The American Civil War Doesn’t Need a Sequel, Much Like the Matrix

“It’s about you but it’s not about you” is the way I can best sum up a response to some things other white people are saying about white privilege in the context of the current movement to acknowledge and address systemic racism.

And, sure, police have been killed in the line of duty but black people are being killed while jogging.

This isn’t about defending the honor of a chosen profession. This is about something much more.

Ahmaud Arbery’s killer/lyncher, Greg McMichael, stated that “his ‘instinct’ or ‘gut feeling’ told him Arbery was responsible for the thefts in the neighborhood.”

It is clear Greg mistook that “instinct” for his internalized racism.

And that was not an isolated incident. The fact that it wasn’t an isolated incident and America is a harbor of fear for many means that the United States of America is in grave danger.

So, yeah, each of us white people needs to do more, like critically reflect on our white privilege, listen to views we haven’t heard before (possibly because those views have previously been silenced or we just weren’t quite ready to hear them) and make some small and/or big life edits.

At the same time, if you’ve spent all your life in one place which is not racially diverse, you are not equipped to speak about “how it is out there.” However, you can speak out about whether or not you feel all people are created equal and should be regarded as such under the law.

That philosophical notion doesn’t require lived experience, it just requires critical reflection, some vague sense of morality and a conscience.

And yet, here in America, openly talking about white privilege and systemic racism is like throwing dynamite into hell.

You do it and people who are known to be kind and “good folk” will physically recoil, frown and ask “Now why did you have to go and bring that up.”

And that conversation triggers immediate defensiveness and goes nowhere.

It’s an American thing.

Not racism. Racism is an international human problem.

But countries around the world which have lived through sanctioned racial inequality seem to be better able to openly talk about systemic racism because they’ve made progress with collectively acknowledging it and have made some progress in moving beyond it.

America, on the other hand, remains in denial and denial is often the first stage of grief. In order to heal, we have to move beyond that first stage.

Well, the prescribed Stages of Grief offend me on a personal level so I feel obligated to again post this more accurate visual of How Grief Really Looks/Feels:

And, while “denial” seems to legitimately be an early stage of grief/healing which is where many white Americans are stuck in regard to systemic racism, the visual above better illustrates the American Experience of coping with it.

The reason us white people get so defensive about racism may be because so many of us are either crushed by our white guilt/cannot let go or refuse to acknowledge our white privilege/are scared of racists we know and their reaction aka “don’t want to make a fuss” or

are proudly racist.

It took me years to accept this but many Americans haven’t really moved much further beyond where we were back during the American Civil War which is another reality Americans are somehow in denial about.

The American Civil War was a domestic war fought over Southern plantation owners’ right to own human beings as property which was perpetuated by the state-sanctioned belief that people of color were “created to serve white people.”

You may hear people say this isn’t so and claim that the Civil War was fought over states’ rights.

Literally, yes, but the sentence goes on: …fought over a state’s right… to designate human beings as lesser-than and enslave them.

In fact, Southern states were quite open about this and put it in their state charters so it’s not as if this is any kind of conspiracy theory about what the Civil War was really about.

And coming to terms with the American Civil War is only a big deal because the ideology over which the Civil War was fought remains and it has spread.

President Lincoln said slavery was illegal and the South revolted and claimed states’ rights (to see other humans as lesser than and enslave them) and then realized that a bunch of other states felt this way and they all attempted to secede from the Union to form their own country.

Thus, that subsequent country was not “America.” It was the section formerly known as America which fought to secede from America and called itself the Confederacy.

And that is why, when I see a Confederate flag flying next to an American flag on someone’s porch, it can only make sense because the Confederacy was physically “next to” America in 1860/61 which the map below illustrates:

Otherwise, the two entities were distinctly, openly, explicitly at odds.

Over systemic racism and an unshakable belief in our Constitution and unified country.

So those who fly both the American and Confederate flags are, I tell myself, fans of historical maps.

Also, when I hear “The South Will Rise Again!” I think… to do what?

