I just am so very very sick of all of it. I'm sick of racism, the xenophobia, the bigotry, the misogyny. Sick of writing about it, sick of reading about it and sick of it happening. I cannot even begin to tell you how much it hurts my heart and soul. Time and time again I have to return to this subject, because if I don't, then the hate will build up within me that mirrors the hate they sow. I refuse to let that happen to me. I refuse to let hate win. I was personally called overly-sensitive when I objected to someone for calling the President a n*gger. I was told the justification for using that word was because it's the same as calling me white. The anger in my heart started to boil. I can no longer tolerate the hate, and the roots from where it comes. It makes me hurt inside. It makes me sad. It really wounds my soul. So here I am trying to heal it by writing about it again.

Yesterday, After getting some serious pressure to clarify his remarks that slavery wasn't "significant" to Virginians, Governor McDonnell changed his proclamation that April was Confederate history Month to include - slavery. From TPM: People are actually saying this declaration is a good thing, not because of the 'tourism' McDonnell said he thought it would promote, but for political reasons. These are the very same issues that begat the first civil war: states' rights and slavery. We all know how that turned out. To be nostalgic over such a painful history - not only for Virginia, but to the entire country - is incredibly disturbing. Yet this is where we are in America today.

Over the past year or so, I have heard statements from politicians and pundits that are akin to the following:

They're lucky we brought them out of Africa.
Why can't the blacks let it go?
It was about state's rights, not slavery.
It doesn't matter anymore because we don't have slaves now.
White men built this country.

I still believe that with every generation, we will see less and less of this behavior and these actions. Until that day comes, the denial of it from those who commit such actions will be even louder and more hate-filled. Like a wounded animal, it is dangerous, but it must not be ignored. In this day and age, we still have people denying that our representatives have been targets of hate and racism. People deny that this exists:



To forget that slavery was a significant part of the Civil War is dangerously ignorant. Revisionist history is never good. We are not post-racial and we won't be for a long time. There is still work to do, as long as there are racial deniers out there. This is part of our history:



Just as this now is:


and this:


But hey-- Governor McDonnell is just appealing to his base and tourists, right? We live in a post-racial society where it's finally okay to celebrate the Confederacy in this nation, right? People should just be over it already, right? No-- it's wrong.

Damn straight I am sensitive to this issue. I pray I never get over it, because then - hate wins.

and
Raine