Such an outstanding article, Stephanie! A round of virtual applause for you! 👏👏👏 Faces of X is exactly what this country and the entire western world need right now! I’m so glad you let me know about this series! Most political and social issues are NOT simple or binary. Reality itself is multifaceted and contains many sides. We need …
Such an outstanding article, Stephanie! A round of virtual applause for you! 👏👏👏 Faces of X is exactly what this country and the entire western world need right now! I’m so glad you let me know about this series! Most political and social issues are NOT simple or binary. Reality itself is multifaceted and contains many sides. We need to put all the pieces together to see the whole puzzle. Your example of when you we’re working with those activists in the Redwoods and you thought you guys were taking on a greedy corporation but it turned out to be a bunch of ordinary, working class people including migrants from Latin America working as loggers to make a living and put food on the table was a perfect illustration of this truth! I’ve encountered this many times both in my studies as an up and coming historian and looking into the big political issues of our times especially the Israel-Palestine Conflict. It is definitely essential we build a more all encompassing world view because reality is complex. I will give a couple examples of each. I’ll start with the American Civil War. The Civil War is one of the most important events in our history that shaped us a nation for generations to come. But it is very poorly understood by your average person. This is because it’s seen in one of two ways. Either it was the good and noble South just fighting for their states’ rights against the evil and tyrannical federal government in the North or it was the good and noble North just fighting the evil South who committed treason to hold human beings as property. The truth is that the American Civil War was fought over both of those issues and many others. While the Confederacy was (typically for its time) a slaveholding society where black people were second-class citizens, there we’re 3,000-6,000 black Confederate soldiers and sailors. It should also be known that thousands of black and mixed-race Southerners volunteered their services to the South when the war broke out and supported secession as they saw the South as their home just like their white counterparts. By the same token, while the abolitionist movement was going strong in the North, Northerners generally agreed slavery was wrong and black people who lived in the North were free and did not have to deal with slavery, the North was by no means a racial utopia. In fact it was just as racist as the South. Ever heard of the 1863 New York City Draft Riots? This was when angry mobs of mostly Irish immigrants reeked havoc on the Big Apple for several days. Guess what it was partly caused by? Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation. The Irish did not want to have to compete against free blacks for jobs. Their was horrific violence against black Americans during the riots including a black orphanage being burned to the ground, a black man being hung and set on fire and random black pedestrians being beaten to death by angry feral mobs. Not to mention, you know where the first Jim Crow laws were implemented? In the North! Frederick Douglass, William Lloyd Garrison and their fellow activists fought against streetcar segregation not in Alabama, Mississippi or Kentucky but in Massachusetts in places like Portsmouth, Salem and Boston. The other historical example I would use would be the Israeli War of Independence in 1948. While it is certainly true the Jewish state was in a fight for its survival and that the surrounding Arab countries and most of the local Arabs had intended to strangle the newborn state in its cradle and horrific war crimes were committed against the Jews by the Arabs, that’s only one side of the story. There were also war crimes committed by Jews against the Arabs this would include looting, rape and mass executions (such as the massacres committed at Deir Yassin and Lydda). Nor did the Israelis always engage in good faith negotiations with the Arabs. I would also note that there were many cases of Palestinians who had fled trying to return to their homes and property and the Israeli soldiers who had since conquered their land would turn them away. I will now use a couple examples from American politics. I support gay marriage and LGBT civil rights 100% but I also believe in religious freedom protections. I don’t believe the government can say, force a church to officiate a gay wedding, a baker to bake a cake for a gay wedding or a DJ to spin their sick beats at a gay wedding if these parties choose not to. The public in turn is free to do a free market boycott (which I would join). I would also use the example of immigration. I firmly believe in reforming the immigration system, giving amnesty and a pathway to citizenship to all undocumented immigrants who don’t have a criminal record, raising the immigration quota, abolish ICE and returning to legacy INS, and starting a temporary guest worker program. But I also believe we need to build a wall on the Southern border, keep the diversity lottery and all the requirements that come with it, increase funding for the border patrol, bring back the Remain in Mexico Policy and Rapid DNA testing for illegal immigrants, and end the use of sanctuary cities. Again, love what you're doing Stephanie! Keep up the incredible work!
