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Burning of Black Churches Cannot Be Separated from Racist Government Policies

Mt. Pleasant Baptist Church on April 4, 2019. Opelousas, LA
By Malcolm Suber and Gavrielle Gemma

The terrible burning of three historic Black Churches in St. Landry Parish was intended to inflict racist terror and trauma throughout the state. This follows the lead of the Trump administration who has welcomed the inclusion of white supremacists in the government and whose sympathies for white supremacist organizations have unleashed a torrent of racist, anti-Semitic and anti-immigrant attacks across the country.

The 1963 bombing of the 16th Street Baptist Church in Birmingham, AL killed four girls: Addie Mae Collins, Cynthia Wesley, Carole Robertson, and Carol Denise McNair.

This white supremacist attack fits the historic pattern of attacking Black churches as a way of intimidating and politically controlling Black communities. The Black church represents one of the only social institutions owned and controlled by Black people. The Black church has served not only as a house of worship but as a community meeting space where Black people can discuss and debate their response to their oppressed condition. Many churches have been active in the Black liberation struggle and have produced good leaders in the Black freedom struggle. The white supremacists unleashed by the rich white ruling class are bent on preventing the Black community from organizing to advance the social and political position of Black workers.

Once again, politicians have responded to the church burnings by offering prayers for the terrorist, by trying to cover up the racist purpose of the attack with phony psychiatry and by trying to paint it as an isolated event. Finally, they admitted what the whole world already knew: that this is a hate crime. They have yet to call it terrorism.

All these crocodile tears distract from the real story, which is the ongoing link between white supremacy, the police, the military, corporations and politicians. Although the ruling class mainly fosters racism through “legal” means of mass incarceration and economic and housing segregation, they’ve always relied on the existence of “extra-legal” white supremacist groups to foment division among the multi-national working class and to guard their own fortunes.

DEFENDING CONFEDERATE MONUMENTS, POLITICIANS AID KKK TERRORISTS

These politicians praise monuments to the confederacy and slavery and resist efforts to take them down. Why? Because they—hand in hand with the super-rich—want to maintain the current state of institutional racism that divides the working class of Louisiana. They turn a blind eye to the eight highly armed white supremacist groups functioning in the state. Many of these groups have members and friends in the police as well as links to the U.S. military.

After the civil war, the KKK and its allies, such as the White League, were used to terrorize Black people. Their aim was to prevent Black freedmen from voting and adopting socially progressive policies. During Reconstruction, the Louisiana legislature was majority black and had a Black Governor. The northern bankers and industrialists wanted more than anything to reach a new unity with former slaveholders. Lynchings and church burnings were rampant and voting rights were taken away from the Black population. The new white politicians were secretly or openly in the KKK. Several members of the U.S. Supreme Court were in the KKK. In just one century, 64 Black churches were burned.

Today nearly all white politicians in Baton Rouge are members of the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) an organization which pays legislators to promote racist ALEC-drafted laws. On behalf of the oil companies and war profiteers, ALEC has been working to disenfranchise Black voters all across the country.

These politicians may distance themselves from openly white supremacist groups, but they share a common ideology. And across the country, they’ve allowed Klan-type groups to proliferate.

WHITE SUPREMACY IS PART OF CAPITALISM

The capitalists—who are few—can only maintain their undemocratic accumulation of huge wealth by dividing the workers, who are many. When the working class is divided, all sectors suffer from lowered wages and benefits, greater poverty, and fewer social programs. This is true for white workers although Black workers suffer much more. This is the legacy of racism and national oppression in the south, where workers are the poorest, the minimum wage lowest, and every indicator from infant mortality to educational quality is at the bottom.

Because the masses are currently quiet—despite ever worsening conditions—the bosses and politicians are moving ahead with even harsher assaults on the social and economic life of workers. They’re ramping up racism, scapegoating immigrants, vilifying other countries—all to distract from their thievery and their war profiteering.

The capitalist rulers’ insatiable drive to amass more wealth is the basis for the renewed growth of white supremacist and other racist groups. The more that wealth is concentrated in their hands, the more the capitalist system is endangered from below. That’s why they lean on extra-legal repression to maintain control.

This is true not only in the U.S. One has only to look to the outright fascist governments with whom the U.S. government is allied, including Ukraine, Poland, Brazil, the Philippines, Israel and others.

COPS & KLAN WORK HAND IN HAND

Charles Sims of the Deacons for Defense and Justice in Bogalusa stands defiantly on courthouse steps, displaying Klan hoods.

