Columnist Jamala Rogers
The election of Barack Obama took millions of voters of all colors, backgrounds and political persuasions. There’s a feeling by some that white voters who transcended their own personal privilege and America’s institutionalized racism to cast ballot a vote for a black man should get special props. Black people alone could not have put Obama in the White House.
I maintain that black people alone could not have brought down Proposition 8 in California. Not when we represent a paltry 6.2 percent of the population. Yet, on the historic day that America gave a Barack Obama a mandate for change, seven out of 10 black voters said no to same-sex marriage.
The response to Prop 8’s defeat was immediate and mean-spirited by white extremists within the gay movement. Black folks were harassed on the streets. Of course, that’s the irrational nature of anger: the perpetrators didn’t know if the intended objects of their venom voted for or against Prop 8.
To their credit, the LGBT movement directed its anger and energy at the funders of the ballot initiative and away from minority voters. Gay and allies mobilized all over the country n including here in the Lou n in protest of the denial of civil and human rights of gay/lesbian/bi-sexual/transgendered citizens.
Escalating throughout the Obama campaign was a simmering white backlash. A black man running the country? The nasty, racist antics are raising their ugly heads all over the land.
A local black hair salon with an Obama sign in the window was attacked with a brick (see News, Page A3). Elsewhere, crosses were burned on lawns that proudly displayed Obama signs. Obama effigies were hung and dead animals showed up on the property of unsuspecting victims. Busted car windshields, racist graffiti and vandalism have surfaced in neighborhoods.
In Standish, ME, store customers could buy a $1 ticket on President-elect Obama’s death date. It comes as no surprise that authorities report more incidents of threats against Obama than any past president-elect.
This thing called change is a scary thing. And when people get scared, it can get ugly. When they get scared and angry, we need to be prepared for the worst.
When people are oppressed or discriminated against, they will continue to fight until they are free. America is a place that thrives off creating fault lines between people, forever creating oppositions of them vs. us: Muslims vs. Christians, men vs. women, gay vs. straight, old vs. young, poor vs. rich n if there’s an inch to drive a wedge, it will be found.
Those who want to hate the “other,” to keep the other from loving who they want, from maintaining the job of their choice, from living where they want, from living life to its fullest, should know that it wasn’t just Obama who got a mandate for change: Americans got one as well.
We cannot allow the human rights of one sector of society to be denied or trampled upon if this country wants to see a transformative period. The responsibility for change starts with ourselves. Yes, we can should now be yes, I will.