Speaking to Trump supporters....

Speaking to Trump supporters, or anyone trying to find blame for what is happening in this country when the fault has already been found:

A couple of things you should be aware of, but it’s okay if you didn’t know this stuff already.  I’m sure you know a lot of crap that I don’t know, so nobody’s trying to condescend or make fun of you.  

The reason that statues of Confederate generals and monuments to fallen soldiers have no place on American soil, in the South or anywhere, is not because of some liberal snowflakes or black people trying to make you feel guilty.  

They are monuments to people that fought against your country.  They are monuments to ideals that we do not share, at least no one in their right mind would want to share.  People have this romantic notion that the Civil War was fought by American citizens against American citizens. .  That’s not correct. Not even close.  The Confederacy was made up of southern states that seceded from the Union. They chose not to be a part of the United States any longer, giving up any rights they held as Americans.  The United States Government rejected those claims of  secession, and so the war began.

The Confederacy was an enemy of the United States, your country, that you so proudly proclaim yourself a patriot.  You denounce people for taking any kind of stand that you deem unpatriotic, yet you argue to keep a flag and statues dedicated to an enemy of the very principles you claim to uphold.  To stick up for the Confederate flag or it’s heroes is the same as sticking up for a statue of Hitler or Hirohito.  These people were the enemy, and we vanquished them and made our country a place where people couldn’t be owned as property any longer. What point are you trying to prove when you stick up for these people and monuments?  

There is a lame attempt to justify it by claiming it is history.  Statues and monuments are not history, they are things, dedicated to the memory of some person or aspect of history, often incorrectly.  History is history.  No amount or absence of bronze makes one bit of difference.  The history is what it is.  When a statue of one of these hateful racist enemies of the state comes down, do the history books vanish?  Do artifacts rust away overnight, leaving a population of amnesiacs in their wake? No, they don’t, so statues of cruel and greedy men do not have a bearing on history.

There is no reason to keep a tribute to our vanquished foes around at all.  Imagine you are an African American, and your ancestors were slaves.  Imagine that even after the war, they were lynched, murdered, denied basic rights, and treated worse than second class citizens.  It wasn’t until 1964, the year I was born, that the Civil Rights Act was passed and ended segregation and discrimination( on paper, anyway) in American society.  

Now imagine as an African American that you have to live in a country where a lot of people think it is just fine to keep likenesses celebrating the men that fought to keep your people in bondage.  Everyday they have to see statues and a flag that tells them that they are unwanted, unless it is as property. Every time they see people fighting to keep the symbols of their oppression, it tells them that a large segment of the population believes that the Confederacy was correct in fighting for the right to own them, that a large part of the population hates them.  If you have even a tiny bit of empathy or decency you would understand that and stop arguing for these monuments and flags.  Nothing you can point to could possibly trump the reasons that African Americans have for their removal.

Now, on to the ridiculous notion that the left is somehow just as responsible for the violence this weekend, and racism in general. I don’t even know where to begin here.  Liberals do not glorify Nazis or the Confederacy.  Liberals did not go to Charlottesville to incite riots and deliver hate speech.  Liberals did not run over peaceful protesters with a car, and then gloat about it on social media.  

The white supremacists, the bigots and racists, the fucking Nazis, want to try to shift blame for their actions because they are cowards, and they are looking to form scapegoats where there are none to deflect the consequences of their actions. They have come up with some non-existent bogeyman, calling them the alt left or perverting Antifa, just to have some distraction.  Antifa is all about fighting fascism, something that you, as an American should be all for.   

Yet, for no apparent reason, want to go along with the propaganda put out there by the white supremacists, bigots and racists, and again, fucking Nazis. Why?  Why would you for a second want to align yourselves with these people?  What are you trying to prove by giving credence to the words of hate mongers?

Then again, you are upset when people assume that you’re racist.  You are who you associate with, and you are repeating the mantra of the same people that wore Nazi symbols and committed acts of terrorism in the name of white superiority.  Why in God’s name would you want to be in that club?

The president you support echoed these same sentiments.  And before you claim that it’s the liberal media making him look bad, keep in mind that the leaders of the white supremacy movement thanked him for not blaming them or denouncing them.  Surely they are not part of the liberal conspiracy?  Then on Monday, President Trump did denounce them, as much as it seemed he did not want to. At least he did the right thing.  Maybe he saw the light?

But no, a day later he went off the script again and showed his true feelings, again blaming the victim as much as the offenders, and again the white supremacists cheered as he followed their script.

So based on his actions, the man you support is a racist, a liar and a coward that will say anything to try to wriggle off the hook when others tell him to say it.  He has no conviction.  Again, you are judged by the company you keep, so if you support him it is only fair that people think you have no convictions, you stand for nothing, save racism and hate.

I have to believe that people are better than this.  I have to believe that perhaps dissatisfaction or fear or the feeling of helplessness led you to make a choice that seemed good at the time.  That is understandable.  Most election campaigns are based on it.  Your character now depends on if you have the bravery and the class to admit that it isn’t working, and try to fix it.  It isn’t easy to admit you were fooled, but there is no shame in it.  The only shame is to keep denying it and making things worse simply because of your ego and insecurities.