[Next Day Notes: Please excuse the gratuitous shot below at the absolutely wonderful city of Detroit. I allowed my anger at the Michigan militia groups to overwhelm my reason, a fate to which it is all to easy to fall prey. I adore Detroit, and have the utmost respect for Michigan’s heroic governor. If you’re looking for someone who leads by example, look no further. Again, my heartfelt apologies for the slight to Detroit.]
Let me once again say “thank you” for the warm welcome I received last week. As ever I find the people here to be interesting, intelligent, and kind. Basically the exact opposite of Twitter (I will never call it the other thing. It’s Twitter. Forever). It’s nice to know after all this time I still have a home to go to.
But that’s not why you called. If you’re here it’s because you’re interested in spelunking the depths of the right-wing mind. I live as a minority in what I believe recently became America’s largest “majority minority” city - Memphis, TN. That title was previously held by Detroit, and it might still be. But deep down I kind of suspect that no one lives in Detroit anymore. I think Kid Rock ran everyone off and they’re just waiting for OCP to finish the corporate takeover / subsequent assumption of police duties by OCP Crime Prevention Unit 001.
This gives me precisely zero insight into what it means to be a minority, by the way. Don’t worry! That’s not where this is going, so you can go ahead and exhale now. I could sense a bunch of “oh God…don’t…” feelings along with held breath out there in the aether.
Growing up here has blessed me with a few things, though. Chiefly I think it gives me a different perspective from most - one where I can see privilege like Haley Joel Osment could see dead people. Over the years it’s become very clear to me that, being born on 3rd base as I was, I had an absurd head start in life. I can see very clearly how far privilege has gotten me. Today I do everything in my power to give opportunities to people who had to go the long way around. The people who actually hit a triple. Or a double. Or just got on base in the face of all of the adversity they face every single day. In their struggle, I am an ally. I’ve gotten very good at recognizing privilege. So good, in fact, that I can see clearly when it is being wielded as a club to beat back the advancing horde. And it’s super obvious when a white majority uses it against a black minority.
A little background for those who consider Tennessee “somewhere outside of flyover country.” I live on a blue dot in a red state. How red is the state? Out of three million voters in the 2020 election, 1.14 million of my fellow Tennesseans voted for Biden, or around 37%. So not the reddest, but you’d never confuse it with the electoral unicorn status of “battleground state.” Despite not being a battleground state, it would stand to reason that out of a maximum possibility of 9 federal representatives for the state, at least 3 and possibly 4 would be Democratic-leaning. But after the next election Memphis’ Steve Cohen will be the only Democrat from Tennessee serving in DC.
No surprise why it’s happening - Republicans have a veto-proof supermajority in both houses of congress, and control the governor’s mansion. So the map will be gerrymandered to keep it that way. It sucks, but I am literally powerless to do anything about it. Do me a favor and just let that statement sink in for a minute. “I am literally powerless to do anything about it.”
I’m not being metaphorical. I’m not exaggerating. My vote in this state is literally meaningless. There is no “secret majority” of left-leaning voters out there that could swing the pendulum back to the center. There’s no way of framing a discussion to get the MAGA crowd of Tennessee to see they’re actually voting against their own self-interests. They are voting the way they vote because, as the once mighty wielders of that supreme historical authority - white privilege - they now face a world where this privilege is being torn down. They're not going down without a fight.
That is 100% NOT how they see it. “I never owned slaves,” they tell themselves, “therefore I did nothing wrong to get where I am.” They actually have their own name for privilege, but maybe you didn’t know what it actually meant. The word they use is “heritage.” It means the exact same thing. Heritage means there was a natural order to things. Heritage means things were better when this old system was in place. Heritage means “you’re changing shit, and I fucking hate it.”
This is why DEI is such a non-starter for them. Because to understand privilege you have to accept that the house you’ve lived in your whole life was built on a rotten foundation. But if it’s heritage you think your house is fine! All you’re hearing is people saying that house needs to be condemned. Under Heritage logic DEI becomes “they’re coming for your opportunities because you’re white.” When that happens, you pull together all the “heritage” you have left under your authority and you weaponize that shit. And using it like an assault rifle, they are perfectly content to keep pulling the trigger until they either run out of bullets or someone else stops them.
How does this metaphorical mass shooting manifest itself, you ask? Most famously, my personal Confederacy of Dunces (aka the Tennessee GOP legislative supermajority) recently made national news by voting to expel the only black legislators from the state house. The pretend reason was…something, something, Insurrection, gun rights, Dark Side. It never made a lick of sense. There were three Democrats who wanted the legislature to do anything at all about gun violence in the wake of a recent school shooting (Let posterity note, at this point I could not tell you the name of the school, where it was, or how many people died. There have been so many I’ve lost count). Two of the legislators were black, and one was white. A vote was taken to determine who would be removed from office, and as we all know the white lady got to keep her job while the black men were sent packing.
