Black History Month 2/9/23

Have you heard the story of Emmett Till? *Content warning for violence*

He was a black boy kidnapped and brutally murdered in 1955, just after turning 14, for being falsely accused of acting inappropriately with a white woman. Till’s murder is a significant part of history because it helped to mobilize the American Black Civil Rights Movement.

IMPACT ON OUR KIDS LOCALLY

Stories such as Emmett Till, Ruby Bridges, etc. are being specifically targeted by extremist school board groups such as Moms for Liberty- which Hartland school board candidates have proudly subscribed to/see comments- be removed from public education. These “conservatives” are stating that such stories are unsuitable for their children because they may make their kids feel guilty or ashamed. Our kids may not learn about these important events due to the far-right’s movement to erase uncomfortable history from public schools. The same local “conservative” crowd are currently cherry picking MLK quotes this month, while simultaneously screaming about CRT in the schools. Make no mistake, the anti-CRT movement strips accurate black history from our schools. Which is obviously badly needed as evident by the continuous race issues happening in schools across LivCo. The most recent being last week an 8th grade Fowlerville student calling the opposing Lansing basketball players cotton pickers (article in comments).

HISTORY

Emmett’s mom, Mamie Till-Mobley, was worried about sending him to visit family in Mississippi. Being born in Chicago she warned him of the racism down south and to be very careful. Emmett visited a market with his cousins where he was accused of whistling at a white woman, grabbing her around the waist and making an inappropriate comment. That woman’s husband and his brother later went to his uncle’s house during the night and dragged Emmett out of bed. Afterwards the men were paid thousands of dollars by journalists to describe how they cut his ear off, whipped and beat him so hard that his teeth were gone and eye was dislodged from the socket, tied barbed wire around his neck fastened it to a heavy object and threw him into the river.

Mamie had to battle authorities in Mississippi to have her only child’s body shipped to Chicago for a funeral (costing almost a year’s worth of her school teacher salary). When his body arrived, the box was locked and sealed. Mamie learned that officials had signed papers agreeing to keep the box sealed, which would have covered up the extreme violence of the crime. Mamie fought hard to have the box opened, and when she saw her son, she insisted they have an open casket funeral. It was not just that they killed him, but the depths of hatred and rage, rooted in decades of fear and anger, that was taken out on him.

His face was unrecognizable, being only identified by his ring, but she insisted that the world should “see what they did to my baby.” More than 50,000 people flooded the streets of Chicago for his funeral. Nurses were on hand to help the many who fainted — Mamie estimated that one in five mourners needed physical assistance. Reporters published photos of Emmett’s body, forcing Americans to see the violent realities of racism.

The murders were acquitted by an all-white, all-male jury which shocked the world. The resulting outrage helped propel the civil rights movement. Emmett’s accuser eventually publicly admitted she had lied which resulted in his family filing a lawsuit demanding her arrest, but nothing ever came of it. No one was ever held accountable for Emmett Till’s death.

WHY IT MATTERS

It’s important to understand that inequity, injustice and racism is what led to Emmett’s murder, this is where the deeper conversation needs to happen. However, it can’t take place when extremists are stripping public schools of accurate Black History. Anger and fear is the reaction that we can continue to expect from some Americans, because we live in a society that doesn’t have honest discourse about race.

Some State Boards of Education have recently rewritten African American history standards to conclude that Black people benefited from slavery because they learned skills (article in comments). The “conservative” groups trying to overthrow school boards prefer to erase the ugly parts of our past. Black History revisions are part of a coordinated national far right agenda that includes book bans, LGBTQ+ rights restrictions, etc. The wave of state legislation and school board policies restricting what educators can and can’t teach is amping up. These efforts rely on this narrative that learning about the history of racism and white supremacy harms students - particularly white kids, leaving them feeling guilty and ashamed.

When white people reject the narrative of the guilty white child by telling these stories, the extremist’s lie will become clear: Their concern is not that children will feel bad when learning about the fight for racial justice, but that children might feel good about what they can do to help. Young white people with the capacity to act in solidarity with movements for justice are dangerous to white supremacy. Those are the real stakes - not white children feeling guilty, but white children armed with truth, history and a righteous desire to work with others to change the world.

WHAT YOU CAN DO

Vote for school board members who support accurate history in our schools! Help to educate others regarding the local school board “conservative” candidates who will work hard to erase accurate history from our schools under the guise of CRT.

Email your school board and let them know that you support evaluating and updating historical curricula to ensure as comprehensive understanding of our nation's history as possible. No better time than Black History month! Let them know that you support accurate history lessons taught to your kids.

https://www.facebook.com/100044412400213/posts/502688701221539/

Original post with sources in comments: https://www.facebook.com/share/p/1AweBxCXA5/