Tag Archives: Frederick Douglass

The Cancel Culture Is Getting Absurd

Posted on by

I knew things were getting out of hand when a mob tore down the statue of Frederick Douglass in Rochester, New York, on Sunday. Now they are coming for Hawaiian shirts. On July 1, Newsbusters posted the story.

The article reports:

The New York Times has identified a new villain in their insane cancel culture wars. Hawaiian shirts. I kid you not.

On Monday, freelancer Nathan Taylor Pemberton targeted Hawaiian shirts because some undesirable people wear them. His warning about the dire associations connected with that ubiquitous article of clothing came in “What Do You Do When Extremism Comes for the Hawaiian Shirt?”

It’s one of the most discussed street styles of the spring: tactical body armor, customized assault rifles, maybe a sidearm and helmet, paired with the languid floral patterns of a Hawaiian shirt.

While it’s not uncommon to see heavily armed white men toting military-grade gear on American streets, the addition of the Hawaiian shirt is a new twist. It turned up in February at gun rights rallies in Virginia and Kentucky, then in late April at coronavirus lockdown protests in Michigan and Texas.

Think of the shirts as a campy kind of uniform, but for members of extremist groups who adhere to the idea of the “boogaloo” — or, a second civil war in the United States. If that sounds silly to you, consider that these groups settled on the Hawaiian shirt thanks to a string of message board in-jokes.

The article explains:

Ah! So now we get to the source of leftist antipathy towards Hawaiian shirts. They somehow interpret it as a symbol of American colonialism in Hawaii although ironically it is a big source of textile employment for many Hawaiians as well as worn by many of them although they refer to them as “Aloha shirts.”

The article concludes:

Sigh! To paraphrase Sigmund Freud: Sometimes a Hawaiian shirt is just a Hawaiian shirt. In fact that is what is should be, always.

I wonder when wearing sneakers is going to become a problem.

Standing Strong Against The Mob

Posted on by

Hillsdale College is unique in many ways. Its students are required to study the founding documents of America and its Constitution. The College accepts no federal money and operates with only private funding. It also offers many free online courses dealing with American history and the founding documents of America. Yesterday The Federalist posted an article about the College that included some recent comments by the College administrators.

The article reports:

The nationally recognized liberal arts institution Hillsdale College has a history of defying political pressure in order to uphold what is good and true. Its recent refusal to give in to the demands of those who think a public statement is necessary to fight social injustice is just the most recent example.

Some of the college’s alumni publicly pushed their alma mater to comment on the recent controversies regarding the death of George Floyd and the ensuing protests and riots. When a petition began circulating calling on the college to release a statement, arguing that its “silence” supported violence, the college responded in an open letter.

“The College is pressed to speak. It is told that saying what it always has said is insufficient. Instead, it must decry racism and the mistreatment of Black Americans in particular. This, however, is precisely what the College has always said,” the letter says.

The letter signed by the college’s administration argues the institution’s steadfast devotion to fighting for the truth that all men are created equal is proven by its actions rather than empty words. Hillsdale was founded by abolitionists in 1844 and has, since its inception, pledged to educate all students, “irrespective of nation, color, or sex.” Such strong anti-discrimination practices were viewed as fiercely radical at the time, and made Hillsdale among the first in the nation to grant education to black Americans and the second in the nation to provide four-year liberal arts degrees to women.

This education produced students who care about the dignity and equality of all people. When the Civil War broke out, a higher percentage of Hillsdale students enlisted to fight for the Union than from any other college. It stood as an anti-slavery symbol during this time, such that the revered abolitionist Frederick Douglass came to deliver a speech on campus.

“The College founding is a statement — as is each reiteration and reminder of its meaning and necessity. The curriculum is a statement, especially in its faithful presentation of the College’s founding mission. Teaching is a statement, especially as it takes up — with vigor — the evils we are alleged to ignore, evils like murder, brutality, injustice, destruction of person or property, and passionate irrationality” the administration writes in the letter. “… And all of these statements are acts, deeds that speak, undertaken and perpetuated now, every day, all the time. Everything the College does, though its work is not that of an activist or agitator, is for the moral and intellectual uplift of all.”

The article concludes:

The college’s commitment to its principles has never wavered. In the 1970s when the federal government attempted to require the college to discriminate against potential students based on their race, the college refused. This meant the loss of all federal funding to its students as well as the institution. Hillsdale has instead generated private funding to continue its mission.

The college operates today as it always has, educating another generation of students to aspire to the great principles animating the Declaration of Independence and Bill of Rights. Statues of Douglass and Abraham Lincoln adorn campus as students study, reminding them of the virtues the college upholds.

While other companies are busy regurgitating statements capturing whatever ideas are trendy at the time, Hillsdale is busy fulfilling the same mission they set forth 176 years ago.

Actions speak louder than words.

What Are These People Smoking?

Posted on by

Today’s Daily Caller posted a story about comments made by Al Sharpton on NBC’s “Meet The Press” today. The Reverend Sharpton was responding to a question about a recent article in Politico Magazine describing him as a surrogate of President Obama regarding race relations.