Tennessee became a national punchline (or stayed one depending on your perspective). Serious people asked the question “how has politics gotten to this point?” To which anyone from Memphis would reply “where the f**k have you been for 25 years?”
You see, Memphis has been legislatively trampled by Nashville going back to the 90s. Once upon a time, conservatives touted a maxim. If you will turn to your Limbaugh Lingua Franca Manual, page 17, “government is best when it is closest to the governed.” This was the fig leaf upon which conservatives would hang their argument for “states rights” that for reasons of, you guessed it, privilege, haven’t given up on since Reconstruction. Say what you will about the tenants of prioritizing local government over federal, at least it’s an ethos.
Funny story, though. This maxim was really more of a rationalization. One meant to centralize power in the areas of government that they controlled via “heritage.” Once conservatives took federal power, state power became less consequential. And with red states suddenly discovering they had icky blue cities inside them, local government became the problem. Which brings me back to where I started - the majority minority community in which I live.
You might imagine that good, honest, principle-bound conservatives would be thrilled to have a city like Memphis govern itself. You keep your blue stuff to yourself. Don’t get your liberal peanut butter into our conservative chocolate. And I’ll tell you honestly if this would be the case I probably wouldn’t be writing today.
But sadly, it’s not the case. Conservatives have replaced the “local government is best” theory with another one - “that government is best which we control.” And anything remotely resembling a principle has been replaced with one idea - “privilege must be protected.”
By way of example, here just a few things that the State of Tennessee has done in response to Memphis (and the Shelby County Government) trying to govern itself:
The City and County governments acted to remove the literal corpse of the man who started the KKK along with his commemorating statue…and his wife. Given that this is the city that is majority black, and also happens to be where MLK was assassinated, this didn’t seem too unreasonable. But oh, dear reader, it was!
The State fought tooth and nail to ensure that this reminder of enslavement and bigotry remain EXACTLY where it was! If you have a few minutes, Google how this went down. The legislature sued, threatened to cut off state funding, blackmailed officials, you name it. Anything to keep a pristine memorial to the worst white man who ever lived right where it was in a majority black city. Not because the man lived here, or was born here, or had anything at all to do with here. Because it was important to Memphians to know “heritage.” And what was the lesson of this “heritage” that they wanted Memphians to know - “know your f**king place.”
It doesn’t stop there. In 2021-ish Ford Motor Co announced that it was building a truly enormous facility just outside of Memphis, offering billions in tax incentives, and hundreds of millions of dollars for construction. It’s called Blue Oval City, and when it’s finished it will be five million square feet of cutting-edge automotive technology! One problem - Blue Oval City already has people living in it. It’s called Stanton, TN, or as the 600 or so majority black residents who live there call it - “home.”
Naturally the state tried to low-ball the residents, offering below market value. For a fraction of the benefit given to Ford by the state, the local residents could have been offered full fair market value for their property. Probably less than the cost of all the court cases! The locals weren’t trying to get rich. But when your neighbor’s one-acre property sells for $10,000, it’s kind of insulting for the state to say your two-acre property is only worth $8,000. But, again, this wasn’t about government or fairness - it was about protecting privilege. “How dare you tell the Great and Powerful GOP that we can’t do what we want! This is our heritage! Don’t you know who we are?” (Full credit, in this case “ripping off the descendants of share-croppers is actually, in fact, 100% their heritage).
The list literally goes on and on. The state overturned our local Ranked Choice Voting in non-partisan elections, because Socialism or some other BS. Want to teach about the history of racism? Hope it’s to say “racism never existed ever in American history,” because that’s what’s on the state-administered test as the correct answer! Think you need an abortion? What you actually need is Jesus, you whore. Want to be something other than a born-again Christian? There are loads of other states you can live in - let’s make this one as uncomfortable as possible for you. In Tennessee, privilege matters, and you can have it when you pry it from our cold, dead hands!
This is why the MAGA crowd can’t be reasoned with. It’s why they’re such bad faith negotiators in national legislation. Back in the ‘aughts the whole conversation was about “framing.” How do we get otherwise well-intentioned people to realize they’re voting against their own self-interest. Framing doesn’t matter anymore, because right now MAGA conservatives are being exactly who they want to be. The cruelty is the point. The shaming is the point. You must be put in your place, and the natural order must be restored at all costs!
The battle for Tennessee is over. The good guys lost. Honestly, I don’t think the good guys ever had much of a chance. This state is cruel by design, and it will stay that way for at least the next couple of generations barring some seismic event that I can’t see from here. But just because the battle is lost, that doesn’t mean the fight isn’t worth it. That doesn’t mean you can’t learn from the losses on the battlefield. So if you need me, I’ll be here. Fighting and studying. Waiting for the day when it will matter. But in the meantime I’ll send out transmissions from Radio Free Tennessee, and hope you can benefit some from the experience.