The Murder Of The Rev. James Reeb

The Rev. James Reeb was a white Unitarian Universalist minister who worked with poor people in Boston. Although he was married and had four young children, he answered the call of Dr. Martin Luther King for clergy to come to Selma, Alabama, to protest violence by state troopers against civil rights marchers.

On March 9, 1965, Reeb and two other UU ministers, Rev. Orloff Miller and Rev. Clark Olsen, were walking back after dinner to a meeting led by Dr. King when they were attacked by a group of white men. One hit Rev. Reeb in the head with a club. The blow was fatal; Rev. Reeb died March 11, 1965.

Elmer Cook, William Stanley Hoggle and Namon "Duck" Hoggle (from left to right) were charged with first-degree murder after James Reeb's death and later acquitted at trial.

In Kenosha, Wisconsin, after the shooting of yet another black man by the police, protests against police brutality took place.

Jacob Blake, a Black man, was shot seven times in the back by a white Kenosha police officer, leaving him paralyzed from the waist down.



During the demonstrations and unrest, Kyle Rittenhouse shot and murdered two people and wounded a third.

All the victims were white. True, none of the victims bore the title of Reverend.

You don't have to be a good person to be murdered and no one should be allowed to play judge, jury, and executioner - even if you think someone deserves to die.

Your personal opinion of someone's character or actions does not give you the right to murder them. Doesn't give anyone the right to murder them.

Kyle Rittenhouse knew nothing about his victims when he gunned them down. He just saw them as other - as BLM and "Antifa". Two boogeymen of the right-wing.


James Earl Ray and Byron De La Beckwith both thought they had the right to play judge, jury, and executioner. As did the Elmer Cook, William Stanley Hoggle, Namon "Duck" Hoggle and William Portwood, the four men who murdered James Reeb, as well as attacking two others.

As did the murderers of James Chaney, Andrew Goodman and Michael Schwerner.

As did every white person involved in a lynching - whether actively doing the lynching or happily cheering it on like it was a social event.

As did all the white people who verbally and physically assaulted every black student trying to get an education.

They all thought they had a right to attack, to kill. They all told themselves they were just trying to protect their children or their businesses, their town, or their "way of life".

They all felt justified.

To their warped thinking, it was self-defense.


White allies have died in the cause of Civil Rights - be it about the right the vote, segregation, or police brutality.

That means they died in the fight against racism.

To pretend race has nothing to do with a white ally, or even perceived white ally, dying at the hands of a racist shows a blindness to how racism works and how racists see everyone not them.

If you take the side of racial justice, you are their enemy.

It's not just a case of a white person killing other white people.

It's a case of a racist killing people they see as traitors to the race. Or their "way of life" - however they cloak their racism.

Distancing language.

Liars use it all the time.

Practiced liars can use it well enough to place them at the center of an event but still, somehow, miss the crucial moment of an event.

The dancing lie - one that weaves in, out and around the truth. Always leaving wiggle room for clarification and plausible deniability.

K&R

Exactly why when I hear a white person complain about "Identity politics", I roll my eyes.

White Identity politics created systemic/structural racism in America.

White Identity politics created the reservations.

White Identity politics ripped children from their homes and sent them off to schools to "Kill the Indian and save the man".

White Identity politics created those all-white towns, all-white schools, all-white churches, and all-white neighborhoods.

White Identity politics created the laws that made Black and Native peoples slaves in America.

White Identity politics created Black Codes and Jim Crow.

White Identity politics created redlining, segregation, the "one drop rule", "Colored" water fountains, Separate but equal, Sundown towns, laws against marriage between Black and White people. And the list goes on and on and on.

White Identity politics gave us job discrimination based on race.

White Identity politics prevented Black people from voting.

White Identity politics made it all about race.

Yet you hear Conservatives say stupid shit like, "Why do they make it all about race?" or "Why do they make it all about Identity politics?".

Seriously?

"They" didn't make it about race - white people did.

And standing up and being proud of who you are in the face of so much damage caused by White Identity politics isn't making it all about "Identity politics" - It's about demanding justice and equality and freedom FROM White Identity politics.

There is also Straight Identity politics that has caused systemic discrimination against the LGBTQ community. Laws made to discriminate and oppression to deny rights.

There is also Religious Identity politics that caused discrimination against Catholics for not being the "right" religion, as well bigotry against Jewish people and Muslim people. And this dates back to colonial America when laws were enacted against certain religions and followers of certain religions not considered the "right" religion (attacks on Quakers). Yes, it's gotten better but the bigotry still exist. Yes, I'm aware of the alliance of right leaning Catholics with Evangelicals - doesn't change the fact that bigots still call Catholics "papists". Doesn't stop them from being one of the three groups the Klan targeted (along with Black people and Jews).

There is also Male Identity politics (patriarchy) with its sexism/misogyny - the discrimination against women. Laws were made to oppress women. So-called (sexist) standards and (sexist) norms and (sexist) laws that denied women their rights and full opportunities.

The oppressors made it ALL about their identity as straight, white, male and the right kind of Protestant and made that the normative way and called it traditional values.

But let people stand up to racism and bigotry and, suddenly, it's the victims of oppression that are said to be the ones who don't want to be just plain Americans.

Always leaving out the parts where the dominant culture created laws based on their identity politics to prevent everyone else from being a true citizen of America, with full opportunities and rights.

K&R

The whole "history won't be kind to them" meaningless/bullshit foreboding admonishment gets a raised eyebrow from me too. Like they give a fuck about what history has to say about them. Once a deed is done, all history can do is write about it. How it is written about can be manipulated. Facts can either be left out or so grossly distorted as to make them meaningless. They can be completely changed. Myths and lies can pass as history. Sure, the truth is out there. But so is a lot of garbage.

A society reaches an agreed upon narrative, however that agreement came about, and the truth doesn't matter one whit as long as enough people are willing to support/overlook or comply with the lie.

Just look at how the line between fact and opinion has been erased in certain quarters. Look at the media will say, "These are the facts" and in their next breath say "Now here is so-and-so to give their opposing opinion of the facts".

A fact is a fact regardless of anyone's opinion. An opinion is not the equal to a fact. The truth remains the truth no matter who walks around in angry disbelief.

Unless the lies win. Unless the lies are allowed to stand. Society can be shaped by lies. Entire nations can be built around a lie. By agreed upon (false) narratives.

Relying on history to correct any of that is ludicrous. Thinking history will sort all that out is madness.

Every right-wing Dinesh, Sean, and Karl writes what some claim to be history.

The Texas Board of Education changes history with a vote - and if falsehoods are taught as history then it will be the falsehoods that become the history - and their (Texas Board of Education) reach extends far outside of Texas when it comes to history textbooks - millions of children nationwide get the conservative agreed upon narrative of history and not the actual facts.

History won't treat them well? If they're writing it, it will.


Thank you, Tom Tomorrow.

A governing body legislating against the teaching of systemic racism and sexism

is an example of systemic racism and sexism.

Denial of systemic bigotry as an opinion is one thing - regardless of how uninformed, egregious, and just plain wrong said opinion is.

For legislative bodies to create laws to decree systemic bigotry a non-issue or untrue IS part and parcel to systemic bigotry.

It is the same systems that imposed - through laws - a structure of racism, sexism, homophobia, and laws favoring one religion over another (as in colonial times - and it did happen, look it up - and still exists with every single insistence that America is a Christian nation) that is now creating laws imposing denial of that same systemic bigotry as a legal standard.

This point is driven home by this current Arkansas law -