For over a decade I have argued that racism remains the most difficult challenge in America, and have been met with skeptics who said that was in our past. I find the singular truth of this election as America has become more diverse and with th power sharing and the economy becoming more diverse, the intensity of fear increased proportionately culminating with the election of President Obama and the eight year hissy fit over a black President.
When I was in the Pensacola area working on a project last week I was two large signs which said "Southern Baptist Christians vote Trump". In 1845 the Baptist church split into the Northern Branch which fought slavery and the Southern Branch which supported Slavery, Jim Crow, and segregation. My mother's family was multi generation Southern Baptist, and I attended my mother's church as a young boy where I experienced a preacher tell us after the four little girls were killed when the Klan planted bombs in a church that it was "outside agitators" which killed those little girls. I remember the attacks of the downtown boycotts of merchants, and again, the "outside agitators". I remember my cousins who were good Southern Baptist and attended church every Sunday and Wed., but immediately got out of a public pool in North Birmingham in the 60s when two black children got in the pool, as my brother and I were the only two white people who remained. I remember in 1968 when my cousin who was my age was shocked that we had a black girl on our homecoming court.
I saw Trump signs put on business establishments. This is a no no in business, but in Santa Rosa County 80% of the folks voted for Trump. Before Bob died he would spend years upset talking about the preacher in Milton who spewed hate under the guise of religion. I have talked to folks who attend the church and they are simple good people like the folks who lived in my grandparents working class neighborhood which was divided by interstate 65 as you are in North Birmingham and see Carver high school where my mother attended. I saw four bathrooms. I saw two drinking fountains. I saw the evolution of my cousins from overt racism to the subtle dogwhistle culture of the SEC and the former confederacy.
I feel that my arguments have been confirmed. I think you need to turn the lights off to have the cockroaches come out into the open. History is not a linear path to modernity. Sometimes you take three steps forward and two steps backward, and lose track that those two steps backward are part of what keeps the momentum and need to keep going forward. I am hopeful that President Trump will succeed for America, and in that process display how utterly disgusting the forces against modernity have been in our history and sadly continue to be present in America.
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