Insurrection
Insurrection on this scale had never happened before. Party leaders came up with a plan to lure white voters away into a dark place. This plan involved stoking up white fear of the others. The revolt included but was not limited to the rebellion against the government’s musings of a multiracial democracy. Deepened by divides, those manufactured fears sparked the alarm of a possible black and leftwing takeover, therefore, supplanting the whites.
Thoughts such as these are reminiscent of the chant lead by Unite the Right supporter’s Tiki torch-lit nighttime march in Charlottesville, Virginia in August of 2017, as they shouted:
“You Will Not Replace Us!” they shouted in unison Saturday. Later, they sang a rendition of the adopted Confederate anthem, “Dixie,” and also chanted, “Russia is Our Friend!” and “The South Will Rise Again!”
In this atmosphere, the old protect the white woman from the black man, “Karening” was well advanced in its fear-mongering. With the threat of violence in the streets, the need to go back to a so-called safer time motivated the levers of power and poison to spread a myriad of lies, deceptions, and conspiracy theories.
As the election approached, white voters became increasingly angry that somehow their way of life was getting taken away by the burgeoning diversity.
Then it happened; rhetorical discourse had spilled over into the streets in bloodshed. The government’s seat of power looked as though it was under the attack of a foreign enemy. Law enforcement was overwhelmed.
January 6 became the flashpoint for a slowly increasingly combustible atmosphere of white rage. As breathtaking as it was, this rage did not describe the events on January 6 at the U.S. Capitol. Actually, it was 1898, and the target was North Carolina’s largest city’s city hall, and blacks through coup d’e’tat by a mob of 200 armed white supremacists. Up to 300 killings, massive property loss, including burning down Wilmington’s Daily Register. The Wilmington Massacre marked the first time in recorded American history that such an event took place. The Mayor and Board of Alderman were forced out, and Alfred Moore Waddell, who had threatened to fill the Cape Fear river with black bodies, became Wilmington’s Mayor.
These events mirrored the voter suppression efforts of today.
Laura Edwards wrote in Democracy Betrayed (2000): “What happened in Wilmington became an affirmation of white supremacy not just in that one city, but in the South and in the nation as a whole”, as it affirmed that invoking “whiteness” eclipsed the legal citizenship, individual rights, and equal protection under the law that black Americans were guaranteed under the Fourteenth Amendment.”
Whiteness
The term white, referring to people, was created by Virginia slave owners and colonial rules in the 17th century. It replaced terms like Christian and Englishman to distinguish European colonists from Africans and indigenous peoples. European colonial powers established whiteness as a legal concept after Bacon’s Rebellion in 1676, during which indentured servants of European and African descent had united against the colonial elite. The legal distinction of white separated the servant class on the basis of skin color and continental origin. The creation of ‘whiteness’ meant giving privileges to some, while denying them to others with the justification of biological and social inferiority.
https://www.racialequitytools.org/glossary PBS, “Race: The Power of an Illusion” (2018–2019 relaunch of 2003 series).
The divisive generic terms are attributed to whiteness by default. Constantly repeated in news cycles, such as Working class (White working-class), Evangelical (White Evangelical), etc., have created today’s political and social stratifications from which many now choose to hide in the post George Floyd world.
The same influences are at work to attempt to push communities of color into a box that has been exposed. That says to speak up is to sacrifice future opportunities, i.e., Colin Kaepernick (Stay in your place, boy, and don’t get to uppidy.). This spans from Alexander Manly, who co-owned Wilmington’s Daily Register to President Barack Obama. Continue to think outside of the box, for there resides true freedom.
Kevin Robinson Executive Director of Accord1.
accord1 