any hate talk need to have the full extent of the law used against them. Only once we realize that there is a serious problem amongst whites will there be any reduction in the increase in racially motivated crimes.