Today in Labor History June 21, 1964: Civil rights workers Andrew Goodman, James Chaney and Michael Schwerner were disappeared near Philadelphia, Mississippi by the Ku Klux Klan, who beat them to death with clubs and chains. Their mangled bodies were later found by federal agents.
As Esther Addley reports, Clacton in Essex, England, is 95.3% white. It has few immigrants.
Yet Nigel Farage's immigrant-baiting is having enormous influence on the aging, economically stagnant, almost entirely white population of Clacton, which is willing to believe that someone else — specifically, immigrants — is responsible for every problem imaginable.
Immigrant-bashing works. Lots of us want a scapegoat to blame our ills on.
Today in Labor History June 20, 1943: Striking African American auto workers were attacked by the National Workers League, KKK and armed white workers at Detroit's Bell Isle amusement park. 34 people were killed and 1,800 arrested in these race riots (scores of whom were African American victims of racist violence). The U.S. army had been brought in to restore order. 400,000 Southerners, black and white, had migrated to the Detroit area from 1941-1943 for work in the automotive industry, which had been converted to support the WWII effort, creating housing shortages and increasing pre-existing social tensions. Further exacerbating tensions were years of discrimination and police brutality against black workers. Earlier in 1943, there were race riots in Harlem, Los Angeles (Zoot Suit Riots), Texas and Alabama.
Today in Labor History June 19, 1865: African Americans were declared free in Texas, more than 2 months after the end of the Civil War and the final enforcement of the Emancipation Proclamation. This date is now celebrated each year as "Juneteenth." It officially became a national holiday in 2021. Emancipation under the proclamation only applied to enslaved people living in former Confederate states. Enslaved people living outside the former confederacy did not gain legal freedom until the 13th Amendment was ratified in December, 1865. And incarcerated prisoners are still constitutionally exempt from protections against slavery.
"Trump’s campaign stop at a 'Black church' this weekend produced a crowd with many white faces, and Black influencers apparently needed to be brought in from afar. ...
In political parlance, this is called 'astroturfing'—making something appear grassroots when it is in fact all fake and manufactured."
internal screaming (parenting is incredibly difficult and I am intensely frustrated with the state of the world and the fact that I cannot get any money anywhere no matter how hard I try and how hard I look because my skills are considered inherently deleted bcuz I'm Black and disabled and art is so devalued and yet out of reach that I can't even get my work seen on any social media besides this one and it still doesn't go far) #despair#disability#racism#BlackMastodon#BrownMastodon
"TikTok creator Lilly Gaddis’ use of the n-word and other racist comments in a video got her fired from her job at a home health-care company this week, making headlines around the country."
"Gaddis, 23, is a self-described 'tradwife'—a growing social media trend of women who take on what they see as their traditional gender role (i.e. cooking, cleaning, and taking care of their kids.) Gaddis deleted her TikTok, so it's unclear whether her content met the “tradwife” bar, but it has undeniably piqued interest in the term."
"Tradwives promote a limited, retrogressive vision of what women can be, posing a setback to the last 100 years of progress in getting women to be seen as men’s equals, rather than their support staff. As 'Fair Play' author Eve Rodsky put it to CNBC, 'tradwives are the definition of patriarchy—there’s nothing new here.'"
Today in Labor History June 16, 1976: 20,000 students protested in Soweto South Africa, against the requirement that they learn the Afrikaans language in their schools. They considered Afrikaans to be the language of the brutally racist and repressive Apartheid regime. The uprising spread to seven other black townships and became known as the Soweto Uprising. The police responded by shooting directly into the crowds of children and teachers. Official reports claim that the police killed the 176 people, mostly children. However, some estimate that over 700 were killed. By the end of the year, thousands had died in demonstrations throughout the country.
"Presumptive Republican nominee Donald Trump repeated his characterization of Black communities as dangerous and depressed on Saturday, courting voters in a city he has called 'hell' and 'totally corrupt' as his campaign hopes incremental gains with Black voters could be decisive in swing states."
Chitown Kev, who is Black, responds to what Trump said at a Black church in Detroit yesterday:
"Trump has been giving Detroit the Milwaukee/Chicago/Baltimore treatment for years now and did so again in this latest visit. Any Black person that votes for Trump is a goddamn fool. No asterisk. Period."
@GottaLaff And in #Finland. Yesterday a previously convicted #nazi stabbed a immigrant looking 12 yo child and tried to stab other kids too. The stabbed child is alive but in critical condition. Our #fascist party's chairman and minister of finance tweeted that the #terrorist stabber was immigrant gang member again. She lied only to spread #racism and hate. It's all the party is about. And our previously moderate #rightwing party is ok with this and that we have literal #nazis in our government.
It's hard to get more conservative, in the traditional sense, than David French is. He's rooted in white evangelical Southern culture, and even though he has come out as an outspoken critic of the Trumpist turn in the Republican party, he remains rooted in that culture.
But as he reports here, his welcome in that culture is now proving very conditional.
PCA is on the right end of the spectrum among Presbyterian churches, far to the right of PCUSA. PCA is meeting in Richmond, Virginia, this week, and French was to be on a panel discussion at this meeting.
But, as French writes, "It [PCA] just canceled me." The church cancelled the panel discussion, saying that it would show PCA as divided.
French and his wife have been attacked — including by church members — for adopting an Ethiopian daughter.
Because he has defended religious liberty and pluralism, and the civil liberties of drag queens and LGBTQ families, and has pushed against the authoritarian turn in white evangelicalism in the US, his former church has cancelled him:
"Race and politics trumped truth and grace, and now I’m no longer welcome in the church I loved."
Not to forget: 50%+ of white Christians voted for Trump twice.
Today in Labor History June 12, 1967: “Race riots” broke out in Cincinnati, with one death and scores injured after National Guardsmen began patrolling the city with machine guns. That same day, riots also broke out in Tampa, after white cops killed a black man. There were 159 race riots during the so-called Summer of Love, with over 85 deaths. 26 of the deaths occurred in Newark. In every case, the riots were precipitated by violence against black residents, after years of racial profiling by police, red-lining by banks, and political disempowerment.
White 'trad-wife' influencer says n-word while filming herself cooking - but refuses to apologize before revealing she got fired from her job | Daily Mail Online
"The same month, a group of far-right insurrectionists went on trial in Frankfurt accused of plotting a violent overthrow of the government. In November, far-right groups secretly met in Potsdam to discuss the forced 'remigration' of millions of German citizens with foreign heritage, should the AfD ever go into government."