I Am Snowflake, Hear Me Roar!
Alex Yarde embraces the conservative put down, welcomes the New Year, and cultivates no fucks fighting the good fight.
I’ve heard a lot of talk from Trumpkins and conservative paper tigers about “getting over it.” And “You liberals are -insert your favorite weak metaphor”. However, I am a Black man, raised in the hostile wilderness of AmeriKKka and a student of the people’s history of this Nation. I’ve no illusions that any humble gains won toward freedom & equality took massive effort and many setbacks. I don’t take anything for granted nor do my progeny. I also have no doubt in the least that this Orange Age of Darkness too shall pass. The Progressive movement will move forward, championed by intelligent people of all faiths, backgrounds and affiliations. And I also know that once the euphoria of this Trump “victory” wears thin and once the orange-tinted googles clear, many of his current supporters will also turn against him.
Your “Walk of Shame” will no doubt be painful Trumpkins, however tyranny makes strange bedfellows.
Martin Luther King said, “The Arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice.” I believe this is true and here is a perfect example. My children, who I adore, are the product of a union that was illegal in the U.S. only a year before my birth.
Interracial marriage in the United States was illegal before the 1967 Supreme Court decision that deemed anti-miscegenation laws unconstitutional across the land. The aptly named case of “Loving vs. Virginia” paved the way. A couple in love, a White Man and a Black Woman sued the State of Virginia and won. The Court declared Virginia’s anti-miscegenation statute, the “Racial Integrity Act of 1924", unconstitutional, as a violation of the 14th Amendment’s Equal Protection Clause.
Love trumps hate, always has, always will.
Contrary to the popular belief of the White Supremacy crowd ( I don’t use Alt Right anymore) the historically marginalized in this country have ALWAYS had to be tough. It’s how we’ve survived. Our allies have also, because what unifies a White Brooklyn Quaker minister harboring escaped enslaved people in his church as a “stop” on the Underground Railroad. or a white male legislator in NY Senate fighting to ratify the Equal Rights Amendment for women is the realization they have skin in the game. Booker T. Washington said, “You can’t hold a man down without staying down with him.” We of good faith are not passengers in this democracy we are crew. Bystanders don’t get to be heroes because silence in the face of injustice only aids the Oppressors as Elie Wisel observed. This country was founded in the “Original Sin” (Lincolns words) of Native Genocide and Chattel Slavery.
Yet, proud descendants, my Native Brothers and Sisters, are still fighting to protect stolen lands because they understand we are only temporary custodians of the Earth for future generations. My people, Black people, taken from all over the African Continent, enriched the Englishmen of Barbados Sugar Plantations and the Southern Slave masters of the Antebellum “King Cotton” South for hundreds of years.
Survived Jim Crow, bled through the Civil Rights era and continue to bled today targeted by Police nationwide. And decimated by a Prison Industrial Complex, aided by an institutionalized racist criminal justice system. We are still fighting behind the most benign and self evident statement, that BLACK LIVES MATTER.
But still, like air, we rise. (Thank you Mother Angelou)
Those that think all that xenophobic bluster about Muslim Registration can’t happen, clearly don’t know the shameful history of Japanese Internment during WWII. Those who doubt Trump would ban Arabs, Muslims or Mexicans for exclusions to immigrate haven’t heard of the Chinese Exclusion Act Federal law in 1882. It was one of the most significant restrictions on free immigration in US history, prohibiting all immigration of Chinese laborers. Yet, “coolie” labor primarily joined and enriched this country through the Transcontinental Railroad.
America has always sought to use cheap labor as it could to enrich the business interests and justify its treatment of immigrants by demonizing rhetoric to stir white resentment. The wealthy landowner convincing you that your plight is caused by “the other”. Oldest trick in the book. Dummies let the Bosses do it again. Too bad many Irish in this country forgot the NINA (No Irish Need Apply) signs that were at one time commonplace. It’s not white that counts as much as green Trumpkins. You’ve been suckered. Men like Trump are experts at it.
Harpers Ferry, Stonewall, Watts, Kent State, Little Rock, Birmingham, Wounded Knee, Alcatraz Island, Ferguson, Cobbs Creek, West Philly, Standing Rock. The list goes on and on. There were many insurrections through American History people’s revolts sparked by injustice from without and within. People seem to forget the white riot of The Boston Tea Party and subsequent American Revolution. This county will survive this unfortunate episode. Our democracy will survive the coming Constitutional crisis of Russian involvement that undermines Trump legitimacy. There have always been men like Trump. There have always been sycophants and opportunists to grow fat off the misery of others. This is nothing new.
Did you forget what it took to get Women’s Rights recognized in this country? Civil Rights? Gay Marriage? These were all Progressive movements. It took courage, determination & grit. It took good people within and without of the marginalized groups to sit, stand, fight, write, march, legislate and yes, even be martyrs for progressive movements to become things we take for granted today.
It took Organized Labor to stand united against the Bosses, the Government and hired Pinkerton thugs to earn a living wage, benefits and regulations to ensure safe work environments. It took manly Jewish, Italian & Irish immigrant women and girls to be burned to death in the Triangle Shirt Waist Disaster to ensure fire escapes and fire exits to become mandatory for businesses and dwellings in large cities. It also was key for Women’s Rights and pointed out the plight of immigrants and unacceptable working conditions nationwide. The fight for survival predates nation states. Back enough people against the wall at your own peril. You will have a reckoning.
Progressives have ALWAYS had to fight, organize and work on intersectional goals for gains in American society. And, there have always been Conservatives social & fiscal, that have put road blocks in the way of positive change and affirmative actions. And there have always been converts, Americans of good will and moral turpitude have been slugging it out since before this country was founded. This is the game. The steaks are always high and if you haven’t got the stones then Woman or Man up. You no longer have a choice.
Today, you are either on the side of America moving the ball forward or backward. It’s that simple. Choose and commit, but the time for playing both sides, contemplating your navel or scratching your head about the Rope-A-Dope Trump and Co. pulled is officially over. Nobody wants to hear your rationalizations, apologies or protestations about how your candidate was treated. It’s bigger than Bernie, Clinton or whatever boutique lefty you think your next champion will be. Sure we need candidates, and a diverse pool of candidates and leadership of color, transgender, LGTBQ and ability. But first we need a conscience. We need to recognize and come to terms with the fact that many of us targeted were let down because those of privilege only though of themselves. Now matters are worse. All the progressive gains over a century are on the table. There is no time to lose.
Now is the time to make yourself useful for the fights to come. POTUS Obama “community organizer” (how quaint he was considered inexperienced because of this and now we have a 70 year old mean girl) called it long ago. “WE” are the Change we need. It’s up to US. Don’t make the same mistake again and get distracted by infighting and the slight of hand playing out while Orange Hitler raids our pantry. Start where you are, use what you have, do what you can. Support your local candidates and get political. If you’re qualified run yourself! Actually DO SOMETHING. If enough of us do, if the majority of people out there actually participate in our participatory government, then as my good friend Sandy pointed out, snowflakes become a blizzard.
And if we Liberal Snowflakes can get our house in order, and the opposition remains inept, we can fucking BURY THEM by Mid Term Elections.
