If you let the bullet holes happen, the defacement will keep happening. Same with the hatred unleashed by the ugly, facile encouragement of this president. We can't let it happen.
6
I'm thinking if Emmett Till were alive today, he would say, "Leave those bullet holes alone. I want them there. They tell you my story is important. They tell you I lived for something. They tell you my memory is worth keeping. They shout louder than any bigotry, and hate. They call the world to justice. Leave those bullet holes alone."
12
This new memorial will also be vandalized, unfortunately. Sadly, it's just the way of too many individuals to do such things. Not all those that would do such things are necessarily racists...it just must make them feel powerful to so easily inflict hurt on so many all at once. Just like the "northern most spruce" tree along the Dalton Highway in Alaska. Once an out-of-the-way natural point of interest for those who venture up there...however, it's no more, someone cut it down.
1
Mississippi is a very elusive place, not easily understood in any amount of time. It's as if time has stood still. Or perhaps, it crawls so painfully slow it seems to stand still. There is so much unease of outsiders, such paranoia and fracture yet a grandiose sense of superiority and pride. Those Mississippians that see themselves as the insiders know who they are and absolutely know they aren't.
White young adults from well-to-do families from all parts of the country, but mostly the south, come to Oxford MS to attend the University of MS like it is a mecca to their privilege and superiority. However, few can stay longer than their four years because their is very little for them in MS that will give them the success they feel they deserve. They go on to bigger and better existences.
Roy Bryant and J.W. Milam wanted to send the message that they were "...tired of 'em sending your kind down here to stir up trouble." They got what they wanted — big business, opportunity, technology, progress, investment, talent, culture — mostly stay clear of Mississippi to the detriment of all ages and all walks of life. "Mississippi Godam."–Nina Simone
4
Emmett Till's murder "...also underscores the repugnancy of President Trump’s attempt to characterize impeachment proceedings as a “lynching.”
Thank you for the clarity of this statement. Thank you also also for highlighting the violence against even the signs memorializing racial violence with a statement by the Editorial Board.
15
Discrimination lives on in every new generation like the eternal cockroach. No religion, no ideology, no insecticide can ever erase it completely. It adapts, it resists, until it comes back full force to enact genocide to gain supremacy. It is not based on just skin color but can be tribal, regional, civil, religious and resource rooted. Man's inhumanity to man. It is the seed of wars.
6
I visited the store in Money Mississippi, in the midst of cotton fields. It was a warm, sunny day. And I was chilled. Emmett Till deserves more than a sign. He deserves renaming the town of Money to Emmett Till Mississippi. That would be bullet-proof.
16
How about this solution to satisfy both sides of the issue? Commission an artist to create a statue of Lee, Jefferson Davis et al. with ropes around their neck a la Rodin’s "The Burghers of Calais." Southerners pining for the days of slavery would have a statue of their heroes, the rest of us could ponder why these traitors were not hanged (like the Nazis after WW2)
13
Bulletproof and curved to ricochet back at these supremacists. And with cameras to capture them in action.
4
The perpetrators will tell you that shooting up the sign, writing KKK, and waving confederate flags are not really racist. Just culture.
9
"Some of the abuse for the sign is a consequence of resentment for decades of Mississippi being portrayed as a place of universal bigotry. This assumption is false, tragically false."
Mississippi has a reputation, not undeserved, as a disgraceful place.
If, in reality, it's really a place where such universal bigotry doesn't exist then the majority of good people there should have, by now, demanded that their fellow citizens not continue to act in such disgraceful ways. You don't fight resentment of being mischaracterized by destroying memorials to a teenager who was deliberately murdered.
11
@matty , Mississippi is like any place else. Only old people know who died in the 1950's. They're good and bad, and they have some of each in them. Don't make it out to be more than it is.
1
@Ryan Bingham
There seems to be a disproportionate percentage of "bad" there, more than other places. My comment was meant to mean that whatever the percentage of "good" is there, it hasn't manged to tackle the "bad" and that bad continues to this day to malign whatever good might exist there.
8
@Ryan Bingham
I beg to differ. I have driven throughout the state several times and seen the "good" and the "bad" there. It's not like any place else. In MS you can see third-world poverty in the USA.
There seems to be a disproportionate percentage of "bad" there, more than other places. My comment was meant to mean that whatever the percentage of "good" is there, it hasn't manged to tackle and extinguish the "bad" and that bad continues to this day to malign whatever good might exist there.
5
Rather than make the monument bulletproof, perhaps it might be better to install at the site appropriate weaponry with advanced automated fire control systems that can instantly locate, target and eliminate anyone who fires at it. I suspect that an announcement that such a protective measure has been taken with a live demonstration of its capability videoed for online distribution would pretty much eliminate it ever being used.
6
We are addicted to racism, addicted to violence, and addicted to guns. The bulletproof sign is as ineffective in solving a problem as bulletproof backpacks for school children solve the problem of school shootings.