To reignite the states’ rights debate?

NO! TO BRING BACK FUCKING SLAVERY AS THAT’S WHY THE SOUTH ROSE IN THE FIRST FUCKING PLACE.

I mean, that is indisputably the heart of it.

According to Alexander Stephens, Vice President of the Confederacy, on March 21, 1862, mere months before the official start of the American Civil War:

“Our new government is founded upon exactly the opposite idea; its foundations are laid, its corner-stone rests, upon the great truth that the negro is not equal to the white man; that slavery—subordination to the superior race—is his natural and normal condition. This, our new government, is the first, in the history of the world, based upon this great physical, philosophical, and moral truth.”

Or read the man’s words yourself:

“Cornerstone” Speech

Few truths are black and white in this world but the reason for the American Civil War is one of the rare exceptions.

But there are many factors which cloud the clear facts of why the Civil War happened.

For instance: it GENERALLY just sucks to lose. War is terrible. Everyone loses. Families are broken. People’s lives were shattered. Everyone’s mad/dead. It’s embarrassing. Many still didn’t believe they were wrong about their racism.

Yet, there is no question about why the Civil War happened or that Lincoln’s federal administration/the Union won and, as a result, the South was no longer allowed to enslave other humans.

Sort of. There wasn’t a lot of enforcement of this clause of victory (or the Thirteenth Amendment).

And though the South barely lost the Civil War (largely, both sides were running out of people and were just sick of dying), an agreement was struck.

But soon the South implemented Black Codes and, later, Jim Crow laws which were systemic racism in a new dress.

“Here,” said the South. “We have reconstructed ourselves to incorporate systemic racism. Better now? Better now. “

And, sure, the South built its identity and economy on slavery.

However, some Southerners feel that they can’t philosophically acknowledge slavery/systemic racism and also be proud of their heritage.

Sure you can. I mean, we humans are highly skilled in preferential viewing! We should never discount our ability to overlook Room Elephants.

I’m not as certain that’s a character flaw in most humans or a means of survival.

!!!!!!!COMPARTMENTALIZE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Also, there are a lot of things in the South which are quintessentially southern and wonderful which compose Southern heritage besides slavery and institutional racism.

And I am not in any way saying that in a sarcastic manner.

As a kid who grew up near a small town called “North Freedom,” I’ve erroneously romanticized the North.

And, while I was working at a corporate law firm just out of college, and a group of Baton Rouge attorneys came for a meeting, I was completely disarmed by how charming and polite they were.

I mean, they dazzled me with smiles and took the tray of coffee from me and then opened the door for me, the peasant legal messenger/lunchtime receptionist who also had to get coffee for people sometimes.

And the corporate Northern attorneys sat there and watched as the Southern attorneys gracefully assisted me, aghast and uncomfortable.

I’m all about gender equality and skeptical AF of players and sweet talkers but those handsome genteel Baton Rouge lawyers completely bamboozled me.

Southern charm/hospitality is a real thing. That’s definitely a heritage thing.

Of course, sure, the formalized lack of hospitality shown to people of color for most of its structural existence brings us right back to the problem.

At the same time, the entire United States was built on the blood of Native Americans so the entire country of America was put into business on the backs of others. Therefore, it’s not like the South is any worse or better than any other cultural region in America.

And many Americans want to just pretend like our forefathers did not violently steal the homeland of the Native Americans.

Or, in an angry, defensive instance of acknowledgment, I’ve heard: “WELL, WHAT DOES IT MATTER NOW I YELL MY WORDS?”

It matters because racism is institutionalized in our country and we systematically try to hide past wrongs and deny they ever happened and never deal with them.

However, all of it did happen and America is now hitting a wall of Reckoning.

Because the Union and Confederate states did not address systemic racism.

After all, the Border States remained slave states while not choosing to join the Confederacy and secede.

They were the “players.”

The South may have tried to secede over slavery and state-sanctioned racism but it wasn’t as if the North was entirely populated by the Enlightened Ones.