It is for this reason that one cannot rely on the capitalist state to stop racist terrorism. To combat white supremacist terrorism, workers and oppressed people must organize their own self-defense. When various Nazi and white supremacist groups announced they were coming to New Orleans to defend confederate monuments, the government headed by liberal democrat Mitch Landrieu allowed them total freedom—even to brandish arms in so-called “safe zones.” Take Em Down NOLA confronted the NOPD, asking why they weren’t enforcing the legal restrictions. The answer from former Police Chief Harrison was, “we don’t have the police able to do it.”

WORKERS & OPPRESSED PEOPLE MUST ORGANIZE THEIR SELF DEFENSE

Robert and Mabel Williams

It was the emergence of armed Black groups in the south that pushed the KKK back, including here in Louisiana. In 1964 the KKK burned down five churches in Jonesboro and carried out horrific assaults. This led to the formation of the Deacons for Defense and Justice which soon had 20 chapters in Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama. Many were workers with combat experience.

Even Dr. King employed armed body guards and had guns in his house during the 1955 Montgomery bus boycott. Fannie Lou Hamer of the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party armed herself.

In North Carolina, Robert Williams led the arming of the NAACP chapter in Monroe to combat Klan terror. While the KKK and others were never—not even to this day—labeled domestic terrorists, the FBI and local police targeted Black civil rights and armed self-defense groups, labeling them terrorists for protesting their oppression and for defending their community.

We need to continue mass organizing and we need to increase our efforts to defend our communities, individuals, churches and unions from the instruments of capitalist terror.

Take Em Down NOLA demands the removal of a monument to E.D. White, U.S. Supreme Court Justice and member of the white supremacist terror organization, the White League.
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Free All People Jailed for Marijuana!

End the Bail System!

By Tina Orlandini

Our families and communities need an immediate release of all those incarcerated for marijuana related offenses and an end to money bail as part of the broader movement toward prison abolition in this country.

Hundreds of thousands have been arrested and imprisoned for minor marijuana related offenses. In 2017, approximately 659,700 people were arrested in the United States for marijuana law violations and of that number, about 91 percent were charged with possession only. Unsurprisingly and in keeping with the discriminatory practices of the police through campaigns and policies like the War on Drugs, Stop and Frisk and Broken Windows theory, about 47 percent of the above-mentioned arrests were of Black or Latinx people (drugpolicy.org), and the rest were poor whites. The rich are not arrested.

Louisiana has its own fraught history with strict marijuana laws, criminalizing the use and possession of the drug in nearly every occurrence with the exception of medical marijuana, which was legalized in 2017. While 11 states in the U.S. have legalized recreational use of marijuana, Louisiana continues to lock up its people for the same activity. As Louisiana’s marijuana laws currently stand, penalties include up to 15 days in parish jail and/or up to $300 in fines for possession of up to 14g; up to 6 months in jail and/or $500 in fines for over 14g; and the time and fines go up from there to double-digit-year prison sentences and hundreds of thousands of dollars in fines (findlaw.com).

Here in New Orleans, in 2016 the city passed ordinance 31,148, decriminalizing marijuana possession and allowing for ticketing rather than arrests, but police can still make arrests for possession under state law (Marijuana Policy Project). On top of all this, New Orleans’ antebellum money bail system keeps the accused in jail without the ability to “buy their freedom” even before a trial. This system with clear roots in slavery is now employed as modern-day institutionalized bondage for people of color, poor whites, immigrant and queer folks.

The history of these laws clearly shows the intent was to push mass incarceration and slave labor in prison. In 1971, President Nixon held a press conference announcing the War on Drugs and declaring drug abuse “public enemy number one.” Painted as a “law and order” stance on the proliferation of drug activity in the United States, the media frenzy that followed—as well as related policies and carceral tactics—at their core were simply strategies to neutralize and destroy radical movements burgeoning at the time, in particular those lead by Black revolutionaries. These policies and the War on Drugs were expanded by Ronald Reagan in 1982, and again, validated and proliferated by mainstream media which elevated racist stereotypes in poor Black communities.

Bill Clinton carried the torch with the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act of 1994, most famous for its implementation of habitual offender laws or three-strikes laws which require a person found guilty of a violent felony and two other offenses (such as drug possession) to serve a mandatory life prison sentence. This law led to bottlenecked courts, the overcrowding of prisons and our current state of mass incarceration and the prison industrial complex. Many of these policies were inherited and maintained by the Obama Administration and the current, outwardly racist administration bares no signs of reform, so here we are today, in the most incarcerated country in the world and the second most incarcerated state, with a large percentage of arrests due to minor offenses like marijuana possession.