A more effective way to protect the memorial to Emmett Till is to employ surveillance cameras at the site, then use broken windows policing tactics to charge miscreants with every possible felony and misdemeanor related to their possession and use of firearms, drunk and disorderly, underage drinking, DUI, drug possession, disturbing the peace, destruction of public property, and on and on.
And if local law enforcement can't handle it, let the Federal government purchase and maintain the site, making all those little "boys will be boys" nonsense Federal crimes.
19
We made a terrible mistake after the Civil War. Slave owners and people who took up arms against our country were allowed to go home alive and to keep their property.
This mistake still haunts us. If we had punished treason as it should have been punished and if we had given property to the people whose stolen labor created it, we would be a far better, happier, more prosperous country today.
It was a terrible mistake, and I do not know now how we now correct it. The slaveholders and their mentality are a cancer. With the Civil War, we had the body open on the operating table, and instead of cutting out the tumor, we sewed the patient back up and left the rot to spread. The current Trump Republican party is evidence that this cancer has metastasized and reached stage 5. It will kill us in the end.
26
@Glen
And you can thank John W. Booth and Andrew Johnson for that.
Jefferson Davis, Robert E. Lee, and the rest of them should have all been executed in public.
That plantation owners were, post-war, compensated for the "loss" of their property (their former slaves) but their former "property" was not compensated for their labor building this nation is a national disgrace.
Reconstruction was a failure because of Washington DC's reluctance to enforce it.
10
A sickening commentary on the current state of affairs in America. With the Trump cult we are marching backwards to into another malignant era. We have had mass shootings by ghoulish Trump supporters, and all kinds discriminatory behaviors are rising. Trumps biggest success is his make America hate again campaign.
13
How can people bear to be so monstrous? How do they live day to day knowing just how vile they are? To desecrate a memorial to a lynched CHILD, who died brutally in terror and pain is inhuman.
These people want to hang on to White supremacy but they have to KNOW that there's nothing about them that's superior. Black people would NEVER do this. We would NEVER take one of their children, torture and murder them. We would NEVER walk into one of their churches and kill people at prayer.
I've always known who the master race is. And who isn't.
14
Some of the abuse for the sign is a consequence of resentment for decades of Mississippi being portrayed as a place of universal bigotry. This assumption is false, tragically false. Most of the population loathes these idiots who desecrate the sign and hate the Confederate monuments. To speak up is to invite torment that very few will endure. Martin Luther King understood this. Even the darkest night finally gives way to the dawn, even in Mississippi. Emmett Till did not die in vain.
10
@David Fairbanks - So, to show they are angry at being portrayed as a bunch of violent bigots they shoot up signs and write racist messages to show how peaceful and non-racist they are? David, your argument doesn't make much sense.
42
@David Fairbanks If people are resentful of being portrayed as bigots or having their state viewed this way, I can scarcely think of a worse way to make that point. The continued desecration of these signs makes it quite clear to me that white people in Mississippi are not even remotely remorseful for the shameful and ongoing history of white supremacy and violence against black people.
28
@David Fairbanks
So Mississippi residents' response to being regarded as bigots is to deface the Emmett Till memorial? That simply does not make sense, and is all too similar to the tortured logic used by white nationalists and neo-Confederates to portray themselves as the real victims of race prejudice, as monstrous a lie as the original accusations against Emmett Till. If mendacity of this kind is the real price of peace with the South, it is too high a price.
30
I’m more than surprised that this editorial fails to mention the fact that Mrs. Carolyn Bryant told the author and historian, Christopher Hitchens, a few years ago, that “nothing happened” in the small grocery store where young Emmett Till went to buy candy with his friends.
The Till story remains one of American history’s signature events. Both a relic of slavery and white supremacy, the unnecessarily violent and extreme measures taken by Roy Bryant and his half-brother, J. W. Milam, to erect their own weird personal monument to the glory of the Confederate cause, the assassination of the young Chicago teenager was meant to be the Southern answer to a number of epoch-making events in then-Negro America: Brown vs. Topeka (1954) and even Jackie Robinson’s 1947 integration of Major League Baseball. What the Supreme Court did in deciding Brown was to throw wide open the doorway to America’s ugliest secret: their national narrative of freedom was a lie. In some respects, it still is, Barack Obama’s presidency notwithstanding.
My twin brother and I were three weeks past our 11th birthday on that final weekend in August, 1955. Two Saturdays later, we would read the appalling story in Jet Magazine, replete with the horrible remains of a boy whose face was anything but human. We remain, all these long years later, unable to come to grips with it. We are not alone.
And neither do we fail to understand the perpetual rage of racists as they shout their primal screams of hate.
