Strange Fruit
Today is Sunday, 23 September 2007.
Fifty years ago this date, nine Black students, under police (and later military) protection integrated Central High School in Little Rock, Arkansas. They endured widespread vilification and death threats.
These days, in certain parts of the “Olde South”, in response to the events in Jena, Louisiana, the noose is making a comeback. Apologists say it’s just a “joke” or a “prank”.
A prank is calling a phone number at random and asking, “Is your refrigerator running?” A prank is the old burning-sack-of-turds on the porch trick.
The noose has only one meaning, and it’s no joke: murder Blacks. At the least, the noose is intimidation by threat of violence. At the most, the noose is a clarion call for lynching.
The noose is not free speech. The noose is a hate crime and an incitement to assassination. When whites display the noose in any context other than anti-lynching, it should be prosecuted as a hate crime.
Herewith, Billy Holiday:
Fifty years ago this date, nine Black students, under police (and later military) protection integrated Central High School in Little Rock, Arkansas. They endured widespread vilification and death threats.
These days, in certain parts of the “Olde South”, in response to the events in Jena, Louisiana, the noose is making a comeback. Apologists say it’s just a “joke” or a “prank”.
A prank is calling a phone number at random and asking, “Is your refrigerator running?” A prank is the old burning-sack-of-turds on the porch trick.
The noose has only one meaning, and it’s no joke: murder Blacks. At the least, the noose is intimidation by threat of violence. At the most, the noose is a clarion call for lynching.
The noose is not free speech. The noose is a hate crime and an incitement to assassination. When whites display the noose in any context other than anti-lynching, it should be prosecuted as a hate crime.
Herewith, Billy Holiday:
posted by HH at 11:40 AM
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