And, when it came down to it, President Lincoln felt obliged to instill punishment on the Southern states via war because he believed the Confederacy was embracing anarchy and the Constitution was a binding legal contract which had no release clause.

Lincoln had been a lawyer before becoming president.

In any case, racism has long spread throughout our entire country.

In addition, many Union soldiers, like many Confederate soldiers, resented people of color and blamed them for the war.

Back then, poor people were sent off to fight on either side. And many of them resented suffering and dying for an issue they didn’t feel was relevant to them.

This line of thinking sounds really familiar right now.

Except the population of people who have been and still are dying at intensely disproportional rates are black.

And yet many white people in the North and South, East and West, still don’t feel it’s their problem, a problem which white people blatantly created and are actively maintaining and feeding.

It’s like how there are so many videos of police engaging in acts of brutality when encountering protestors who are peacefully protesting police brutality.

The Union may have won the the Civil War but the North was happy to maintain racial segregation in schools and other places in the next incarnation of systemic racism with its “separate but equal” launch which had absolutely nothing to do with equality and everything to do with racism.

And, subsequently, the country continues to have a gaping hole in it.

Yet, we’re not yet in a civil war yet.

Not yet.

Mostly because it’s no longer the South versus the North because the South largely thinks it is True America (except for Texas which is always trying to secede from America and be its own country) while young outsiders in the North feel the Confederate flag represents them because, to them, it represents “being a rebel” and not that one time the South seceded from the United States of America aka America over the issue of slavery/systemic racism.

In regard to our own history and national understanding of racism, the United States of America is a complete mess.

However, due to the infestation of systemic racism in every state, a modern-day civil war would be composed of states at war with itself and with everywhere else.

And we don’t have a national leader to unite us.

Therefore, and this may sound really crazy to some, but a civil war is what the current social change movement is trying to prevent.

Thomas Jefferson once said that slavery was the issue that would break apart this union and he was right once before and he may be right again.

Thus, in order to prevent that, it requires everyone who thinks a civil war is a bad idea to help prevent it.

How? Shake up your notion of who is the “us” and who is the “them” in the binary way of thinking most of us utilize to see the world around us.

And start seeing those philosophically espousing violence and civil war as the most apparent threats to the Union.

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/all/three-men-connected-boogaloo-movement-tried-provoke-violence-protests-feds-n1224231

And, I don’t know, better understand what racism is and stop being racist.

In response, some people say “Well, that’s why I’m saying ‘All Lives Matter,’ because all lives do matter.

However, in the current context of “Reckoning,” “All Lives Matter” is politicized and synonymous to “Go home, negro.”

And you may be shocked by that because you wish everything was peachy and hope with all your heart that this country does treat each life as if it equally matters, but it does not.

Historically, it has not.

And this has to change so all lives do matter, equally, in the eyes of the law, legal system and American society and state.

That feels like a very tall order which requires more than hopes and wishes.

“Well, I don’t know!! I never wanted to be part of a racist society!“

Join the movement, sister.

I have a cynical friend who suggested that we just cut the country in half because civil war feels inevitable and systemic racism is insurmountable.

Therefore, have people voluntarily choose a side.

In other words, break apart the union without the manifestation of civil war and disregard Lincoln’s constitutional argument.

Honestly, sometimes I wish we all could just retreat to our respective caves. Forget America, forget the union, sorry Lincoln… there are too many of us and we can’t ever agree on anything so we’re giving up.

However, that would not only be just another form of running away/hiding our head in the sand, it would also not be logistically possible.

For example:

If we could somehow let all people freely choose a side and split the country in half now…

Even if every single person somehow “picked a side” and then physically got on that side through some kind of serious magic or an AI program to end all AI programs (and, shortly after, human beings)…

Even if every person was magically “on the side they chose to be on,” when have any of us experienced a time, say in grade school sports, where everyone was happy with their side/team?

Never.

But let’s say everyone was super happy with their side/country and somehow, magically, was physically then residing there…

What would each half of America name itself?

Who gets “America”?