16
For shame
2
"Only A Pawn In Their Game" excerpt
Bob Dylan
A bullet from the back of a bush
Took Medgar Evers' blood
A finger fired the trigger to his name
A handle hid out in the dark
A hand set the spark
Two eyes took the aim
Behind a man's brain
But he can't be blamed
He's only a pawn in their game
A South politician preaches to the poor white man
"You got more than the blacks, don't complain
You're better than them, you been born with white skin, " they explain
And the Negro's name
Is used, it is plain
For the politician's gain
As he rises to fame
And the poor white remains
On the caboose of the train
But it ain't him to blame
He's only a pawn in their game
The deputy sheriffs, the soldiers, the governors get paid
And the marshals and cops get the same
But the poor white man's used in the hands of them all like a tool
He's taught in his school
From the start by the rule
That the laws are with him
To protect his white skin
To keep up his hate
So he never thinks straight
'Bout the shape that he's in
But it ain't him to blame
He's only a pawn in their game
From the poverty shacks, he looks from the cracks to the tracks
And the hoofbeats pound in his brain
And he's taught how to walk in a pack
Shoot in the back
With his fist in a clinch
To hang and to lynch
To hide 'neath the hood
To kill with no pain
Like a dog on a chain
He ain't got no name
But it ain't him to blame
He's only a pawn in their game
5
What’s not making sense is why are there people out there shooting Emmett’s sign when that poor kid went through hell and back for no apparent reason. There is plentiful of violence and imperfections in our country and instead of making it a better safer place they don’t do anything about it. Him and his mother were both disrespected and put through a lot. No teenage boy should have to go through this no matter what the circumstances are. It shouldn’t matter what time frame they were born in. At the end of the day he’s still a 14 year old boy and he’s still a human being.
6
Lyndon Johnson said "If you can convince the lowest white man he's better than the best colored man, he won't notice you're picking his pocket. Hell, give him somebody to look down on, and he'll empty his pockets for you." The essential truth of that statement is hard to refute when we see a Trump rally and rhetoric that inflames those crowds. While he and his cronies see the nation's treasury as their personal slush fund.
22
Driving through Mississippi, I wanted to stop for a coffee - we slowed for the only gas station in many miles on the long lonely highway
but I hesitated when I saw what looked like a road gang - a dusty group of male workers wearing sleeveless overalls - they all seemed to be steely blue eyed Germanic origin type white boys.
I felt the hatred coming from them even before I drove in - it was a strong repellent - but my desire for coffee was so strong I decided to chance it.
I drove in - those guys looked scary - like a piercing hatred emanating from their steely gaze 'you're not from around these parts, are you boy ... ?' - like they wanted to kill something
I got my coffee - wanted to eat, the BBQ place the road gang were all standing around looked good, and I was hungry - but no way was I gonna linger with that feeling of resentment boring holes in me - I got back in the car and hightailed it outta there ! (shudder)
15
That in 2019, a University of Mississippi fraternity racist, can proudly post on Instagram, a photo of his and his three hideous friends’ desecration of an Emmet Till memorial, explains why Trump is our president.
35
Never mind bullet-proof: how about these signs and memorials have security web-cams pointing out towards the shooters, linked to an FBI database of white supremacist terrorist organizations?
15
I'd love to add a live video feed to the memrial site, which is monitored 24/7. Any attempts at desecration will be prosecuted with this evidence and broadcast for the world to observe. Perhaps then, the madness of white supremacy there will cease, shrivel and die a limp death.
7
Nobody should be desecrating anyone’s memorial. Witness the recent senseless vandalism in Charlottesville, VA:
“The noses of the Faith and Valor figures were chipped off, along with parts of the figures’ toes along with other chips.”
Monument Fund asking city to install cameras, pay for second statue damage assessment
https://wina.com/news/064460-monument-fund-asking-city-to-install-cameras-pay-for-second-statue-damage-assessment/
1
@NorthernVirginia
You're correct. The monuments, which symbolize and uplift the hatred and oppression of white supremacy, should just be politely removed from public properties.
6
@NorthernVirginia Yeah, right a Confederate statue put up in 1920 to commemorate the victory of Jim Crow and installed with racist speeches from the KKK, is exactly equivalent to a memorial to a man tortured to death by racists.
No other country in the world would put up statues to losing traitors who fought to enslave their fellow countrymen. And before you lie some more and talk about "States Rights" you might recognize the primary State Right confederates were fighting for was slavery.
11
@Donna M Nieckula
What you meant to say is: “The monuments, which [today, nearly 100 years after they were erected, are now interpreted by extremists to] symbolize and uplift the hatred and oppression of white supremacy...”
In another 100 years, there will no doubt be another interpretation — provided that hysterical, wide-eyed radicals have not effaced them and their personages from history.
There are people among us who are determined to be ugly, violent, disgusting. I can't fathom it. All I can do is bear witness and hold on to dreams of outliving their mentality.
6
It’s unbelievable to me that people did this to a sweet innocent boy. Still people want to abuse him, they just can’t get enough? This is what scares me about America more than anything else- the need for violence, the need to torture and mutilate.
In A Day in the Life of a Slave girl, the author says she thinks slavery was worse, in some ways, for white people, because it turned them into monsters.