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“From Confederate Park to Jackson Square, Fight White Supremacy Everywhere!”

Jacksonville, Florida, March 23.

By Tina Orlandini

This past weekend, March 22–24, a delegation of Take ‘Em Down NOLA comrades traveled to Jacksonville, Florida for the second annual Take ‘Em Down Everywhere international conference. This global grassroots movement is “a black-led, multiracial, international, intergenerational, inclusive coalition of organizers committed to the removal of ALL symbols of white supremacy from the public landscape as a part of the greater push for racial and economic justice and structural equity” (TakeEmDownEverywhere.org). Take ‘Em Down Everywhere was inaugurated last year in New Orleans, bringing together organizers from Louisiana, Mississippi, Florida, South Carolina, North Carolina, and Trinidad & Tobago.

This year in Jacksonville, described by locals as “the city that time forgot,” organizers and allies spent the weekend sharing local history, exchanging organizing strategies, and hitting the streets. On Saturday, March 23, local historian Rodney Hurst led a bus tour of Jacksonville, visiting the birth place of James Weldon Johnson, author of “Lift Every Voice and Sing” (also referred to as the Black National Anthem); Hemming Plaza where the monument of the Confederate soldier stands (for now), along with a historical marker commemorating Youth Council sit-in’s at W.T. Grant Department Store and Woolworth’s Five and Ten Cent Store in 1960. Though this was not the beginning of the Civil Rights movement in Jacksonville, it signaled a turning point in local consciousness and was succeeded by further agitation that forced the integration of lunch counters, schools, parks, restrooms and other public facilities within the decade.

Later that day, Take ‘Em Down Jax, the Northside Coalition, and the Jacksonville Progressive Coalition organized a rally, beginning with a press conference at Confederate Park in front of the Women of the Confederacy monument, where they proposed an economic boycott of Jacksonville. Ben Frazier of Take ‘Em Down Jax and the Northside Coalition said to a cheering crowd, “it’s time for us to start telling people not to come to Jacksonville, Florida. Don’t come to Jacksonville because Jacksonville is a racist city which refuses to deal with these Confederate monuments.”  The crowd of about 140 marched in Take ‘Em Down NOLA style formation to the International Brotherhood of Electoral Workers (IBEW) Union Hall for a panel discussion featuring Take ‘Em Down NOLA’s very own co-founder, Michael “Quess” Moore. Other panelists included Reverend Ron Rawls, Pastor of St. Augustine Church in Saint Augustine, a city 40 miles south of Jacksonville described by Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. in 1964 as the most racist city in the United States. Maya Little of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill’s “Move Silent Sam” movement skyped into the panel and shared her account of the recent removal of the Silent Sam Confederate Soldier monument, current attempts to bring it back to campus, and ongoing intimidation she’s experiencing from local white supremacists and the police.

Following the panel, Take ‘Em Down organizers broke bread and continued to build at the Yellow House Art Gallery, described by director and Take ‘Em Down Jax member Hope McMath as a space where art and activism meet to create change.

On the final day of the conference, organizers from New Orleans and Jacksonville discussed specific successes and strategies to move forward the work of dismantling white supremacy, rooted in the South with eyes on the more than 1,500 white supremacist symbols littering the United States, and even more internationally. By the end of the conference, Take ‘Em Down Everywhere announced that next year’s convening will take place in Montgomery, Alabama.

The Take ‘Em Down NOLA delegation left Jacksonville with gratitude for Take ‘Em Down Jax and energized by this growing movement of working class organizers, teachers, historians, artists, faith based leaders and elders unified in the revolutionary struggle to end white supremacy everywhere.

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New Zealanders March Against Attacks on Muslims

Hundreds of Thousands Show Solidarity

By Joseph Rosen

On March 15, a white supremacist Trump supporter carried out a brutal massacre of 50 Muslims in Christchurch, New Zealand.  These fascists think their actions will get popular support, but tens of thousands of New Zealanders, white and not, Muslim and non-Muslim prove them wrong. Along with thousands more across the world, they poured into the streets to show solidarity with Muslims.  Like the recent Pittsburgh synagogue massacre and the deadly 2015 attack on the Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Charleston, this was an assault on families gathered in worship.  In Christchurch, the terrorist also specifically targeted immigrants. Among the dead and injured were families who had fled to New Zealand seeking refuge from the devastation of the Western imperialist wars on Palestine, Syria, Somalia, Pakistan, Iraq, and Afghanistan.

