Page 2 The Skanner August 23, 2017
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Challenging People to Shape
a Better Future Now
Bernie Foster
Founder/Publisher
Confederate Statues Fall, But Economic Racism Lingers
Bobbie Dore Foster
Executive Editor
C
Jerry Foster
Advertising Manager
Christen McCurdy
News Editor
Patricia Irvin
Graphic Designer
Melanie Sevcenko
Reporter
Monica J. Foster
Seattle Office Coordinator
Susan Fried
Photographer
2017
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heers to New Orleans
Mayor Mitch Landrieu,
one of the first mayors to
take Confederate statues
down and to make the strong
point that these statues repre-
sent nothing but oppression.
You should check out the
speech he delivered, in May,
at MarketWatch.com.
More cheers to Baltimore
Mayor Catherine Pugh who
had statues removed in the
dead of night to avoid Char-
lottesville-type
confronta-
tions between racist White
supremacists (also known as
“good people” according to
“45”) and those who oppose
them. And though he does
little that I agree with, in the
interest of equal praise, I
must lift up Maryland Gov-
ernor Larry Hogan, who had
the statue of Roger Taney
removed from the Maryland
state house. Taney was an
especially vile racist who
authored the Dred Scott de-
cision in 1857. He wrote that
Black people had no rights
that Whites were bound to re-
spect, and provided justifica-
tion for enslavement, even as
many in the rest of the nation
were clamoring against the
unjust institution.
As the statues are falling,
economic racism is not fad-
ing. African Americans still
earn just 60 percent of what
Whites earn. We have just
7 percent of the wealth that
Whites have. The unemploy-
ment rate for Black workers
is double the unemployment
rate of White workers. Even
with equal incomes, Blacks
find it more challenging to
Julianne
Malveaux
NNPA
Columnist
get mortgages or other access
to capital and our economic
rights are being challenged
every day.
It is important to note that
these statues were not erect-
ed immediately after the Civ-
il War. Of course, Southern
Confederates — a bunch of
“
it in the dead of night. Black
people, who had land, were of-
ten forced to concede it or be
killed. The Emergency Land
Fund, a now-defunct organi-
zation that documented the
Black loss of land, indicated
that Black folks lost as much
as 90 percent of their accu-
mulated land by 1970, at least
partially due to trickery and
intimidation.
The origins of the wealth
gap lie in this loss of land, and
in the intimidation that kept
African American people in
near-slave status in the South.
Confederate statues, flags,
The origins of the wealth gap lie in
this loss of land, and in the intim-
idation that kept African Ameri-
can people in near-slave status in
the South
losers — were too broke to
build statues. They were still
trying to recover from the
devastation of the Civil War.
How did they plan to recov-
er? They needed a captive la-
bor force to work their fields,
just as enslaved people had
before the war. So they en-
sured quasi-captivity through
intimidation.
That
need
was partially responsible
for the emergence of the
KKK. They inspired fear,
suppressed resistance, and,
through Black Codes and
Jim Crow, engineered the
near-re-enslavement of Black
people.
Black people who wanted to
leave the South after the end
of Reconstruction had to do
and Klan activity appeared
wherever there was resis-
tance—during and after the
reconstructions, in the 1920s,
after the Red Summer of 1919
and the return of Black men
from World War I.
Again, we saw the rise of
this activity, these statues
and these flags, in the 1950s
as the Civil Rights Movement
pushed hard for equality.
When people talk about tak-
ing “their” streets back, what
they really mean is they want
Black people (and other peo-
ple of color) in their place; in
their economic place and that
place, for them, is subordi-
nate.
So while Confederate stat-
ues are falling (not quickly
enough — there are more than
700 of these odious symbols
still standing), and Confeder-
ate flags are waving less fre-
quently, the economic racism
the Confederacy established
is alive and well. Just ask the
young Black couple redlined
away from a banking oppor-
tunity, or the innocent arrest-
ed person who can’t pay bail.
Ask the Black student whose
loan burden is nearly twice
that of her White counter-
part, or the Black woman who
pays more, and at a higher in-
terest rate, for a car loan.
Sure, we have come a long
way since those ugly days of
enslavement or stark segrega-
tion, but some power comes
from the Benjamins. And, ac-
cording to some estimates, it
will take more than 200 years
to close the wealth gap. The
statues may be falling, but
economic racism is alive and
well.
While I commend Repub-
licans Lindsey Graham, Tim
Scott, John McCain and so
many others for condemning
their president for his abject
and ugly racism, I wonder if
any of them would be so force-
ful in condemning economic
racism, or in advocating for
reparations. Absent their
willingness to do that, they
can earn style points for their
remarks, but they do not seem
prepared to change the harsh
realities of Black life in our
country today.
I challenge those who would
tear down the statues and
take down the flags to show
equal zeal in tearing down the
walls of economic racism.
Symbols of Hatred and Racism Should Not be Venerated
Trump administration’s refusal to condemn the public display of Confederate
symbols emboldens the hateful groups that seek to divide our country
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or too long, the American
people have lived side by
side with the emblems
of White supremacy,
oppression and segregation.
Their continued presence in
our public sites and buildings
is highly offensive to millions
of Americans — regardless of
ethnicity — and also serves
as a painful reminder of the
racial, ethnic and religious
hatred that have marred this
country’s history.
Today, we are dealing with
a President who believes that
to take down these symbols
is to change “history” and
“culture” and an Attorney
General who believes that
to remove the Confederate
flag from public buildings
is to “delegitimize the fabu-
lous accomplishments of our
country.” We ask: how does
it benefit our country to pre-
serve an archaic and trea-
sonous Confederate culture
which sought to devalue, di-
minish and profit off the suf-
Derrick
Johnson
NNPA
Interim
President &
CEO
fering of Black citizens? The
Civil War is a part of our
history, but those symbols be-
long in textbooks so we may
“
some instances blatantly
defend the public display of
these Confederate symbols –
serves only to embolden and
mobilize the hateful groups
that seek to tear our coun-
try apart. As was evident in
Charlottesville, theremnants
of the Confederacy will con-
tinue to evoke hatred and in-
spire domestic terrorism un-
til they are removed. Leaders
of the Ku Klux Klan and oth-
The mechanisms that aim to
spread hate, terror and injustice
take on many forms – from dis-
criminatory laws and unfair sys-
tems, to racist symbols and con-
federate statues
learn from our past mistakes
and grow from them. Symbols
of hatred and racism should
not be venerated.
This administration’s re-
fusal to condemn — and in
er white supremacists groups
continue to praise the actions
and rhetoric of our President,
further illustrating that he is
on the wrong side of the mor-
al compass.
Striking down these stat-
ues, flags, and memorials
will not solve all the chal-
lenges concerning race and
equality in America, but it
will symbolize an end to the
reverence and celebration
of values that have divided
us for too long. Baltimore,
home of our national head-
quarters, just removed sev-
eral confederate statues and
moments. The NAACP com-
mends the Charm City and the
other towns, states and uni-
versities that have taken steps
to rid themselves of these
shameful monuments.
The mechanisms that aim
to spread hate, terror and in-
justice take on many forms –
from discriminatory laws
and unfair systems, to racist
symbols and confederate stat-
ues. As the nation’s foremost
civil rights organization, the
NAACP will continue to fight
the constructs whose sole
purpose is to make America
hate again.
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