It destroyed their souls.
Trump winning this election shows us how far we have to go. I doubt it’s possible. Too many people in America take pride in torturing others.
17
The toxic venom of white racism in America is so deep that even after 64 years after Emmett Till's murder vandals feel compelled to desecrate and defile any attempt to memorialize him as a human being. These destructive acts brush aside the confession of Carolyn Bryant who admitted to the lie that cost young Emmett his life.
What happened to Emmett was a lynching of an innocent child that was avoidable but for the moral turpitude of a southern woman who lived her lie for well over five decades. Her belated confession does her no credit.
These vandals cannot erase the history of their southern heritage by shooting holes in signs that are reminders of a sordid past that may even shame them if they have a conscience or are capable of remorse.
What these racist vandals don't realize is that they were victimized by Carolyn Bryant more than Emmett ever was. Her sin has stained their souls forever.
12
I'd think the appropriate response to each time the sign was shot, would be to blow up another confederate statue in Mississippi.
A lesson taught, and a way to clean up the obscenity of such monuments to apartheid in the US.
15
The woman admits that she lied about Emmett Till and the racists still found justification in their warped minds to shoot up the memorial to this innocent child. This story does not bode well for the future of our nation.
I’m guessing there are about 62,984,828 people in our nation who feel the same way about this young man as do these vandals.
9
You could have just written a 1 word op ed:
Racism
Meanwhile the courts gut the voting rights act while R state legislatures enact modern day poll taxes (ID laws).
6
That anyone would shoot or deface an historical marker for a victim of murder this way is unconscionable. Our country seems to keep producing cruel, ignorant, people. I feel a profound sadness for Emmett Till's family and all black people. I wonder why our country can't wipe out the KKK, White Supremacists, and all hate groups? Such useless, pathetic, people. I hope they find those who have vandalized signs and memorials and lock them up for a very long time.
8
I am saddened that even in an article about such an important issue the NYT can not control itself as an institution and has to print a snide remark about President Trump. This comment could have been left out of the article and it would not have taken away from the importance of the issue. If you insist on criticizing his statement that an impeachment inquiry is a political “lynching” please also state the Vice President Biden said the same thing. I guess it’s only offensive when Trump says it.
1
It's no mistake that the cowards who defile the memory of Emmet Till do so in secrecy. Perhaps a few hidden cameras may be in order, with a judgement rendered for community service, such as years long yard work at community black churches, while being required to wear the white robes and hoods which they don in private.
6
The bigots clearly can't tolerate the notion that the martyrdom of a black person is praised in their neighborhood.
There is a twisted, hateful strain that runs in the blood of millions of Americans, more in the deep south than elsewhere. Sometimes I think it would have been best if Lincoln had agreed to let the Confederacy peel off and rot away on its own.
9
The beating heart of the Republican party. Without the former slave states, they would have no power whatever.
8
Racism, bigotry, and hatred of "Others" is not only alive in America, it is at a zenith beyond anything I've seen in my 72 years of life in these Divided States of America! Tens of millions of Americans voted for a "man" who would purge this Great Nation of People of Color and "Others". A country which once opened its arms to the world has become a veritable beacon of hope to rising Nationalists and Fascists across the globe. Sickening!
7
Emmett Louis Till lived in my South Side Chicago neighborhood. But I did not know him nor his family.
When he was lynched my grandparents, mother, aunts and uncles attended his funeral.
Seeing and hearing them crying and sobbing was seared into my Chicago Public School Kindergarten pupil heart and minds-eye forever. Because of what happened to him as boy and a teen, I wasn't allowed to go South to visit family in Georgia, South Carolina and Virginia.
I saw Emmie's 'face' from Jet Magazine and the Chicago Defender in many a nightmare.
Mamie Till Mobley's 2nd husband Eugene was my barber. Mother Mobley was not a regular in his barber shop. We all knew who she was and admired and revered her dignity.
I attended Mother Mobley's wake and funeral. As one of her many' sons'. But we could not and did not replace her one and only child.
The 16th Street Baptist Church was bombed afterwards. Trayvon Martin, Jordan Davis, Michael Brown, Tamir Rice and Lequan McDonald were also lynched later on.
No fair nor just nor moral nor objective God would ever bless this American past nor present....future???
83
@Blackmamba
From 16th Street Baptist Church were Addie Mae Collins, Cynthia Wesley, Carole Robertson and Carol Denise McNair.
' To speak the name of the dead is to make them live again' Ancient Egyptian proverb
10
@Alice please stop. Michael Brown in no way "got himself killed."
2
@JH he certainly did, by his actions, and you know that as well as I do.
2
I stood in front of the Dana Schultz painting at the Whitney for at least 20 minutes. Words fail me.
Such acts are terrorism. The message they convey is this:is
"We can murder your children with impunity, and if you try to mourn or remember them, we will kill them again and again. And when we die, our children will continue their legacy of murder against you. Forever."
Such people must be found and convicted. The poison they bequeath to new generations must be purged.