The mass murderer cited Trump as “a symbol of renewed white identity and common purpose.” The Trump administration’s racist and anti-immigrant program has included a “Muslim ban” on travel and an expansion in concentration camps for undocumented men, women, and children whom Trump regularly dehumanizes as “criminal.” In the wake of the attack, Trump has downplayed the threat of white nationalism. In contrast, the New Zealand prime minister Jacinda Hearn stated that “as a nation, [we need] to confront racism, violence and extremism.” While this statement is a welcome rebuke of Trump, her hypocrisy needs to be challenged. Like Democrats in the U.S. who condemn Trump’s racist rhetoric but happily support and fund genocidal wars against Arab countries, Hearn’s own party is in a governing coalition with the right-wing “New Zealand First” party whose leaders echo the anti-Muslim and anti-immigrant tirades of Trump and who, together with the Hearn’s Labour Party, support the U.S.-led wars and military occupations in the Muslim-majority countries of Syria, Iraq, and Afghanistan.

Horrific as these individual fascists’ attacks are, U.S. wars for oil and profit on the Muslim-majority countries of the Middle East have cost the lives of millions more. The most obvious difference between the terrorist attack in New Zealand and George W. Bush’s self-described “crusade” against the people of Iraq and Afghanistan is that Bush is responsible for the death and displacement of millions of people. Another difference is that Bush’s wars garnered profits for his capitalist friends. Dick Cheney’s former company Halliburton alone gained $17.2 billion in Iraq war-related revenue from 2003-2006. But rather than admit that these wars are fought for private profit, the capitalist-owned media promote the white supremacist idea that the “civilized” West is at war with its “uncivilized” other.

The capitalists can only carry out their wars for profit if they succeed in dividing the working class against itself. Their media outlets gave the New Zealand fascist the publicity that he sought. To win over a section of the workers to support, promote, fight and die in their wars, they will resort to the most hideous racism and lies. In countries such as the U.S., Australia, New Zealand, and Israel– all founded on the right of white settlers to the “spoils” of their government’s colonial plunder– white workers have been repeatedly duped by the racist myths and lies of their bosses. Yet their adherence to this hateful ideology hasn’t done anything to reverse the general decline in their living standards which continue to worsen under capitalism.

Workers cannot play into the hand of these would-be Nazis. We must organize ourselves through international solidarity and solidarity at home. This means opposing imperialist wars for profit and rejecting white supremacy.

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Take Em Down NOLA Confronts Zulu Club’s Use of Blackface

By Take Em Down NOLA

Take Em Down NOLA (TEDN) exists for the purpose of removing ALL symbols to white supremacy from the landscape of New Orleans, as a very necessary part of the struggle toward racial and economic justice. This has been our consistent stance since we began this leg of the long historical journey to remove symbols that honor, celebrate, and perpetuate white supremacy. These symbols support a white economic power structure—a SYSTEM—designed to exploit and oppress Black working class people.

TEDN has continued this work by taking a clear stance against blackface. On Thursday, February 21, during a press conference outside ZULU headquarters, we issued an appeal to their members to end this practice, which originates in the degrading caricature of Black people.

ZULU has completely lied about its Blackface tradition claiming that there is a difference between black face and black makeup. This explanation is a disrespectful dismissal of the actual history and an exploitation of those who don’t know it. ZULU also pretends that their wearing of blackface, grass skirts and tightly curled fro wigs pays tribute to the proud ZULU nation in South Africa. Actual South Africans and other people from Africa have called the practice offensive and confusing.

The sad truth is that ZULU’s use of blackface has its origins in the minstrel tradition, which was created to mock, degrade and stereotype Black people as lazy, oversexed and of low intelligence. No pride can be generated from such a white supremacist beginning.

Many have expressed confusion about our agenda or tactics since our confrontation of ZULU. Below we address some of those questions and concerns:

“TEDN is mostly comprised of transplants.”

