Eugene weekly., July 21, 2005, Page 5, Image 5

TO THE EDITOR
SENSELESS IDEOLOGY
In his 6/23 letter, Steven Gider appears
to not understand my 6/16 letter. I simply
showed that Chris Calef’s claim (Viewpoint
6/9) of Jeff Luers’ sentence being greater
than that of murderers was untrue, as the
minimum in Oregon for murder is longer
than Luers’ sentence. I never said that he did
not receive a long sentence for arson.
Gider has unfortunately missed the criti-
cal problem with Calef’s editorial. And that
was his clearly anarchist philosophy: stating
that it was meaningless for people to vote,
that communicating with politicians did little
good, and that peaceful protest was pointless.
It is this kind of dysfunctional thinking which
has led to tragedies such as Luers’ long im-
prisonment. If people wish to point fingers in
this matter, it should be towards those in the
local anarchist movement who indoctrinated
Luers into this corrupt and senseless ideol-
ogy, and thus ruined his life.
Recently, the city of Eugene renamed a
major street after Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
Just this past week, Springfield began con-
struction on a major parkway, also to be
named in his honor. The key question here
for our community is whether we want to be
a society that pays homage to Dr. King’s
commitment to the teachings of Jesus Christ
and Mahatma Gandhi, or whether we want
to be one that disgraces his memory, by re-
jecting his guidance about violent protest. I
believe that 99 percent of the people in Lane
County want to do the former.
Lance Jacobs
Springfield
HERITAGE OF MURDER
The Senate recently voted to apologize
for never making lynching a federal crime.
Twenty senators still could not bring them-
selves to sign on to the bill, and to protect
them, the bill was passed on a voice vote in
the dead of night so no one had to declare
their vote. They missed another opportunity
to truly confront America’s murderous her-
itage, because they never stated why the
Senate defeated more than 200 attempts to
make lynching illegal. They merely
acknowledged that those defeats
happened, and they still have
not passed an anti-lynching
law.
The mass media did no
better — not one program ad-
dressing the lynchers, their
motivations, and the ongoing
impact of their actions on any
major TV or radio network. There
was no mention that most lynching vic-
tims had in some way tried to assert social
and/or economic equality between blacks
and whites. The media did state a body
count of fewer than 5,000 since the 1880s,
and that count only includes cases docu-
mented in newspapers and is low by tens of
thousands.
There was also no mention that most of
the lynchings occurred in what we now call
red states, and that the most conservative
Christian states had the most lynchings.
Furthermore, no mention was made that
lynchings were considered family entertain-
ment. Lynchings have happened in all but
two states and continue occasionally to this
day. This is not ancient history, and most
whites refuse to participate in any truth and
reconciliation efforts to address these crimes.
Because of the reopening of the
Goodman, Cheney, and Schwerner and the
Emit Till lynching cases, there has been
some acknowledgement that lynching is a
form of murder most often used to control
black people. However, there has been no
acknowledgment that lynching is an inte-
gral part of the American heritage. There
was no mention that while dredging the
rivers for Goodman, Cheney and
Schwerener’s bodies more than 200 bodies
of missing black men were found. Only a
few were ever identified.
I have yet to hear a white Christian, con-
servative or otherwise, explain why whites
felt comfortable attending lynchings with
their wives and children. They don’t explain
why they proudly took photos with the bod-
ies or why they took home souvenirs includ-
ing body parts, and they don’t explain why
the Post Office proudly delivered lynching
postcards or why people would travel hun-
dreds of miles to attend show lynchings, de-
manding that they don’t kill the victims too
quickly. Less than 1 percent of the perpetra-
tors have been prosecuted, much less con-
victed.
Charles Dalton, President Emeritus,
Eugene/Springfield Branch, NAACP
FEED-BAG POLITICS
I see Karl Rove has crawled out of his fat
farm feed bag long enough to blubber about
the Dems being traitors and wimps
for starting a phony war and
killing a bunch of non-ter-
rorists while subverting
the Constitution and
bankrupting the coun-
try.
Perhaps we cow-
ardly Dems should be
stuck in a concentration
camp or something like
that ... like those poor twits
from Afghanistan down in Cuba.
Yes, that would show us all just what democ-
racy is really about, according to the tubby
man and his fellow feeders ... oh, pardon me,
JULY 21, 2005 5