50 years ago today the Freedom riders arrived, in a fashion, in Anniston, Alabama. To honor what they experienced, I am begging you to read Colbert King in today's Washington Post. He has a piece titled On Greyhound with the Freedom Riders. It begins like this:
On this date in America 50 years ago, two buses arrived in Anniston, Ala. It was Sunday, May 14, 1961. The Lord must have been in his Holy Temple. His presence wasn’t in evidence when those buses carrying Freedom Riders rolled into Anniston’s Greyhound and Trailways bus terminals.
King recounts the events of the day as told by Raymond Arsenault in his book Freedom Riders: 1961 and the Struggle for Racial Justice (Pivotal Moments in American History)</>
It was Mother's Day. The Freedom Rides had been going on for 10 days. That day was a near tragedy, all because of hatred.
I am not going to go through the King column. I want you to read it. It is the starting point for my further remarks and reflection. You can also read this Wikipedia artice for the larger context of the Freedom Rides.
I was not quite 15 and in my sophomore year of high school. This was a key moment in my growing realization of the danger of hatred in America.
We have seen the fanning of the flames of hatred increasing since Obama began running for President. Yes, it started before then. There was some directed at Clinton. Before that political opponents were more inclined only to use ridicule as a tool, and not overtly try to inflame hatred - consider the attacks on Jimmy Carter.
And of course for a while the targets of hatred shifted. We saw even at the time of the Oklahoma City bombing how easy it was to fan the flames of anti-Muslim and Arab hatred. By shortly after 9/11 that led to a sitting U. S. Representative, John Cooksey of LA, saying
If I see someone (who) comes in that's got a diaper on his head and a fan belt wrapped around the diaper on his head, that guy needs to be pulled over."
We also saw hatred directed towards those who spoke Spanish, ostensibly as a reaction against "illegal" immigration (although somehow we never get the same reaction against people of Irish or even Russian origin who arrive on temporary visas and then melt into ethnic communities, for the Irish in Boston or New York, for the Russian especially around Brighton Beach in Brooklyn).
We have seen justification of hatred for gays and those who are transgendered, with rationalization for violence, and perhaps a vile expansion of the heckler's veto. For those who do not understand the heckler's veto, it is the idea that someone whose speech I oppose should not be allowed to speak lest I lose my cool and act violently. That is, I threaten the possibility of violence in order to force authorities to prevent that speech or demonstration from occurring. For gays and those trangendered, we see arguments by some that they should be restricted in their rights so that bigots don't take violent action against them. That is hatred, that should be unacceptable, and it certainly in my mind is morally wrong.
We have a still unresolved issue of religious intolerance leading to hatred. Too often anyone not White Protestant has experienced elements of this. As one of Jewish background I have been called a Christ Killer on Good Friday. When I was a Christian I was told I was an example of a good Jew but the rest were going to burn for eternity in Hell as if this was supposed to make me feel better. When I held nationally elective office in the Orthodox Church of America I was told that a key donor to one of our seminaries told the people at a table I had just left "Don't let the Jew boy come here." Some Catholics experienced this. Muslims and Sikhs and Buddhists and Hindus often cannot avoid it. And now, unfortunately, we see similar things directed at Mormons.
Still, somehow, Black skin remains as it has been for so much of our history a main focal point of hatred and violence in this nation. It is somehow still acceptable for some in parts of the Republican party to describe Blacks as inferior, to make racial jokes, such as the Republican candidate for Governor in West Virginia who succeeded in offending even his Tea Party hosts when after calling Nancy Pelosi a bimbo he added that Barack Obama was a Sambo.
Hatred should NEVER be acceptable. That is, if someone expresses in any fashion hatred of a group or class, for us to remain silent is to acquiesce.
Perhaps it is not comfortable to speak out. Perhaps we ourselves may fear some consequence to ourselves. No matter. If hatred can be directed towards someone Black my white skin will not protect me from hatred directed towards Jews. I may be straight, but if I stand up for my gay and transgendered students I know I may be tarred with epithets as a fag-lover or worse, just as some Southern sheriffs would throw arrested white civil rights workers into drunk tanks while announcing they were nigger-lovers and then walk away for the next few hours, hoping "an unfortunate accident" might occur.