84
@Daniel Kim
During the Birmingham Civil Rights Campaign during the summer of 1963, the movement leaders with some controversy unleashed the Children's Crusade. And what followed was dogs, fire hoses, fists, feet, clubs paddy wagons. Just like Baltimore and Ferguson.
And Dr. King wrote a letter from his jail cell.
This is the 100th anniversary of white European American Judeo- Christian ethnic cleansing terrorist riots in Chicago and elsewhere in the nation.
This is the 400th anniversary of the arrival of the first enslaved Africans in British Empire North America.
9
I have argued with family members over the taking down of Confederate statues. I end up saying "You don't know what it's like to be black in the South and to walk past these hostile reminders day after day," when they tell me "It's history; it's past." Is it that hard to imagine what that does to a person, a people? If they don't think that these statues serve to intimidate African Americans, what about a marker riddled with bullet holes? That beautiful child died a terrible death. Is that "past" for black children who see those bullet holes today? Absolutely not. I'm sending this editorial to my family members. The statues represent an ideology that endures, and the bullet holes stand for continuing, unreasoning, and immediate hatred.
77
All history is past. Every monument commemorates something that happened. Memorials to future events don’t exist.
The question is, what past do we honor?
Name me one other country that venerates leaders of a failed rebellion whose cause was as ignominious as slavery. That rebellion won’t be put down until everything named in its honor is torn down or recommemmorated to honor those whom they oppressed.
46
@James K. Lowden or put into a museum, which has been my recommendation.
5
Comparing this to trump's claiming that the impeachment hearing is a lynching -- and then having him backed up by lindsey graham -- it makes me sick that we have made so little progress.
9
Emmett was murdered and his body mutilated. Photos and the story were publicized across the country in periodicals and newspapers whose primary readers were African American. It aroused them to join in support of equality for their community in this country. He was hardly the first person murdered by white racist thugs but his was the tipping point, the one that just was too much to try to bear in silence. His murder was as important to the Civil Rights movement as the NAACP's decades effort to end Jim Crow, Parks refusal to move the back of a bus, and Martin Luther King's non-violent protests.T
hose who vandalize the memorial will not be the ones to emerge successful in the end. They just prove that some people are determined to remain fools.
One thing that is coming up these days which is not good is the attempts to make some words monuments to one kind of behavior despite it's historical meanings in different contexts. The word 'lynch' has described executing people without trial by mobs throughout the history of this country, and happened very often in the frontier communities all across the continent. In particular it was how murders of African Americans by white racist mobs and night riders to suppress communities of African Americans were described. Today, some people are claiming that only racist murders of African Americans can be called 'lynchings', that when it's not it serves to obscure those acts and to deny the victims their voice. It's not reasonable.
@Casual Observer There is no "successful in the end" against evil and hatred and the worst of humanity. All there is is the fight. But it is not a hopeless struggle, and it is always, always worth fighting it.
Read the article, then follow some of the links to the articles about the "offense" that was claimed as a motive for the torture and murder of a 14 year-old boy. THEN - read the accounts (also in links within this article) to the recent attempts by "Ole Miss" to cover up the identities of the frat bro's who posed with guns in front of the memorial signs they'd apparently shot up ... this associating their fraternity and their school with this heinous murder.
Isn't it manifestly the case that Mississippi is a foreign country? It's not part of the U.S. and hasn't been since well before the "noble cause" of white supremacy brought us to civil war. They have no desire to be part of the U.S., do not believe in or support American values and still imagine themselves to be the superior race entitled to dominion over all others. And it's not just a be-goitered few who hold to these views: it extends all the way up to the administrative leadership of Mississippi's beloved university, where they are so committed to the "noble cause of the South" that they will lie and disgrace themselves in defense of their um ... "clansmen."
Secession would be a welcome formalization of the still-current reality that Mississippi is not part of the U.S., has no desire (nor ability) to join in the American vision of what it means to be human, nor what it means to be a citizen, and and is indeed a foreign country to this day.
Let Mississippi go. And let other states join them at will.
7
Disappointed, but not surprised. Thank you for calling this to our attention.
I used to wonder why some European cultures harbored hundreds of year old grudges. Those cultures have been around longer, that's all. Law and order, yep. Until there is a law one doesn't like. Then it is different.
Till/Chaney-Goodman-Schwerner/the 5000+ lynched.
3
The apologists for white supremacy use the argument that they shouldn’t be held accountable for the actions of their ancestors. Reckoning for the country’s original sin has been put off for so long that it looks to be unattainable under the present form of government.
3
It is my hope the people mentioned in Charles Blow' s op-ed applauding Trump read the tragic story of Emmer Till and the defacing of his memorials that continues to this day. No need to ask their party affiliation, it is an historical Republican agenda. Those University students should be expelled for their hideous behavior.
