I’ve been working myself into a knot thinking about the latest proliferation of nooses and the recent regurgitation of racial hatred taking place all over America. Racism is a virus, you know, seemingly impossible to cure completely. It lives in the spine of the American soul as a retrovirus, always waiting for the next trigger, the next opportunity to flare into full blown, incapacitating disease. The September 20th march in Jena was the trigger some white Americans had been waiting for. They cite that peaceful, massive march as an excuse to abandon all the principles espoused in the American ideal. They have jumped right into the gutter hanging nooses, threatening black children, turning their backs on any semblance of reconciliation.

Hatred is “in” right now and that is a sad state of affairs for us all. Like a hem length or the “new” black of the season, it seems everybody’s doing it. Of course not everybody is hanging nooses or hating, not even most, but the proliferation of nooses is an unnerving sign post on the road we are traveling. It’s a dead end.

Where are our “friends?” Where is the supposedly liberal MSM asking the question, “what in the heck is happening here?” Where is the “liberal progressive” blogosphere asking their jumbo readership to encourage members of their communities to stand against racism and seeing nooses as a “joke.” Where are the government officials stating loud and clear and over and over again that “these attempts at intimidation will not be tolerated and will be punished to the fullest extent of the law.”

Some people believe this ever chilling climate of racial intolerance is fueled by the Bush administration. I am not so sure about that. I think it has to do with visible signs of black progress. Some white people find that evidence of that progress extremely unsettling. Couple that progress with the kind of unity seen on September 20th and you have people who feel that they have to do something, anything, to take back a sense of control that was an illusion in the first place. What are they trying to hold on to?

Part II

And so there is the requisite outrage by people of color (and the people who support them) who are justified in recognizing a hanging noose as a symbol of hatred used in an effort to terrorize. We have spoken almost in unison on this.

Then some walking epitome of foolishness steps out at the BET Awards looking like this:

What on earth…?

Yes. He’s wearing a noose.

With this one minstrel like sartorial choice he has undermined every argument that has been made by any blogger explaining the racial significance of a hanging noose and the emotional pain and in some cases deep fear such a sight produces. Like the misguided youngsters in Jena, people caught hanging nooses often respond by claiming, “It was just a joke.” No people of color are laughing.

I guess along with frustration, I feel some shame that this self-identified comedian would be so desperate for attention that he would drape himself in such a bloodstained relic of American hatred.

I am not one mired in history. But history establishes heritage. And heritage establishes the context for how we see ourselves and our role in our communities and society at large. A noose will never be a necktie or a joke to anyone with an honest, thorough grasp of American history. And anyone who attempts to assert it as such is only fooling themselves and those looking to laugh at the expense of truth.

hat tip to Villager and Attorneymom

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