jewel bush
Last week, Facebook blocked my account for 12 hours because it alleged that a picture I posted violated its terms of use. The image in question was a black-and-white still from the early 20th century of a man hung from a lamp post with a sign affixed to his chest that read: “This Nigger Voted.”
Yes, this is graphic, uncomfortable and hard to view, but given last week’s news — the highest court in the land striking down key parts of the Voting Rights Act of 1965 — the context made sense. It wasn’t gratuitous Rambo-esque or Tarantino bloody and gory for brutality’s sake. I shared this historic image of a lynched black person to spark a discussion and to remind the pop culture community that while folks waste brain cells deciphering the lyrics of Kanye West’s new album or who is Twitter beefing with whom, our rights are being stripped away in brazen swoops.
These photographs were taken as grisly keepsakes to cast fear and send a chilling message to blacks that violence wasn’t a false threat; it was a tree, rope and hate-filled mob away for those who sought to take part in this country’s democratic process. Sometimes these prints were turned into souvenir postcards and retailed for as little as a dime.
After returning from my Facebook timeout, I immediately began a thread on the incident and social media censorship. The responses came pouring in. A friend was blocked for a few days, years ago, for posting a snapshot of her pregnant belly. So according to Facebook, an expectant mother’s figure is offensive, yet it’s perfectly acceptable to post shots of weapons and other tools of violence or even an effigy of the country’s first black president being desecrated.
The Facebook government turns a blind eye to cyberbullying, drug use of the marijuana variety and Girls Gone Wild-groping, but bars political content that can lead to intellectual discourse. During this writing, I paused to peruse my timeline and ran across several questionable postings, but I’m no snitch. I guess Facebook is OK with the triviality that occupies Gen X and the minds of millennials as long as the subject matter isn’t too political or anything other than patriotic red, white and blue.
Between 1882 and 1930, lynch mobs killed 2,805 people in 10 Southern states. Although mobs murdered almost 300 white men and women, 2,500 of the victims were black and 94 percent of them died at the hands of white lynch mobs. Considering these numbers, on average, a black man, woman, or child was murdered nearly once a week, every week, during this timeframe, based on information from Stewart E. Tolnay and E.M. Beck, A Festival of Violence: An Analysis of Southern Lynchings, 1882-1930.
The Voting Rights Acts of 1965, a shining legislative moment for the civil rights era, is signed in the blood of those — both black and white — who were murdered and brutalized for advocating for equal rights. Lynching photos like the one Facebook removed from my page are stark reminders of the routine debasement of black humanity in America. Lynch mobs reinforced the racist social order. These images are a gut punch and have not lost their power over time.
These images aren’t to be merely dismissed or flagged. These pictures show just how ugly American history was – and still is. Racism is offensive and disturbing, and Facebook’s censoring of a dialogue of this nature serves injustice.
jewel bush, a New Orleans native, is a writer whose work has appeared in The (Houma) Courier, The Washington Post, The Times-Picayune, New Orleans Homes & Lifestyles Magazine, and El Tiempo, a bilingual Spanish newspaper. In 2010, she founded MelaNated Writers Collective, a multi-genre group for writers of color in New Orleans dedicated to cultivating the literary, artistic and professional growth of emerging writers. She is currently communications coordinator for Service Employees International Union Local 21LA. Her three favorite books are Their Eyes Were Watching God, The Catcher in the Rye, and Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret.
Love your article…you are so right, it was a perfect time to have that conversation and I believe people should look at a picture of that historic nature as art and as a purpose
Great article, so timely! Hope to read more from you!
Great article Jewel. Well written and insightful. Racism is alive and well, and ignoring this problem will not make it go away.
This is a result of the word “nigger” becoming taboo. This was a societal overreaction as the word does have some legitimate uses. Nothing should be taboo. At the risk of losing all my endorsement contracts, I admit to having used the word in the past. Anyone growing up in New Orleans in the fifties and sixties heard it all the time. I also once answered “Nigger of the Narcissus” in a quiz bowl contest and was awarded points for it. Words need to be considered in context and by whom they are spoken. Even in the old days, use of the word was rejected in educated society, and its use was regarded as evidence of lack of education or class, and that should have been allowed to continue as the norm. Now we have absurd results such as are reported here.
Jewel, while I understand and agree with you on your criticism of Facebook’s censorship policy, I’d like some further explanation about how, “our rights are being stripped away in brazen swoops.” I fail to understand how the Supreme Court’s ruling on components of the Voting Rights Act serve to strip away our rights.
If you’re going to include a stick of dynamite like that in your article, you better be willing to explain it.
uptown_rooster, the “stick of dynamite” Jewel included in her article is a matter of fact. As far as explaining the Voting Rights Act, and your failure to understand it, the onus is not on her, or any black person, to make you understand it. I recommend Google. If you need more help, I can throw you a few more sources. But you should accept your own burden of ignorance of how the VRA decision strips away the rights of people of colo. If you’re going to include a stick of dynamite like that in your comment, you better be willing to do some work to back it up. The essence of what I’m saying is your first lesson. You’re welcome
I’m white and the gutting of the Voting Rights Act was highly offensive to me.
A matter of fact? I believe they call articles such as this by Jewel an ‘Opinion.’ Her sentiment (and apparently yours as well) are opinions. I merely asked that she explain her reasoning behind it. She didn’t support that statement with any explanation. You didn’t either; your entire post consisted of veiled threats and a suggestion to educate myself via a search engine.
So again, I ask… how does the Supreme Court’s ruling on the VRA “brazenly” strip us of our rights? I fail to understand how striking out Section 4(b) of the VRA will deny anyone their rights under the 15th Amendment. These components of the VRA were never intended to be permanent in nature; to call them still relevant is more a result of paranoia and sensationalism than reality.
Is it really so outrageous to ask legal, voting adults to produce identification at the voting booth? We require proof of identification for driving an automobile, flying, traveling overseas, collecting benefits, enlisting in the armed forces, etc. and yet it’s discriminatory to require it for voting?
The Court eliminated Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act which required certain states with a history of blocking minority votes to preclear any changes to their voting requirements. The preclearance was required to insure that any changes did not unfairly prevent particular blocks of communities (e.g., Black, American Indian) from voting. The most current example of that would be requiring a particular form of identification (for example, two forms of photo id) in order to vote. In my grandmother’s days, it was requiring that a literacy test be passed, a poll tax paid, or a person who could previously vote vouch for you, before you could vote. The Court did indicate that congress could re-enact section 5 using current day criteria. But that is unlikely in a House controlled by Republicans. Therefore, if you live in one of those states – most in the south – the laws can now be changed to particular requirements be met before you can vote. I assume that the sole recourse will be that someone denied the right to vote could challenge the requirement in court, after the fact. The requirements will impact all of us – even those like me who do not live in the impacted states – in national elections, like president because significant numbers of people who might vote one way or another in an national election might be prevented from voting. To see the impact of this, look at the Bush Gore election. Bush won Florida by 537 votes where 6 million people had voted. Assuming that Florida had a voter id requirement and 600 of the people who voted for Bush had been prevented from voting due to lack of id, Gore would have won the election, hanging chads or not.
Today I crossed the street with my dog and got yelled at by a black guy who assumed I did it because he was walking towards me. He was right! I was being polite as my pooch was about to drop a 2.