From our calling out of their erasure of Native Americans to their hatred of Nikole Hannah-Jones’ 1619 Project, they are big mad.
It is no secret that the Republican Party has been on a quest to amplify America’s culture wars. From Mr./Mrs./The Potato Head to Dr. Seuss, Republicans have made it clear that they are not interested in or willing to adapt to our shifting society. While toy makers and literary giants are recognizing that the times are changing and that in order to stay relevant, they must adapt — Republicans on the other hand are taking the opposite approach — denial. The problem with Republican denial however is that it is not contained to their own malaise no, instead it is legislated.
While various industries and outfits recognize that the world around us is changing rapidly which was becoming increasingly obvious before the global health pandemic that rocked our sense of calm and what was considered “normal”. Republicans’ refusal to face this reality has placed us in jeopardy — not just in their denial of facts and science that aided in the deaths of nearly 600,000 Americans but also in our basic understanding of how America was founded and for what purpose. Their latest target has been the New York Times’ Pulitzer Prize winning 1619 Project created by the brilliant Nikole Hannah-Jones, who recently lost tenure at University of North Carolina over what we can only assume is her true scholarship on actual American history.
One of the biggest opponents of the 1619 Project has been to the shock of no one the self-professed Grim Reaper of the Senate Mitch McConnell. “There are a lot of exotic notions about what are the most important points in American history. I simply disagree with the notion that The New York Times laid out there that the year 1619 was one of those years,” he said. What’s interesting about this statement is the use of the word “exotic.” This was a word commonly used by colonizers to describe non-White people that they were coming into contact with as they spread disease and terror around the globe. The use of this word to describe a seminal body of work that is written through the eyes of non-White people is revealing. The issue that Republicans are having with the 1619 Project is that it rejects the idea that the only lens to view American history through is that of white men and that the sheer purpose of our history is to uphold and celebrate Whiteness.
Last year at a pre-test Cricket match in the U.K famed Jamaican Cricketer Michael Holding put world history into focus with his comments on race and racism: “History is written by the conqueror, not those that were conquered,”
Holding went on to say this:
Go through history. Thomas Edison invented the light bulb, everybody knows that, but he invented the light bulb with a paper filament that burned out in no time at all. Can you tell me who invented the filament that makes these lights shine? Nobody knows, because he was a Black man, and it was not taught in schools. Lewis Howard Latimer invented the carbon filament to allow lights to continue to shine, yet who knows that?
Everything should be taught. In my school days, I was never taught anything good about Black people and you cannot have a society that is brought up like that where you only teach what is convenient to the teacher. History is written by the conqueror, not those that are conquered. History is written by the people who do the harm, not by the people who are harmed. We need to go back and teach both sides of history.
The truth that Holding offers here is searing. For centuries we have allowed White men to dictate how we understand history and who/what is important. Just this month Rick Santorum was trending on Twitter for blatantly racist and nativist comments he made regarding White American’s decimation of Native Americans. “We birthed a nation from nothing. I mean nothing was here. I mean yes, we Native Americans, but candidly there isn’t much Native American culture in American culture.” Nothing was here? You mean the generations of Native American tribes with traditions, culture, economies, religion were just a blank slate for which White colonizers could build on the backs of? Santorum sadly isn’t alone in his racism. This is the ideology of an entire Party — the 75 million plus Americans that voted for Trump in 2020.
The Republican war on history isn’t just about their misguided understanding about the founding of America but is steeped in their desire to uphold white supremacy. If you tell the truth about the slaughter of Native Americans, the brutal and inhumane treatment of enslaved Africans then you will begin to question the very country you were told to pledge allegiance to and the very systems that have allowed persistent racism and discrimination to exist. Truth matters. History matters. Why? Because it’s hard to create a truly equitable future without firmly understanding your past — but that’s the point, isn’t it?
As the late Nobel Peace Prize winner Toni Morrison once said, “The function, the very serious function of racism is distraction. It keeps you from doing your work. It keeps you explaining, over and over again, your reason for being. Somebody says you have no language, and you spend twenty years proving that you do. Somebody says your head isn’t shaped properly so you have scientists working on the fact that it is. Somebody says you have no art, so you dredge that up. Somebody says you have no kingdoms, so you dredge that up. None of this is necessary. There will always be one more thing.” The 1619 Project is Republicans “one more thing,” but the truth will always find a way and that is what scares them the most.