Response to Obama Murder Plot Says Much about Belonging
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I was a 6th grader at Clara Barton Elementary School in 1976. The school bus I rode everyday was a multi-racial smorgasbord of young kids who were excited to get to school so that we could shoot marbles or show off our newest toy before class started. It was on one of those days, on my way to school, that I was told something that changed my life forever.
On a Monday morning one of my school mates whispered that the previous weekend neo-Nazis protested against Jews and blacks in one of the parks that we passed along our way to school and that it had been in the paper. No one really talked about it much, and I’m sure that the conversation quickly turned to our favorite television shows, but from that day forward this park took on a sinister form in my mind.
While the conversation ended, I never forgot it. I also never ventured into that park even though I lived in Long Beach another eleven years. Who would have ever thought that a small group of neo-Nazis would succeed in limiting my America? At age eleven I was already being taught who was an American and what America should look like- in short – a lesson in belonging.
I’ve always been hesitant about sharing this story beyond a few of my closest friends. Mainly, I’ve always thought that people would respond to my story with “it was just a few malcontents,” and “there was no need to take them seriously.” I think that the recent media coverage to the assassination plot against presidential candidate Barack Obama proves me right. The problem wasn’t the neo Nazis in the park; the problem is the unwillingness of America to take them seriously.
According to the Jackson-Sun, “Daniel Cowart and Paul Schlesselman planned to go state to state to kill 88 people and behead 14 black people, according to federal authorities”. To neo-Nazis, 14 means the number of words in a defining statement about protecting the white race and preserving its future. Eighty-eight means the letter H twice - as in “Heil Hitler.” Afterwards, according to the ATF (Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms), Cowart and Schlesselman planned on targeting presidential candidate Barack Obama.
While the public, political pundits, and even some law enforcement officials have been quick to downplay the actions of Cowart and Schlesselman using words such as “unlikely,” “unsophisticated,” and “bizarre”, these individuals are making a case for who they believe is an American. I can’t help but think back to 2006 when seven men who thought they were working with al-Qaida (but in actuality an FBI informant) were arrested in a plot against Chicago’s Sears Tower.
I can’t help but to ask if Coward and Schlesselman had been self-proclaimed Muslims would these same political pundits and law enforcement officials find themselves so blasé? Would the public write it off as “stupid kids who weren’t serious?”
Doubtful.
This double standard says much about identity in America and who has the right to belong. After the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, hate crimes targeting those perceived to be Muslim or Arab soured in the United States. Taxi drivers were assaulted, children were harassed and Muslim religious sites in the U.S. were vandalized.
Six years earlier on April 19, 1995 a young man by the name of Timothy McVeigh, who self-identified as a “white Christian”, drove a truck bomb into a federal building killing 168 people and injuring over eight hundred. I often ask my friends who identify as “white,” or “Christian” if they felt unsafe sending their children to school, or nervous about going to work, or attending church because they thought they might be targeted by those upset at Timothy McVeigh. All agreed that they never even considered themselves in danger for being associated with Timothy McVeigh.
At the end of McVeigh’s trial, one of the jurors expressed this sense of belonging by saying that she “had the hardest time convicting McVeigh, he seemed like he could be my next door neighbor or someone I would let date my daughter.” In the recent assassination plot against Barack Obama and the targeting of over 100 African Americans these same sentiments were expressed when Lacy Doss, a former classmate of Cowart’s said, “He was a nice person, to me anyway.”
Deep down the majority of the American public is willing to make allowances for those they believe belong. As a young black child on his way to school, I always wished that this same American public would let me belong by taking these threats seriously, too.
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7 Responses to “Response to Obama Murder Plot Says Much about Belonging”
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One of your best Eric. Thanks for this!
As usual my friend, you are right on target. These threats are as real,or even greater than any “foreign” threat. Pogo, the great philosopher, hit it on the head when he quipped, “WE HAVE MET THE ENEMY AND HE IS US.”
Nicely done Eric!
Eric, This was such a powerful piece and analysis. I too have been frustrated with the response, and the ways that shapes the discourse in the u.s., and the ways that the acts of these two have been severed from the other racist and xenophobic attacks hurled at everyone from Sarah Palin to some random guy in Oklahoma. It is understood and explicit that anyone can attack our feelings of safety as people of color. Also implicit in that is the understanding that no matter who you are, even if you are 6 days away from possibly becoming the next president of the united states, if you are of color, you are never safe.
Eric, thanks so much for speaking my mind. I think those of us who especially were among the wave of students being bused for the sake of integration all have similar tales to tell. I was bused in 4th grade and continued to graduation in 1976 in predominately white schools in Seattle and experienced all that and more. In high school, we had what the administration referred to as “race riots” every year. They were really more like beef between individual students that evolved to calling each other names, but each year the Black students experience what seemed to become a ritual of pulling us out of class (whether we knew what was going on or not), locking us in a room until buses came to take us back to “our neighborhood” and dropped off on a street corner. Never mind that many of us were not from the neighborhood where we were taken, we were left to take the city bus home — where ever that might be. We were then targeted by the police standing at bus stops downtown who assumed we were truant. I have knots in my stomach when I hear the response from the crowds at McCain/Palin rallies. But, so proud when Obama won’t even allow folks to boo at his rallies, reminding everyone to just vote!
Eric, great to see that you’re still out there working! I wondered what happened to you. I remember when you came to Great Falls, Montana way back when and gave a talk to the Montana Human Rights Network. I was very, very impressed. Keep up the good work.
eric: this was so powerful, honest and tangible. you know my history, and reading this was like walking back to significant moments in my life. it’s so hard (and emotionally draining) when people who don’t have the experience of being devalued ask “why do you feel/think that way?” your post will be handed out as homework.
thank u!