June 12, 2009. Today we note two anniversaries, both that are indelible marks in our country's civil rights struggle.
1. On this day in 1963, Medger Evers, a champion for civil rights, was assassinated outside his home in Jackson, Mississippi by Byron De La Beckwith, a white supremacist and card carrying member of the KKK. Beckwith was not convicted until 1994. Medger Evers is a hero for our time and a martyr in our struggle for racial justice.
2. On this day in 1967, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled, in Loving v. Virginia, that the state of Virginia's anti-miscegenation law (miscegenation laws banned interracial marriages) was unconstitutional, and thereby ended all race-based marriage restrictions in the country.
Two vastly different events, one tragic, the other celebratory, both linked forever in time by their shared anniversary and role in moving our country closer to racial justice and civil rights for all.
We've come along way in the last half a century, the most obvious symbol of our progress being the election of Barack Obama as president -- a Black man who is biracial (and whose parents' marriage would have been illegal in some states when he was born).
At the same time, these anniversaries give me pause given current events of this day and week:
An 88-year old white supremacist man who openly harbored hatred for Jewish people (and also believed Obama caused the Holocaust), opens fire at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum, killing a guard, Stephen Tyrone Johns, who was African American and father of an 11 year old son).
And then there is the daily racism, like this: A friend twitters today that he's on a plane and notices, once again, the flight attendant greets the people in front of and behind him (who I presume were white), but ignores him -- a dreadlocked, dark skinned black man.
And what about the reverse-racist nonsense regarding Sonia Sotomayor, President Obama's nominee to the Supreme Court? It is such raw evidence of the ignorance of white people about our own privileged world view. (Watch for a post dedicated entirely to white privilege. In the mean time, check out this post on Cinna.mn: Facing Race Ambassador Awards with Peggy McIntosh.)
So now let's add DOMA and the Obama Adminstration's defense of it to this stew. For a nice round up of this news and response to it, head over to the ever sharp Pam's House Blend.
While I don't agree with those who feel Obama needs to put gay marriage at the top of his agenda, I am disappointed that his administration is defending DOMA, which is a hateful piece of legislation. Repealing it is as necessary as was the repeal of miscegenation laws 50 years ago. Dismantling DOMA is Loving v Virginia for the 21st century.
It all comes to this -- those who believe that Obama's post racial America means that racism, hatred, and oppression are over are terribly naive (and likely white). The struggle for racial justice continues, as do acts of racism, each and every day. Racial disparities are greater than ever.
But make no mistake, the fight for marriage equality is on. It is part of -- not separate from -- our fight for civil rights.
The blogger Dana Rudolph notes in a post that in 2007, Mildred Loving said, "I believe all Americans, no matter their race, no matter their sex, no matter their sexual orientation, should have that same freedom to marry." (Read a great account of the story of Mildred and Richard Loving here: Never Mind the Race Haters, Remember Loving Day, by John Ridley. His post also helps explain how this rambling post ties together)
Perhaps some day in the not-too-distant-future we will have a new anniversary to observe -- the day the Supreme Court (because that is where it will land) will overturn some state's law prohibiting gay marriage (or DOMA itself) and the U.S. will be one step closer to equal rights under the law for all.
(OK, I know I've done about three posts on this topic, but the news just keeps bringing it around again and again!)
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