Would one of the two countries call itself “Founder Land” or “New World”?

I honestly believe so.

Each side would still somehow want to BE America, or what we think America is/should be, even though America, the United States of America, would be officially dead and failed.

But the biggest hypothetical logistical problem would come down to the same issue which is killing the current union.

Because, even if we have two countries within former America, composed of citizens whose voluntarily chose to be there, how long before the one side had a problem with the other side?

I mean, they’d be physically connected. There would be no body of water or geographical boundary and we all know that “putting a wall up” is a much more difficult endeavor than we may think.  

So, realistically, we’d just have a long fence separating the two countries.

And that wouldn’t be enough as each side of former America would inevitably have a serious problem with the other side because America always has a problem with the countries it borders.

This wouldn’t change once former America was cut in half.

Because soon one country composed of former Americans would re-institute state-sanctioned slavery or hoard natural resources or simply say it’s “the better side,” and the other side wouldn’t be able to tolerate it and the two new countries composed of former Americans would just go to war with each other.

However, that wouldn’t be a domestic civil war.

That would be the wars we Americans are most used to: the Us Americans against Them kind.

It wouldn’t matter if the “Them” would themselves be former Americans.

After all, look at how easily mainland Americans pretend Puerto Rico isn’t really part of America.

It took Puerto Rico almost a year to restore its electricity after it was destroyed by Hurricane Maria.

What would Kentucky do if it didn’t have electricity for eleven months? Or Wisconsin?

People in Wisconsin couldn’t even handle not being able to go their favorite bar for six weeks without completely flipping out.

Though the response was more extreme/disproportionate in Michigan which had armed militia in its state capitol.

Off/on topic but does Flint, Michigan IN THE HEARTLAND OF AMERICA have clean drinking water yet?

(many say “not really”)

Militants don’t seem to mobilize for clean water, only other non-essential realities like not being able to physically go inside bars, restaurants or salons.

Hmm. Could the fact that Puerto Rico and Flint, Michigan were denied federal aid be due to the racial composition of those who live there?

Could that be an example of systemic racism?

(rhetorical)

Click to access VFlintCrisisRep-F-Edited3-13-17_554317_7.pdf

In any case, we can’t just not deal with systemic racism and all our philosophical differences and physically split the country in half.

Like “All better! We’re separated and apart! We’ll just use anarchy as our organizational system and things will be super. I’ll be able to get my hair done in peace.”

No, you won’t.

Largely because America is in a period of Reckoning. Many people are justifiably upset and other people are just always upset.

Once I posted on Facebook a selfie as my husband and I were staying in Erie, Pennsylvania and I received a rather scary threat via Facebook Messenger BECAUSE I MENTIONED MOVING TO CANADA.

I used to do what I could to not upset people.

However, A BLADE OF GRASS WILL UPSET SOME PEOPLE.

At times, it honestly feels that the expression “you can’t win for losing” should be the new American motto.

America has long felt superior to Canada based on very little if nothing but the American ego trip which really solidified post World War II which America won for everyone.

Were other countries even involved in World War II?

(again, rhetorical)

Of course, since World War II, America can’t stay out of anyone’s business.

Well, until Donald Trump was elected as National Leader and now everyone is just figuring out how to do things without America because America’s blatantly toxic.

But America went toxic and crazy a long time ago.  Many of us are just slowly realizing this now.

#mentalhealthawarenessmonth

In any case, we can’t all run away and form our own country because those left behind would try to kill us.

And we can’t just move to Canada or Scotland because I’ve tried.

It seems much more logical and efficient to work on preventing a civil war here and maintaining the United States of America by facing and addressing the systemic failings in our culture and system.

That seems much more possible after the peaceful protest activity in every single state in the Union composing a national call for racial equality and reforms to a police system which has become increasingly militarized and is, systematically, statistically, more likely to cause harm to a person of color than a white person i.e. racist.

Again:

Some may believe that there are currently radical ideas floating around about police reform but, honestly, to a person living in a very small town which is entirely composed of white people and who has never really left that town, the local diner changing its hours may sound like radical change.