You're on a roll with your synthesis perspectives! I love your articulation of the Civil War. Indeed, Faces of Race notes that it was actually the *North* that made blacks 3/5 human -- for votes.
Such an outstanding article, Stephanie! A round of virtual applause for you! 👏👏👏 Faces of X is exactly what this country and the entire western world need right now! I’m so glad you let me know about this series! Most political and social issues are NOT simple or binary. Reality itself is multifaceted and contains many sides. We need to put all the pieces together to see the whole puzzle. Your example of when you we’re working with those activists in the Redwoods and you thought you guys were taking on a greedy corporation but it turned out to be a bunch of ordinary, working class people including migrants from Latin America working as loggers to make a living and put food on the table was a perfect illustration of this truth! I’ve encountered this many times both in my studies as an up and coming historian and looking into the big political issues of our times especially the Israel-Palestine Conflict. It is definitely essential we build a more all encompassing world view because reality is complex. I will give a couple examples of each. I’ll start with the American Civil War. The Civil War is one of the most important events in our history that shaped us a nation for generations to come. But it is very poorly understood by your average person. This is because it’s seen in one of two ways. Either it was the good and noble South just fighting for their states’ rights against the evil and tyrannical federal government in the North or it was the good and noble North just fighting the evil South who committed treason to hold human beings as property. The truth is that the American Civil War was fought over both of those issues and many others. While the Confederacy was (typically for its time) a slaveholding society where black people were second-class citizens, there we’re 3,000-6,000 black Confederate soldiers and sailors. It should also be known that thousands of black and mixed-race Southerners volunteered their services to the South when the war broke out and supported secession as they saw the South as their home just like their white counterparts. By the same token, while the abolitionist movement was going strong in the North, Northerners generally agreed slavery was wrong and black people who lived in the North were free and did not have to deal with slavery, the North was by no means a racial utopia. In fact it was just as racist as the South. Ever heard of the 1863 New York City Draft Riots? This was when angry mobs of mostly Irish immigrants reeked havoc on the Big Apple for several days. Guess what it was partly caused by? Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation. The Irish did not want to have to compete against free blacks for jobs. Their was horrific violence against black Americans during the riots including a black orphanage being burned to the ground, a black man being hung and set on fire and random black pedestrians being beaten to death by angry feral mobs. Not to mention, you know where the first Jim Crow laws were implemented? In the North! Frederick Douglass, William Lloyd Garrison and their fellow activists fought against streetcar segregation not in Alabama, Mississippi or Kentucky but in Massachusetts in places like Portsmouth, Salem and Boston. The other historical example I would use would be the Israeli War of Independence in 1948. While it is certainly true the Jewish state was in a fight for its survival and that the surrounding Arab countries and most of the local Arabs had intended to strangle the newborn state in its cradle and horrific war crimes were committed against the Jews by the Arabs, that’s only one side of the story. There were also war crimes committed by Jews against the Arabs this would include looting, rape and mass executions (such as the massacres committed at Deir Yassin and Lydda). Nor did the Israelis always engage in good faith negotiations with the Arabs. I would also note that there were many cases of Palestinians who had fled trying to return to their homes and property and the Israeli soldiers who had since conquered their land would turn them away. I will now use a couple examples from American politics. I support gay marriage and LGBT civil rights 100% but I also believe in religious freedom protections. I don’t believe the government can say, force a church to officiate a gay wedding, a baker to bake a cake for a gay wedding or a DJ to spin their sick beats at a gay wedding if these parties choose not to. The public in turn is free to do a free market boycott (which I would join). I would also use the example of immigration. I firmly believe in reforming the immigration system, giving amnesty and a pathway to citizenship to all undocumented immigrants who don’t have a criminal record, raising the immigration quota, abolish ICE and returning to legacy INS, and starting a temporary guest worker program. But I also believe we need to build a wall on the Southern border, keep the diversity lottery and all the requirements that come with it, increase funding for the border patrol, bring back the Remain in Mexico Policy and Rapid DNA testing for illegal immigrants, and end the use of sanctuary cities. Again, love what you're doing Stephanie! Keep up the incredible work!
AMEN, Noah!!!!
You're on a roll with your synthesis perspectives! I love your articulation of the Civil War. Indeed, Faces of Race notes that it was actually the *North* that made blacks 3/5 human -- for votes.
Thank you!
💜💜💜💜