3
The cold-blooded murder of a young boy made clear that no black person living in the south was ever truly safe. The brazenness of the murderers and their protectors galvanized a movement demanding freedom and resisting state-sponsored terror that runs from the children’s march in Birmingham to Black Lives Matter. The struggle continues around the world. MLK spoke against US imperialism in Vietnam and his spirit fights with the youth of Hong Kong today.
5
I'm only half-kidding when I say that rather than merely a bullet-proof sign, they need a bullet-proof sign that deflects bullets back to the shooter(s).
This type of behavior in and by people living in Mississippi is why it continues to be a failed state. Seriously, people like myself and my peers = who might bring money, ideas, and businesses - would never make a choice to move their voluntarily.
Everyone should make an effort to visit the African-American Museum on the Mall in DC: Emmet Till's full story is explained there along with his coffin.
12
Good on Mississippi for making a 500 pound bulletproof sign, but the sign isn't the problem. And I'm sure the good old boys in Mississippi that recently bombed and burned churches, and have historically terrorized, and murdered black and brown people will find a way to desecrate this monument as well.
The real problem that needs to be confronted and fought is the long history of racism and racial discrimination in this country and is still on the rise worldwide. It's the daily slights, insults, and continuing terror inflicted on black and brown people in America. It's the brutal state sanctioned violence inflicted on black and brown people in ghettos, jails, and 'detention facilities'(ie. concentration camps). It's the same hatred that produced banking, housing, education, and employment discrimination. It's the same hatred that elected Trump and is nurtured by the entire GOP. It's the neverending efforts by the GOP to rollback all of the gains from the civil rights movement via gerrymandering, voter roll purges, and voter intimidation.
It's not the sign that needs to be bullet proof, it's the resolve of those in charge in Mississippi and all around the world to end racism, race based discrimination, and almost daily violence that needs to be 500lbs and bulletproof.
6
The lack of humanity rooted in this racist mentality is not only appalling but is the epitome of our self defeating ignorance. Trump’s controversial election success and the radical messaging m propaganda from the right wing media has fanned the flames of this imbedded destructive belief system and reversed all the progress achieved from our civil rights movement. Sadly, It certainly jeopardizes our once great nation’s ability to function as a unified country.
Let’s impeach n remove and begin the healing before it’s too late.
6
Emmet Till and I were about the same age. I grew up in Jim Crow South, absorbing the culture. There was actually a whipping post in the courtyard of the county jail still in use. Post cards pictured it, bragged about it.
Emmett's murder woke me up. I knew it wasn't right and I started questioning everything. Blessings to his mother who was able to show the world the true results of hate with his open casket. I still weep for us all.
74
It wasn't the murder of the 14 year old that made the difference - it was the brave and bold decision by his mother to have an open casket funeral for the child so the world could see the consequences of racial hatred against innocent children as well as innocent adults.
Perhaps that image should be a part of the memorial - so those tempted to desecrate it can see the results of hatred such as theirs.
Of course, the self-serving lies by the perpetrators that led to his torture and execution should have a prominent place in the memorial too.
6
It's very easy to answer the question of why the new Emmett Till Memorial needed to be bulletproof.
And in many ways, you don't have to look much further than American history or our current president, who has made racially insensitive remarks about people of color ever since he's moved into the White House.
One of the most egregious of them coming only a few days ago when he likened his impeachment inquiry to a "lynching".
There's no way to get around the fact that his word choice was a poor one, especially since he has a well catalogued history of making these same kind of dog-whistle remarks to ensure his popularity.
Add to that the fact that this country has never come to terms with its brutally racist past and refuses to recognize the extent of the damage it has done -- and it's no surprise that bigots and white supremacists are once again coming to the fore.
Whether it's the current spate of attacks on unarmed Black citizens by law enforcement officers, the continuing segregation of schools and housing, or unequal employment and voting opportunities, the seeds of hate that allow one race to be despised by another are still present.
And it will take more than a bulletproof sign to change it.
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The memorial needs multiple web cams as well. It's only a matter of time before some good ol' boys with a big truck or a backhoe try to take it out.
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Emmett Till personifies why Trump’s lynching comment was beyond-the-pale offensive.
And for those who want to “move on,” we need to be reminded of this sordid history because it is all too easy to forget it, and then to repeat it.
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A pox on anyone who would defame a memorial dedicated to Emmett Till. Surely, this is the dark side of humanity.
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And people are surprised that Trump was elected to power?
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A thought - schools need to teach children meditation and stillness. Also that their brains record all actions and when life ends we get a printout. This could take root if planted.
Isn't Mississippi the place where the party in power wants to build public signs stating the Ten Commandments? Some people can't tell hypocrisy or it doesn't matter, just "do as I say not a I do."
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It’s usually unremarkable to conclude that civilized countries will make an effort to atone for past atrocities. Look at Germany or South Africa. What is it about the American character that can’t stomach the idea of making amends?
