Fri 21 Sep 2007
Submitted from Black Entertainment USA
Suddenly after months of bloggers speaking about the Jena 6, the major news media has finally woke up and realized there is an issue. It would be funny that they are treating this as a new thing, except there is no humor in this. Rev. Jesse Jackson is holding rallies and blaming Sen. Obama over this case, suddenly. Democratic Presidential candidates are all jumping forward to make a comment on how they feel about this injustice. And the President was asked to speak on the controversy. You would think this all just came up in the last day or 2, yet that is a false impression. At least it’s finally getting attention.
But what I want to share with you is a conversation I had yesterday with a colleague and friend. He is a White man about my age, owns businesses, and a good person. He also writes to a couple of blogs and was completely unaware of the Jena 6 case. After hearing all the news yesterday, he decided to write some thoughts on it, and then got in touch with me to discuss it.
His position was basically
To a degree I agree with him. But there is a lot going on with this case that most are not getting. There is something not being conveyed. The main question is not as much that there should be no punishment, but that it should be equal. Attempted murder was hardly the correct charge, if charges must be made in this case. I say must as others White males were not given any charges for their fights. But if a crime is done, punishment is mandatory. But it shouldn’t be blind or biased.
Given that, the conversation evolved to discuss the real issue that Jena 6 represents and the major news media seems to never want to discuss. Race, segregation and anger. These are the roots of the Jena 6 case. And these are the things not being addressed. The charges and the imbalance of the legal system are only symptoms of this root.
The facts are that no one in this nation should be fearful of entering an establishment or standing in a space and being punished for it. In this case a tree was designated ‘Whites Only’, harkening back to the segregation of the 1950’s (for the younger readers, that’s really not as far in the past as you might think). A tree.
When that segregation was acknowledged and challenged, the response was to place nooses on the tree. That is a powerful message, especially in the South. When my friend thinks about a noose he thinks of a hanging, but I informed him that for an African American it evokes an image of a BLACK person being hung – a lynching. And when that happens in the South you get the image of KKK and slavery. It’s very different for me to see that and for my friend. I wanted him to comprehend that. I know he cannot understand it as I do, but the comprehension that those nooses are a death threat. It makes the difference of how the reactions unfolded. It provoked anger, and that is not an excuse. Violence is a bad response to provocations, but it is one response when death is the message.
As I recall, back in the 1970’s a court (I believe the Supreme Court) held that incendiary words exist, and their use could provoke actions. These actions could be crimes, but due to the incendiary words the punishment could be minimized or removed. I’m not a lawyer but I recall that well [any lawyers that know better or the exact case, feel free to correct/support me here]. Thus, back then, if an African American were called the N-word, and he beat the crap out of a White man that said it to him, the incendiary clause could be used as a defense.
The nooses were the incendiary. The tree is the segregation. Essentially what happened and was said is, in my opinion, ‘Hey N*****, you don’t belong here. Go away.’ When that was challenged with the thought that segregation doesn’t have a place in 21st century America the response was ‘Uppity N***** I will KILL you.’ Which lead to the violence.
Perhaps it’s the fact that African Americans still feel the weight of the past of America on them, or that America has never apologized for slavery (nor willing to provide reparations as the nation has for other groups that were wronged in the past) because America is not beyond the thoughts of that time, but this is the sentiment that still pervades the nation.
It goes both ways. As my friend correctly mentioned, there are places that he cannot go in New York City. There are places that any race or ethnicity cannot go in America, to this day. We have not gone as far as most of us wish we have. And as long as we don’t address the root of the problem, we never will.
America has its head in the sand when it comes to race relations and segregation and prejudice. Slavery is a subject no one wants to speak about. Reparations is so terrifying a concept, because of what it addresses, every Presidential candidate except one (not Senator Barack Obama) refused to even speak about it in a debate. And these events, like Jena 6, continue to happen.
I mentioned to my friend what he thought about a situation. I said, ‘Does a case where an individual got away with murder for 43 years before being brought to justice deserve national airtime?’ The answer was yes. I went on, ‘If that person committed 2 murders, and the local police covered up the case knowing who committed the crimes, and it took 43 years, does that deserve coverage on the national cable news channels?’ Again yes. ‘Does it matter the race? And how much time do you think it deserves? 5 minutes? 3?’ he answered that it doesn’t matter, that is does need to be covered, and should have at least a couple of minutes. Then I asked him if he knew who Jonathan Riches was and how much time his case got on national news. He had no idea. Check the link if you want to find out.
America is afraid to address the roots of the problem. We want to turn a blind eye to the Jonathan Riches in the nation. The major news media ignores the Jena 6’s that occur. The media wants to emphasis OJ Simpson, and gloss over Ms. Megan Williams of West Virginia. And when this willful detachment of facts reaches critical mass and we have events like the Rodney King riots, everyone acts shocked.
I’m tired of the feigned ignorance. I’m tired of the propped up ‘leaders’ and politicians that seek to puff up their election chances and political clout with contrived concern over issues that have been ongoing for some time prior to their sudden involvement when the television cameras roll.
I deserve better. We deserve better. America must do better.
National news media needs to do their job. They need to investigate the roots of the problems in these cases. Then need to promote discussion on what is not changing in this nation. They need to shine the spotlight, which bloggers like me cannot yet do, on the shadows of the past of America that remains with us today.
The Jena 6 case is a problem. It’s racial, unjust, and reminiscent of a separated ignorant violent past of America that really wasn’t long ago. In the history of America it was just yesterday that African American were still being lynched for being in the wrong place or looking at a member of the wrong race. It was just a few months ago, in that historic clock, that slaves became free. And if America does not, as a whole nation, move forward to a better way, we will always carry the past on our collective backs.
This is what I think, what do you think?
