White History Month Volume 4

From Neil Armstrong and Christopher Columbus, to Benjamin Franklin and Theodore Roosevelt, the history taught in U.S. public (and I suspect in private) schools focuses overwhelmingly on the white people who have shaped our nations history.  That history has been spun in such a way as to overlook the many horrific acts committed by white people since the founding of this country.  In thinking back to what I learned in public school, the most barbaric event caused by white folks that I learned about was the Civil War. And that was a watered down, “the Civil War wasn’t fought completely over slavery” version (no amount of historical revisionism will change the fact that YES, it was fought over slavery). I recall learning about Christopher Columbus “discovering” this land, but not the rape and murder of Indigenous citizens at the hands of Columbus and his fellow colonists. I remember learning about various United States Presidents, but curiously, the fact that many of the early ones were slave owners was left out of teachings.  I certainly never learned about the racialized history of policing in this country.  In fact, in addition to the history of the United States being presented from an almost exclusively white perspective, it was also told in an overwhelmingly positive one.

When you look back at USAmerican history without the tinted glasses, you begin to realize that that history you were taught? It’s not so rosy after all. White people have indeed contributed to the shaping of this nation. They have performed many great deeds and been responsible for many important discoveries and inventions. They’ve also been responsible for some of the most vicious acts of barbarism one can imagine (and some you don’t want to). Given that most people aren’t taught these unsavory aspects of USAmerican history AND given that so many people whine about a lack of a White History Month, I figured what the heck. Let’s give ’em what they asked for. Again.

A 31-day calendar highlighting various people, events, and atrocities related to white supremacy in the United States.
White History Month 2019
  1. Senator James J. Davis, a Welsh immigrant who became Labor Secretary and established the United States Border Patrol and worked with Coleman Livingston Blease in an effort to curtail immigration
  2. U.S. Code § 1325 establishes penalties for migrants attempting to enter the United States unlawfully
  3. Coleman Livingston Blease was a white supremacist and pre-Southern Strategy Democrat who worked with James J Davis to curtail immigration and establish penalties for those who migrated into the United States unlawfully
  4. The Scottsboro Boys were 9 Black teens falsely accused of raping 2 white women in 1931.
  5. Harry Anslinger, was the xenophobic white supremacist who led the Federal Bureau of Narcotics (precursor to the DEA) and can be considered the first architect of the Drug War.
  6. No, Kansas Republican Steve Alford, African-Americans don’t handle weed more poorly than other races because of our genes.
  7. The Marijuana Tax Act of 1937 outlawed the sale and possession of weed, beginning the racist War on Drugs bc according to Harry Anslinger, weed made Blacks and Latinx people forget our place.
  8. The concept of race as a hierarchical social system based on the physical features of different groups–primarily skin color–was crafted in the late 1800s by proslavery forces to defend the institution of slavery, bc in large part, they felt they could not survive without African slaves.
  9. In 1963, white high school students became the Face Of Racism when they cursed Black students on the first day Montgomery, AL public schools were integrated.
  10. So many wyte people like to claim that racism no longer exists. Even if one ignores the existence of systemic racism, shit like the racist knickknacks sold at flea markets demonstrate that there is still a market for racism.
  11. No more racism? Then why did a Customs and Border Patrol agent in Montana detain Ana Suda and Martha “Mimi” Hernandez for speaking Spanish?
  12. On March 5, 1959, 21 African-American boys burned to death at the Negro Boys Industrial School in Wrightsville, Arkansas. All of them had been incarcerated there bc Jim Crow laws made anything and everything a crime if a Black person did it. Riding a bicycle owned by a white person? Crime. Soaping windows on Halloween? Crime. Homeless? Crime. Though the blaze was not caused by arson, imprisoning those boys to being with was racist as all get out.
  13. Make sure you’re sitting down for this one, bc it might be shocking (he says with a hint of sarcasm). In a 1971 interview with Playboy, John Wayne (yeah, THAT John Wayne) said, and I quote, “I believe in white supremacy“.
  14. For the fourth year in a row, the number of hate groups in the United States continued to grow, rising by 30% in 2018. But I’m suuuuuuure that it’s just a coincidence that this happened concurrently with the racist rapist in the White House fanning the flames of white supremacist resentment over changing demographics and immigration.
  15. It should be irrelevant that James Marion Sims is the ‘father of modern gynecology’. The 19th century physician conducted unethical and immoral experiments upon enslaved Black Women. Without anesthesia. The monuments to this monster (found in New York, South Carolina, and Pennsylvania) should be taken down.
  16. Waco, Texas. 1916. Jesse Washington, a Black youth of 17 years, was accused of murdering a white woman. He was found guilty by a jury in 3 minutes and sentenced to death. But that wasn’t enough for the mob of 1500 white people who beat, stabbed, dragged, and then chained Washington. He was then hung from a tree and burned alive as the crowd of white onlookers and participants (which had swelled beyond the initial 1500) cheered. (there are images at this link and the next one that are seriously disturbing. Reader discretion is strongly advised)
  17. Photographer Fred Gildersleeve–a real piece of work–took photos of the suffering and dying body of Jesse Washington, bc Black suffering was (and still is as can be seen by Hollywood’s love affair with slave movies) a great way to make money.
  18. Charlottesville, Virginia. 2017. Unite the Right Nazi/White Supremacist Rally.
  19. the Proud Boys are a white supremacist, misogynistic, Islamophobic organization
  20. Proud Boys founder Gavin McInnes is a white supremacist
  21. If you hold a pro-confederate rally (as the Hiwaymen and Confederate 901 did in February 2019), you’re racist. Also, your side lost, and you support traitors to the United States, so I hope you don’t go around waving the US flag. Bc your side literally rebelled against the United States government. Traitor =/= patriot.
  22. Virginia Governor Northam. Blackface.
  23. KKK hoods. Blackface. Mock lynchings. A USA Today review of 900 yearbooks from the 1970s and 1980s found a metric fuckton of racist imagery.
  24. Founded in 1894, the United Daughters of the Confederacy (AN ORG THAT IS STILL AROUND) bear a great deal of responsibility for perpetuating the ahistorical nonsense that is the Lost Cause Myth. Oh, and those visual eyesores and odes to white supremacy (aka confederate monuments) across the country? The UDC is responsible for many of them being erected. To this day, this group of traitorous white supremacists fight to keep these shitty monuments in public spaces.
  25. Hurricane of September 26, 1928.  A devastating hurricane (they weren’t named back then, nor was their strength measured as they are today) hit Florida on this day. In West Palm Beach, 600+ victims of the storm–all African-American–were thrown into a massive, unmarked grave. If you have to ask why this is racist, you need Intro to Racism. You aren’t going to find that here, bc here, Black Lives Matter, and I have no desire to argue in my own space why that is true.
  26. Sugar Land Slave Grave
  27. July 1866 New Orleans Race Riot
  28. The burning of the Colored Orphan Asylum
  29. Patenburg Massacre
  30. Black soldiers paid less than white ones in Civil War 
  31. the murder of Joseph Kahahawai

 

(Here are the previous versions of White History Month: V1, V2, V3)

White History Month Volume 4
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