Campaign Action
This August, America will commemorate the 400th anniversary of the arrival of the first documented enslaved Africans in Virginia. It is an understatement to say that this is a big deal. For years, individuals and organizations have been planning events, trips, and gatherings across the country—especially in Virginia—to provide opportunities for people to acknowledge, reflect, and wrestle with the ugliest, most painful parts of our history and their impact on the present.
This anniversary is particularly poignant for black people in America who are the descendants of slaves. There are likely just as many feelings about this event as there are black people themselves, ranging from loss, sadness, and anger to a sense of hope and resilience as we continue to explore who we’ve been, who we are, and where we are going. The one sure thing about this anniversary is that it means many things to many people. It’s our continued reminder of the long-lasting impact that African culture and black people have had on both Virginia and America as a whole.
Given this important year, Black History Month should have kicked off with a commemoration of our deep history, heritage, and experiences in this country dating back to our arrival four centuries ago. The morning of Feb. 1 started off that way. But it was quickly marred by the appearance of racist photos in Virginia Gov. Ralph Northam’s medical school yearbook, dating back 35 years to 1984. In response to the photos, Northam released a video on Twitter apologizing for the photos and acknowledging that he would need to regain trust. While he didn’t specifically mention them, this was no doubt an appeal to black voters (especially black women) in Virginia who came out in droves to help him get elected in 2017.
Still, calls for Northam to resign poured in, and were numerous before his dreadful press conference on Saturday afternoon. But after the press conference, nearly everyone associated with the Democratic Party urged Northam to do the right thing and step down.
In case you missed it: In a press conference that could only be described as a complete and total disaster, Northam refused to resign. Not only did he claim that he wasn’t in the photo that he’d previously admitted to being in just the day before, he went as far as actually denying ever having seen the photo and the yearbook. He also admitted to dressing in blackface as Michael Jackson for a party that same year. When a reporter asked if he could do the moonwalk (Jackson’s signature dance move), he seemed to actually consider it before his wife said it was “inappropriate.” Lastly, he followed up his admission/non-admission/flat out denial by saying that he wanted to have honest conversations about race and that the only way for that to be possible is for him to stay in office.
Of course, he’s wrong.
He’s wrong because, though this should offer us yet another opportunity to have an honest conversation about race, the truth is that we won’t actually do it. Americans are piss-poor at dealing with the hundreds of deep, dark wells of shit we carry around race—and this is no exception. Instead of doing the hard work of talking about the legacy of racial terror, violence, and white supremacy and how they are very much alive today, this has devolved into another conversation about how good white people should be allowed to redeem themselves from past racist acts. We are being urged to allow those said good people to move on, especially when they say they are sorry and when they are deemed as being “on the right side.” For people of color, especially black people, this is an exhausting, boring, and, frankly, repetitive exercise.
Once again, the harm that has been done to black people isn’t actually the center of this conversation. The fact that Northam had images of violence, death, and trauma directed at black people on his yearbook page and then lied about them is getting glossed over. The fact that he admitted to dressing in, and joked about, blackface is, too. The fact that black Virginians overwhelmingly helped him get elected in a state where Nazis were marching the street two years ago and killed Heather Heyer, where fights over Confederate statues still loom large, and where the first African people were forcibly brought to this country 400 years ago this year, seems to have gone unnoticed. The images are the worst kind of insult to black people, especially in the era of Trump when every day feels uncertain and more dangerous for our physical and emotional safety.
But we are being told to take all of this in stride because it was a long time ago, and the constant fear of racial terror and violence and anguish that we feel in our DNA every time we see photos like these doesn’t really matter. We are being told that racism is a thing of the past and these acts are a thing of the past.
This conversation is now about preserving Northam’s career and his entitlement to the office of governor because he’s done lots of seemingly non-racist things throughout his life. For some reason, there are a whole lot of people out there who believe that we can and should overlook racist deeds because someone’s heart supposedly isn’t racist. Sure, we can never know what’s in someone’s heart. But there’s a lot of assumption of innocence that gets afforded to white people and their hearts. This is a terrible litmus test and a dangerous game to play. It does no good to only recognize racists as the people who self-identify as such. It’s likely that there actually aren’t a whole lot of them out there. Even Klan members (you know, the ones who wear robes like the photo on Northam’s yearbook page) think they are faithful Christians with good hearts who are protecting their own.
Good white people’s hearts, their good intentions, and the accidental racism that so many seem to show in their youth (that we all want to assume can be magically reformed with age) are not what this is about. And this is not just about the past. This is about the present and the future.
Ralph Northam has lost all moral authority to lead. But he’s particularly lost it in the eyes of black Virginians, who comprise almost 20 percent of the state’s residents. They have described this moment as “betrayal, pain, and disappointment.”
Black Virginians matter. And their lack of trust in Northam matters too—for his leadership going forward, the presidential race going forward, and for the Democratic Party going forward. Can Northam can find redemption after such an event? Yes, it’s possible. But past actions are not automatically absolved from consequences just because we like someone or think they are a good person or didn’t dress up in blackface or Klan robes later in life. Black people are hurt by this act of white supremacy, not just because the photos themselves invoke a terrible reminder of this country’s past and present, but also because Northam seems fundamentally unable to tell the truth about this incident. He refuses to acknowledge that the longer he stays in office, the more damage he does.
That’s the saddest part of the story. In 2019, as we commemorate the 400 years of African presence in America and all that it means, we are still subjecting black people to the worst kinds of abuse, gaslighting, violence, and oppression because we can’t bring ourselves to admit that this country’s racist past can be felt in every aspect of the present. To continue to demand absolution for Northam without real accountability just tells black people that our experiences are invalid and our trauma not real. That our right to live as racial minorities in this country free of racial terror and violence is not nearly as important as a good white man’s career.
Hundreds of years later that America, a country built on genocide and enslavement, is still unwilling to do the work of racial reconciliation and healing. It is this prospect that should frighten and outrage everyone, not just old photos in a yearbook. Northam may or may not lose his job over this. But, as always, it is black people that will pay a steeper price.