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I have little reason to visit the South as a lifelong Californian. My visits to North Carolina and Tennessee a decade ago showed me that while many wonderful people live there, the behaviors of pervasive deference and racial inequality "proudly" still exist. If I were to go there, I would go to see memorials to those who lost their lives to this "proud" heritage or to large civil rights sites and of course places of natural beauty. I suspect further planning exists for yet another Till monument as the latest memorial will be assaulted also due to a small group of men full of hate as shown in Ann's comment:"Though it's deeply depressing knowing that people who hate so much exist, we at least can see the toxicity upfront and out in the open."
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@Jon No!!! Come to the South! Shop at minority-owned businesses. Take tours that tell the truth about American history and most of all, enjoy the food! (Unless you're vegan. In which case, good luck...)
My mother's family has deep roots in New England (to the 1700s) and they hold the same fears? prejudices? about the South that you've expressed. Both of my parents are black. I grew up here in coastal Virginia and I was just telling my sister last night I don't see myself settling anywhere north of Maryland in my old age.
The Deep South (MS, AL, LA) is well, deep in layers of confusing and contradicting actions and attitudes but even those places are worth a visit or two. Just look at as visiting a foreign country and you'll have a lovely time. ;)
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@Jon. Please visit New Orleans! It is in the Deep South (deeper than Atlanta) and you will see all kinds of people, all colors, all ethnic and religious backgrounds living and working together. Sure, NOLA has its issues as many large cities do. But we are working on it!
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@Jon
The tone of the comment you posted make it sound as if California is a utopia of racial harmony and bliss.
These problems are not neatly corralled only in the South. Race riots, red-lining and Jim Crow laws effected and continue to affect the West Coast. Santee California in San Diego is still referred to as "Klantee". Along the coast in the affluent beach cities, the dress codes for bars and restaurants still prohibit hooded sweatshirts for attire to discourage certain customers.
"Although the world is full of suffering, it is full also of the overcoming of it. My optimism, then, does not rest on the absence of evil, but on a glad belief in the preponderance of good and a willing effort always to cooperate with the good, that it may prevail." - Helen Keller
Yes, there continues to be racial hatred in our nation - and we must never avoid our responsibility to identify and root out this hatred wherever and whenever it appears. But, to reflect on Helen Keller's famous quote, there is also reason for hope. May each of us focus, not on the hatred and despair, but on the hope that the "arc of the moral universe" will continue to "bend toward justice." That means each and every day we must make that decision to be a part of the solution and not part of the problem.
It's often difficult to avoid reflecting the hatred - to hate the haters. There is a strong urge to end the racist language and behavior by despising, condemning and shunning those who perpetrate it. But that is seldom effective, and often produces more of the same. So it's a tall challenge to love the haters but hate the racism - but it's a challenge we must embrace if we are to avoid falling into despair.
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Outside the state capitol in Salem, OR, there are 50 flag poles, but only 49 flags; Mississippi's is not welcome until the confederate symbols are removed from their flag. A small gesture, but Mississippi needs to be ostracized until they begin to reckon with and show remorse for their past, which is more a source of shame than pride.
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@Karl It should be noted that Oregon was founded as a "whites only" territory and enshrined it in their first constitution. At some point they realized how wrong that was and changed.
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@AnObserver The bulk of Oregon official racist laws were repealed with the ratification of the 14th Amendment. The last vestige disappeared in 1925. I won't hold my breath for Mississippi.
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Phil Ochs wrote a great song called Here's to the State of Mississippi. The chorus was "Mississippi find yourself another country to be part of". Unfortunately, with Mr. Trump as president, it seems our country has become more like Mississippi than is comfortable.
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@John A great songwriter and a great song!
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@John — Nina Simone also had a powerful song about Mississippi, the title of which can’t be disclosed here.
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@John, Songwise, Nina Simone had the definitive word on Mississippi. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mississippi_Goddam
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I am a chaperone leading a group of Colorado high school students on a traveling classroom trip through the U.S. South this week. Today we visited what's left of Bryant's Grocery in Money, MS, and the courthouse in Sumner, MS. We met with representatives of from the Emmett Till Interpretive Center in Sumner and talked to them about the murder of Emmitt Till, his legacy and how his death echoes through the decades. There is much talk about coming to terms with the past here in Mississippi and seeking reconciliation between the races — none of which is easy and all of which takes time. It is also difficult for white people who were not alive in 1954 when Emmett Till died to accept responsibility for the sins of of their predecessors.
In the courtroom today, however, as some of our students fought back tears and decried the willful obstruction of justice the Till family suffered in that very courtroom 65 years ago, it became clear that Emmett's death still resonates today and is capable of imparting great meaning and emotion, regardless of age or race.
It also became clear, as we stood in the Emmett Till Interpretive Center next to one of the bullet-riddled signs that used to mark the spot where Emmett's body was found, that the racism on which this nation was founded is still with us today.