The article reports:

“First of all, I’m not a surrogate,” he contended. “I have access to the White House in every era going back to Lincoln with Frederick Douglass. Presidents talk to those that were leading at that time.”

“Not comparing Marc Morial or Melanie Campbell and I to Frederick Douglass,” Sharpton added (though the “and I” was barely audible). “But that’s nothing unusual.”

“I went to Ferguson because the family, the grandfather called to ask me to come,” he said. “The White House called while I was there, talked to me, the head of the NAACP and others. So it’s not a surrogate, it is a customary, traditional role.”

Reverend Sharpton is no Frederick Douglass. Let’s talk a little bit about the Reverend Al Sharpton. He has done more to stir up strife between races than to quell it. Reverend Sharpton has a way of showing up in a difficult situation and throwing gasoline on whatever fire is raging. More than one of the situations Reverend Sharpton has been involved in included  information that was questionable at best at the time, and later proved false. Reverend Sharpton is not a man seeking peace and harmony between races, he makes a living by stirring up strife and claiming to be a peacemaker. If harmony between the races occurred, Reverend Sharpton would be out of the spotlight and out of a job. He is very aware of that.

Has Anyone Seen This In Their Newspaper Or TV News ?

Posted on by
 I realize that this is long, but please read the entire story. It is disturbing.

On February 26, the Frederick Douglass Foundation of New York released the following Press Release:

In Case You Missed It

13 Year Old Jada Williams Persecuted by the Rochester City School District  Over her essay on Frederick Douglass.

On Saturday, February 18, 2012, the Frederick Douglass Foundation of New York presented the first Spirit of Freedom award to Jada Williams, a 13-year old city of Rochester student.  Miss Williams wrote an essay on her impressions of Frederick Douglass’ first autobiography the Narrative of the Life.  This was part of an essay contest, but her essay was never entered.  It offended her teachers so much that, after harassment from teachers and school administrators at School #3, Miss Williams was forced to leave the school.
 
We at the Frederick Douglass Foundation honored her because her essay actually demonstrates that she understood the autobiography, even though it might seem a bit esoteric to most 13-year olds.  In her essay, she quotes part of the scene where Douglass’ slave master catches his wife teaching then slave Frederick to read.  During a speech about how he would be useless as a slave if he were able to read, Mr. Auld, the slave master, castigated his wife.
 
Miss Williams quoted Douglass quoting Mr. Auld:  “If you teach that nigger (speaking of myself) how to read, there will be no keeping him. It will forever unfit him to be a slave. He would at once become unmanageable, and of no value to his master.”
 
Miss Williams personalized this to her own situation.  She reflected on how the “white teachers” do not have enough control of the classroom to successfully teach the minority students in Rochester.  While she herself is more literate than most, due to her own perseverance and diligence, she sees the fact that so many of the other “so-called ‘unteachable’” students aren’t learning to read as a form of modern-day slavery.  Their illiteracy holds them back in society.
 
Her call to action was then in her summary: “A grand price was paid in order for us to be where we are today; but in my mind we should be a lot further, so again I encourage the white teachers to instruct and I encourage my people to not just be a student, but become a learner.”
 
This offended her English teacher so much that the teacher copied the essay for other teachers and for the Principal. After that, Miss Williams’ mother and father started receiving phone calls from numerous teachers, all claiming that their daughter is “angry.”  Miss Williams, mostly a straight-A student, started receiving very low grades, and she was kicked out of class for laughing and threatened with in-school suspension.
 
There were several meetings with teachers and administrators, but all failed to answer Miss Williams’ mother’s questions. The teachers refused to show her the tests and work that she had supposedly performed so poorly on.  Instead, the teachers and administrators branded her a problem.
Unable to take anymore of the persecution, they pulled her from School #3.  Wanting to try another school, they were quickly informed that that school was filled and told to try “this school.”  During her first day at this new school, she witnessed four fights, and other students asked her if she was put here because she fights too much.
 
Long story short, they took an exceptional student, with the radical idea that kids should learn to read, and put her in a school of throwaway students who are even more unmanageable than the average student in her previous school.  To protect their daughter, her parents have had to remove her from school, and her mother has had to quit her job so she can take care of Miss Williams.
 
To date, the administrators of School #3 have refused to release her records, even though she no longer attends the school, and they have repeatedly given her mother the run around.  We at the Frederick Douglass Foundation have contacted school administrators in regards to this situation and have also been told to hit the pavement.
 

That’s what we intend to do.  If this school will sacrifice the welfare of an above-average student whose essay, that they asked her to write, they find offensive, we intend to make everyone aware of this monstrous injustice.  The school has a job, and it is not doing it.  We would like as many folks as possible to call the Principal of School #3 and complain about this injustice.  Her name is Miss Connie Wehner, and she can be reached at (585) 454-3525.  This treatment of Jada Williams cannot stand.

 

Enhanced by Zemanta