Too many in law enforcement and the military have a tendency to use their positions to advance their bigotry. In law enforcement, we know that the likes of Bull Connor in Birmingham and Jim Clark in Selma were perfectly prepared to use the power of their offices openly to condone attacks on those seeking to advance Civil Rights. One of the key figures in the lynchings of Cheney, Goodman and Schwerner in Philadelphia MS was a Deputy Sheriff. We have seen hatred of Muslims in the words of Lieutenant General William Boykin. We saw an even more broad based hatred in the words and deeds of General Edwin Walker in the 1960s. That complicates our ability to overcome the fear many have of the other, a fear that can too easily be manipulated into hatred and discrimination and then violence.
Our society is rapidly changing. We are ever more diverse. This had always been a part of American history. When the Irish first started appearing in large numbers, there was hatred and discrimination directed towards them: in Boston one might see signs saying "No Irish or dogs need apply." Later it was Italians, or Poles, or Jews. We certainly saw it directed against those of East Asian heritage. We had the Chinese Exclusion Act. For those from Japan we had the Gentleman's Agreement. And then there is the shame of this nation after Pearl Harbor, with the internment even of American citizens.
One problem for America has been our diversity, even as it has also be the source of some of our greatest strengths. We are not ethnically nor religiously pure. Even as we all spoke English, we did not speak the same English. Now increasing numbers of new Americans speak English when they must if they can, but can survive in ethnic communities where they can use their native tongues. This is not a new phenomenon. It was true for years in New York City, where there were newspapers in the languages of large groups of new Americans. Later there were radio stations that catered to them. Now we have cable tv channels that offer programming keeping them connected with their heritage.
If we do not address fear it too easily is manipulated into hatred. Hatred all too easily turns to violence.
Gandhi was successful in part because he demonstrated a willingness to absorb the blows of hatred and to shame the cultures in which he received them, to some degree in South Africa, to a much larger degree in India. He was not entirely successful. South Africa maintained its apartheid system for the better part of a century after he left for India. In the subcontinent he could not fully overcome the religious intolerance and hatred between the two major faith groups, so the Jewel in the Crown fragmented into multiple nations organized largely along religious lines.
We have ready access to the tools of violence in America. We have a history of being willing to use violence to suppress dissent. We had the organized use of violence by the wealthy, including the perversion of law enforcement, against those seeking labor rights. It is not that far a reach from things like Homestead and Ludlow to the violence acquiesced in and sometimes perpetrated by those in law enforcement in the South. Even after the horrors of Anniston 50 years ago today, it was still part of what those seeking civil rights confronted. Consider 1963 in Birmingham:
Then there was Bloody Sunday, March 7, 1965, at the Edmund Pettis Bridge outside Selma AL:
Perhaps an overview, briefly, of this period, might provide a context:
Perhaps we have come too far, and memories have faded too much. I was scarred by what I saw then. For me it was the culmination of what began as a realization upon arriving in Miami in December of 1956 and seeing segregation for the first time.
As a teacher, I have tried to connect my students wherever I have taught with this part of our history, as sad and shocking as it may be, so that they understand the importance of standing up to bigotry and hatred lest it again wreak havoc on our nation.
We thought we had grown as a nation because of that.
But somehow we have been willing to ignore, to look away and not confront when racism and other hatreds have again begun to sprout and spread.
We do not confront politicians and others who seek to use fear as a means of gaining or maintaining control or power.
We do not act as if we understand that to allow hatred towards any group is to acquiesce in unbridled hatred towards all groups.
Some act as if they can roll back history to a time where racism, anti-Semitism, sexism and homophobia were not only accepted, they were rampant.
If we come close to returning to that kind of society, it will destroy this nation.
If we do not confront it and once and for all establish that hatred is not an acceptable form of public discourse, we will continue to disintegrate, the American dream will finally be totally lost for too many.
Fifty years ago today we saw one of the most brutal examples of where violence can lead.
On (not Tuesday, sorry) Monday there will be a show on television that will explore the Freedom Rides. Here is the trailer:
I will be urging my students to watch it if they can. It will be difficult, because this is the week we have state testing, and many of my students will sit for four multi-hour tests this week.
I hope that many Americans will take the time to watch, to reflect on how hatred can destroy our society.
Hatred in America. It should not be accepted. If we would know our history, we might understand the danger.
Peace?