This is for the Virginian with his panties in a bunch who either blocked me or deleted his subthread (in either case, excellent choice! –ed.) No I don’t think you are all about slavery. I think you are a moron that can’t understand why we point to fully half of your state as being backwards jackasses.
At least you aren’t in West Virginia or one of the Carolinas. Then you would definitely be racist, pro-slavery and a white supremacist. But then I repeat myself. Speaking of West Virginia, what happened to you? You left Virginia to stay with the Union, and then what? You got bored? Too much moonshine? What was it?
Just FYI, I live in Texas, one of the few places that could be proud of being part of six different countries. I grew up in Kansas, the state that nearly destroyed itself over the question of slavery and gave birth to John Brown, the man who almost single-handedly started the Civil War. Almost.
Might I suggest you understand some history? Here’s a good place to start:
facebook (dead link)
As I said on the subthread that disappeared why reply at all if you are just going to paint with a broad brush? I get it, you want to convince people. I used to think that was a worthy goal myself. Now I don’t bother unless there is some broad general agreement between me and whoever.
Text does not communicate subtlety unless the writer is a master at his craft. These exchanges could be considered mental training, someday hoping to have a more comprehensive perspective and be able to effectively communicate it. It’s a nice dream, the belief that we can head off the violence with better, more effective words. I don’t believe it. Not even for one minute.
We are headed towards violence. There is little doubt of that. These armaphiles haven’t been stocking up on semi-auto hardware dressed up in military garb just because they like looking sexy on the range. They know (KNOW) that there will be violence, and they will make sure of it. Just as they already did twice this weekend. (There were actually four mass shootings on the weekend of August 10-11, 2019. –ed.)
When your opponent dismisses education and conversation as weak what they are left with is violence to make change. This violence is playing out all around us now. This is fascism. That is what we are witnessing. Fascism manifesting all around us and there is little hope of stopping the violence now.
Perhaps this generation does not understand what war really is. If they did know they would not be so anxious to experience it first hand. But they will experience it, and we are already getting the first taste of what this might all be like in our near future. What the people who want to talk their way out of the violence they see brewing don’t seem to understand is that, politically, in a winner take all system, one side is right and the other is wrong. Demonstrably wrong, based on history.
Now. The Republicans think that the Democrats are wrong, and if I lived in New Jersey, I might agree with them. The Democrats think the Republicans are wrong, and since I live in Texas, I do agree with them. The people who say the system is rigged are right, except that you can’t fix a rigged system from outside of it. You can only fix it from inside. You can only destroy it from outside, and destruction necessarily spills blood.
So. Either the Democrats will discover what the majority of Americans want right here and now, or the Orange Hate-Monkey will whip up the militant white supremacists/white separatists, and they will create the Gilead they’ve always dreamed of having. One side or the other will win in the end. Your choices amount to picking a side or getting the hell out of the way. Choose wisely.
…as for the people who side with the Trumpists and think there won’t be bloody, society-ending violence, they don’t know history. They’re simply repeating what they have been told is true. It is a lie. The angry detractors are telling the truth. Holding their anger against them does not solve any problems it just entrenches the old problems even deeper.
Had Lincoln gotten his way, the former slaves would have been given property, as they were promised. There would be no memorials to Confederate traitors, because there wouldn’t have been a white supremacist victory after the assassination of Lincoln. (See Andrew Johnson) the confederate flag would be just another battle flag displayed as a trophy on the walls of military museums, which is where that slave-owning banner of treason belongs.
The real problem here is that we all were lied to. All of us. The history we were taught in school (if you were educated before 1980) is not the real history of the United States. That history is waiting for you to discover it right now if you just open your eyes and look at it.
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In August of 1619, a ship appeared on this horizon, near Point Comfort, a coastal port in the English colony of Virginia. It carried more than 20 enslaved Africans, who were sold to the colonists. No aspect of the country that would be formed here has been untouched by the years of slavery that followed. In the 400th anniversary of this fateful moment, it is finally time to tell our story truthfully.
NYTimes – The 1619 Project
Featured image: WaPo Tweet. WaPo Article.