This is false. Half of our leadership are natives to New Orleans. Two who were born elsewhere, have lived here for a collective 50 plus years, one of whom has direct family ties that go back 8 generations. Even if we were transplants, that shouldn’t matter. The legendary Civil Rights Activist Rev. Avery Alexander wasn’t born in Orleans, yet it didn’t stop him from fighting on behalf of his people. Nor did it stop the people from benefiting from his fight; holding both white and Black people accountable. Charles Deslondes was a Haitian transplant after the Haitian Revolution, and he helped lead the 1811 Enslaved People’s Revolt in New Orleans. If Black working class people around the world are to ever achieve collective liberation, we must learn to think, act and build with one another beyond the mental and physical limitations of colonial borders and parish lines. We must be as united as the white supremacist force that oppresses us.

“The issue is petty. Why does it even matter?”

Symbols reflect systems. They are a way of telling us what our roles are supposed to be in daily life in New Orleans. White supremacist monuments hover over us to tell us who’s still in charge. Blackface tells us that we are still minstrel servants of the rich white ruling class, as we entertain them joyfully. If the symbols didn’t matter, why would the rich white ruling class spend millions to build and maintain them in the first place? Why would they fight so hard to keep them up?

Think: what your oppressor proactively supports is 9 times out of 10 not good for you.

“TEDN doesn’t tend to anything but statues and symbols.”

False. TEDN is mostly comprised of black educators who have taught black students for a collective 4 to 5 decades in New Orleans. TEDN organizers actively work in support of abundant issues. TEDN organizers fight for hospitality workers’ rights, jobs for youth, education equity, protection against police terror, and the long-overdue fully-funded relocation of the Residents of Gordon Plaza off toxic soil. TEDN fights against environment racism, militarism, and the dysfunction of the Sewerage and Water Board, supporting the moratorium on water shut offs, and much more.

“Why didn’t TEDN go after Rex?”

We did. Our 2016 campaign “Racism at Mardi Gras” was a direct shot at ALL the racist symbolism reflected at Mardi Gras every year, from Rex’s KKK-like regalia to Zulu’s blackface. Also, when we took on the monuments, we were confronting the real life version of Rex. The people that put those monuments up generations ago are the ancestors of the rich white ruling class that masks as Rex every year and controls our city’s economy to this day. And it is that same class that fought so viciously to keep the monuments up.

“Why take to the streets like that?”

We wrote a letter to Zulu requesting a meeting. When no response came, we called the leadership. All was ignored, as these types of requests are by the petty bourgeois class. So we were forced to take to the streets as we always do when those in power ignore us. The history of organizing shows that only direct action will bring direct social change. Now that the global and national consciousness has risen to contend with the issue of blackface—as they should—the city of New Orleans can finally confront our own symbolic and systemic value of Black lives.

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New Orleans Disgrace: A Statue Glorifying Andrew Jackson, Slave Holder, Murderer of Native Americans

Ten Reasons to Remove the Jackson Statue

1. Using his position as a colonel in the Tennessee militia, by force Jackson seized land from poor farmers to benefit slave holding plantation owners. He personally acquired over 640 acres and set up the Hermitage Plantation, owning over 300 slaves.

2. With his partner Overton they acquired land reserved for Cherokee and Chickasaw, in violation of law, to found Memphis, Tennessee.

3. Jackson whipped slaves and sent troops out to capture runaway slaves.

4. To acquire more land for slave owners he embarked on stealing land from Native American tribes across the Southeast.

5. As President he enacted the Indian Removal Act of 1830. Although the Supreme Court ruled against this policy, Jackson defied the court and ordered removal.

6. Jackson represented the slave state who voted to enact the removal policy. The southern state governments destroyed tribal governments, banned assemblies, the right to sue or testify in court, or dig gold on their own land.

7. 17,000 Cherokees were forced from their farms.

8. This came to be known as the Trail of Tears. 8,000 Cherokee and Chickasaw, 4,000 Choctaws died from brutality, hunger, exposure and disease and in prison camps.

9. While in the military Jackson invaded Florida in 1818. He carried out wars against the Seminole, Creek and Muscogee Indians. This was to acquire Florida for slave owners and to prevent runaway slaves from joining the Seminoles. Jackson burned the homes and crops of the Seminole and others.

10. Jackson was opposed to treaties calling them “an absurdity” and said “the government should simply impose its will on them.” TAKE DOWN ANDREW JACKSON PUT UP HARRIET TUBMAN & LEONARD PELTIER Take Em Down Nola, info@takemdownnola.org,

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Take ‘Em Down Takes the Streets

By Antranette Scott

On the 4th Thursday of every month Take Em Down Nola, takes to the street to continue the struggle to bring down ALL monuments and symbols of white supremacy from the landscape of New Orleans. In this current phase of the work, TEDN is focusing on 5 monuments in and around the French Quarter.