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@Jeff Sloan Well said Jeff. It was a powerful experience for all of us. As we sat in the courtroom in Sumner and listened to the reading of the letter of recognition and reconciliation to the Till family by the people of Tallahatchie County, the importance of this simple act became clear. When we make the effort toward empathy and understanding then we realize our greatest nature as human beings. We were also told that the letter to the Till family was controversial, and that not all were supportive of the effort. The decision to reconcile is not an issue isolated to the American South. Whether it’s Native Americans, Japanese comfort women, or any other community that has been wronged, a simple apology is a good first step in the process of healing. Why then is it so difficult to simply say, I’m sorry?
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Ego makes it difficult to impossible for small-minded people to apologize.
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Has the nation ever truly said it’s sorry for all of the atrocities that founded and built it?
Still, not long ago, an innocent American boy, on his way back from getting snacks, was gunned down by a neighborhood vigilante. The murderer was free to go after the trial. Another brown boy dead with no justice.
People donated money to Zimmerman and argued Trayvon Martin attacked him. I debated these people but the wall was thick- impenetrable- between humanity and those who thought this young black man was justifiably killed.
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Many of us continue to be horrified by these kinds of stories of institutional racism and white supremacy that seem endless. While it's hard to go through, maybe it's a critical step in dealing with our country's ongoing legacy of racism. Though it's deeply depressing knowing that people who hate so much exist, we at least can see the toxicity upfront and out in the open. It can't be hidden away... the bullets piercing young Emmett's body and memorials rivet through all of our lives.
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Our nation has historically striven for improvement, and while the country has always been imperfect, we have steadily made progress to eliminate our flaws. But now, it feels as if something in our collective consciousness has changed. Instead of building up, a frightening number of people seem driven to destroy, to tear down anything which threatens their fragile sense of self-worth, even if it is to the detriment of us all. Unfortunately, this attitude has been fostered by Trump's appeal to the downtrodden, as if by collective disdain, mockery and violence those who feel the need to inflict pain on others can rise up in society.
I would rather be a pauper in a dignified country than a prince in a country that utterly rejects many of its citizens.
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@Ed Martin Sadly, Trump’s appeal is not only to the downtrodden but largely to the hate filled with fragile egos. They are not concerned with policies and world events that work against their best interests. At least they feel they’re a step ahead of people of color.
We are now in a period of survival. How can we continue to recite the Pledge of Allegiance that professes one nation, under God, indivisible with liberty and justice for all. Does that really define our country at this point in time or is it an aspiration?
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@Ed Martin Mississippi ranks near the bottom in Education, Economy and Healthcare. Maybe they should save money on bullet proof signs and spend it on education.
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It's hard to believe that, up to now, there is only one response to this tragic story. I remember all too well my horror and shock when it happened. As a mother, I have been even more amazed at his mother's courage in showing the world what had happened to her beautiful boy. Just remembering this horrific event should be enough to make any thinking adult resolve to make our world a better place, and it is both shocking and saddening to read that some are still literally shooting down every effort to memorialize the event. It should be a reminder to all of us to practice not only civil behavior but also kindness and respect toward everyone. We can never undo or atone for what Emmet and his mother went through, but we can do everything in our power to prevent any other parent or child from living through such evil.
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@Mary As often as I've read about her strength in showing the world what happened to her handsome young son, I'm always aghast at her bravery and selflessness when I think about her actions. She lived through torture, then put herself through the gauntlet again, for us.
I remember presidents back to Eisenhower. And I grew up in a white America that was not very friendly to folks like me (brown-skinned minorities whose ancestors did not come from Europe).
I went on to become a trial lawyer in the 1970's. Before that, I saw incredible progress through the Civil Rights movement, and the Women's rights movement. Women and people of color were beginning to have opportunities - educational and professional - that our parents had only dreamed about.
But effort was valued. Education was valued. Science and facts mattered. Everyone believed this - even Republicans.
We were told, in that era, that all we needed to do was to pull ourselves up by our bootstraps, in order to succeed. So millions of us did. I worked my way through college and law school. And I worked 60+ hours a week in an extremely demanding profession, and have been able to provide for my family in a manner my parents could only dream of.
Fast forward to today. Trump voters tell us we're uppity. They tell us that we're "elites" because we've tried to better ourselves. You know, put in all that effort they told us to make?
Now they're angry that some of us have actually done well in this country. And they're taking out their anger. The defilement of the Emmett Till memorial is just one example of this kind of hatred.
Trump voters cannot accomplish much of anything. But they're virtuosos at destruction, and taking their hate out on others. Much like the president they worship.
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Strongly agree. There are 2 types of people (to sound slightly reductionist) - those that blame other people for their problems ie immigrants, and the ones who do the work and create opportunities.
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@Orion Clemens I agree with you on Trump voters, Brexit voters, Far right voters here in Europe and in Brazil and elsewhere : destruction is their motto. But where do we go from here ?
Rumi said “Out beyond ideas of wrongdoing and rightdoing there is a field. I'll meet you there."
How can we go beyond polarization and where do we meet these people ?
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Virtuosos of destruction
Perfect.
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