On August 23, the protest began with a rally at Lafayette Square where there are two especially egregious shrines to racism, Henry Clay and John McDonough. The community gathered and were educated by speeches from organizers. Lea Thompson from Mississippi Rising gave a passionate talk about the work that is happening in Ocean Springs, Mississippi against the racist flag of the state of Mississippi. Lea spoke on the commitment of the organizers, particularly the youth of the city to making sure the flag, embedded with the Confederate emblem, is not risen in public space.

The crowd then got into formation, and took to the streets. Chants of “White Supremacy Got To Go!” rang through the French Quarter. Protesters were joined by passersby, and raised fists of solidarity came from many hospitality workers in various shops and restaurants. The next stop was in front of the Louisiana Supreme Court building where stands a monument to E.D. White, known member of the white supremacist Crescent City White League and Supreme Court justice of the racist “Separate but Equal” Plessy v. Ferguson verdict that sanctioned segregation and ushered in Jim Crow area violence for decades to come. Spoken word artist, Chuck Perkins gave a moving piece following an informative speech. Next up was Jackson Square where those dedicated to the end of white supremacy gathered to listen to Sonny Patterson speak truth to power at sunset after an indigenous activist spoke on the multitude of atrocities that slave owner and architect of the Trail of Tears Andrew Jackson committed against the Indigenous Peoples of this land.

The final stop was on Decatur St where a statue glorifies colonization and mass death at the hands of Jean Baptists Le Moyne de Bienville. After a closing affirmation, protesters marched down Canal St loudly and proudly declaring that the fight against white supremacy is not over. The citizens of New Orleans will not be satisfied with a job partially done. Next month join Take Em Down NOLA in demanding that Mayor Cantrell FINISH THE JOB!!! REMOVE ALL MONUMENTS TO WHITE SUPREMACY FROM THE LANDSCAPE OF NEW ORLEANS!!!!

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“No Union for Fascists” – Sioux Falls AFL-CIO Bans Fascists

The working class movement and fascism have always been opposed to one another. Even though fascists make appeals to sections of the working class – particularly white workers – this is never more than empty rhetoric; for all of Donald Trump’s talk about blue collar workers and reviving coal country, we can see that his administration has done everything they can to undermine workers’ rights, to the benefit of the bosses. Fascism and white supremacy are props that hold up the power of the capitalist class. Fascist power hurts workers, but workers’ power is the weapon that smashes fascism and white supremacy!

The AFL-CIO in Sioux Falls, South Dakota, has reaffirmed this truth. This union local recently amended their constitution, officially banning all fascists and white supremacists from the organization. This move was meant to coincide with the one-year anniversary of the death of Heather Heyer, a union member murdered by a fascist organizer at the Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville.

In a message on their website, Sioux Falls AFL-CIO president, Kooper Caraway, stated: “It is our duty to let our fellow workers know that Fascism, White Supremacy, and its organizations have only ever existed to divide us as workers and do the dirty work of the Boss Class. The White Nationalists have always been bought and paid for by those in power, they exist not to fight for any ideal, but to destroy the progress made by us as working class people. That is why the Sioux Falls AFLCIO voted to Ban all Fascists and White Supremacists from our organization.”

In the statement, Caraway cited the long history of struggle between labor unions and the Klan. In the Jim Crow era, hundreds of union organizers were murdered by the Klan. On the other hand – together with civil rights and black liberation organizations – unions have historically helped to keep the power of the Klan and other vile reactionaries in check

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Rock ‘N Bowl Hosts White Supremacists

Rock ‘N Bowl, a bowling alley on Carrollton Avenue, will be hosting a fundraiser for the Monumental Task Committee and the Beauregard Monument Association this January. These two organizations have for years been at the forefront of defending the city’s white supremacist monuments. They openly glorify figures like P. G. T. Beauregard or Robert E. Lee, who fought to defend the South’s brutal plantation slavery regime. The Monumental Task Committee openly brags on its website that it’s polished the Henry Clay and Jefferson Davis monuments. It can’t be easy for them to defend against the accusation of being white supremacists while they’re so busy licking slave-owners’ boots.

Rock ‘N Bowl is donating its parking, lunch, bowling, and bar funds to these organizations. This isn’t the first time either—Rock ‘N Bowl organized a fundraiser in March of last year for the same cause. The mask is off, this mom and pop shop is complicit in these organizations’ white supremacy.