But all of us need to support #blacklivesmatter and this movement to bring about necessary social change because it’s the right thing to do, the Christian thing to do, the pagan thing to do, the moral thing to do, the American thing to do and also the way to prevent another civil war.

We need to stay focused, ignore or deconstruct the distractions, and ensure everyone votes and that their vote is counted.

Some American police chiefs and officers saw the bigger picture and joined the protest/social change movement:

However, many officers did not join the peaceful protestors and retained the “us” versus “them” mentality.

And that kind of thinking is tearing our country apart (leaning towards Civil War II).

And it feeds into the “Maybe we should get bigger and more ominous weapons?” reasoning which is not logical because it begs the question:.

To destroy who?

These protestors are not a small segment of the American people.

Rather, according to polls and video footage, these protestors represent the American people. If the American people represent the “them” to police officers, then who do the police feel is “us”?

The state?

Isn’t America “and its government (to be) of the people, by the people, for the people”?

Are not the people the state?

But, specifically, the institutionalized oppression of large segments of the American population over a long period of time has manifested civil unrest.

Shocking.

I compare this to the #metoo movement which seemed to have come out of nowhere (though of course it didn’t) and brought giants to their knees.

The power of that movement and how it impacted formerly untouchable public figures was unthinkable to me. I hadn’t thought it possible.

Not in my lifetime.

However, the #metoo movement also birthed a retaliatory “Women will use this new power to be believed about rape and abuse to accuse innocent men!” message which I’ve heard repeatedly.

What it comes down to is some white men are most concerned about someone else fucking them over because white men are used to doing the fucking and can’t imagine that others wouldn’t fuck them over, given the chance.

In other words, some can’t imagine not experiencing the reaping of the seeds they’ve historically sewn and will prevent this reaping at any cost.

In short, they fear the old saying, “What goes around, comes around.”

And systemic racism has been an institution of America since its very beginning.

It’s something we’ve all known and endorsed on some level and so we can’t talk about it or fully process it.

America doesn’t often live up to its American Dream “work hard = good job = stable life,” especially not in the least twenty years, so many people live sad, desperate lives which seem fated from their birth.

We Americans love a story about someone who defied the odds and pulled themselves up by their boot straps because we know how the system tries to prevent this at all costs.

But we haven’t lately, actively, tried to reform this ever-worsening system which keeps on killing the American Dream until recently.

Honestly, the only time I’d openly hear white people casually talk about racism before #blacklivesmatter was when I was younger and first on my own.

And the notion that white privilege is some sort of economic payment would often come up.

Like, “Oops! The KKK forgot to deposit my payment of white privilege today! I checked my bank account!”

And they, the people who would be the soldiers in the looming civil war many are actively trying to prevent/bring about, would point out how poor and shitty their life was and how doomed and shitty their family’s life was and, consequently, they didn’t feel they were at all a recipient of “white privilege.”

When I was in my very early 20s, I remember talking with a peer about racism and he definitely believed there was systemic racism but then he said:

“My life is shit. It’s been shit since the day I was born. If I had privilege, I guess I missed it.”

He was laughing when he said this but it was as if he was angrily, bitterly crying while also smiling and making just the sound of laughter with the appropriate facial movement.

I honestly didn’t know what to say.

I didn’t have the language. I saw his point.

As I earned my BA and MS and PhD and became overeducated, I participated in a lot of academic conversations and community discussions and developed the language to better articulate the distinctions between class and race and gender and identity but, honestly, I still struggled with what exactly I would say to the acquaintance I once knew.

I was in a better place, at least emotionally, so I didn’t feel like adding to his plate of misery.

So, as a contextualized example of white privilege, I just stopped thinking about it.

Until I heard white privilege summed up so succinctly in the movie Minding the Gap.

The documentary follows three young men who are dealing with a bunch of everything (see the movie, if you haven’t, as it’s really good and it’s still on Hulu), but when one of the white guys in a room expresses his frustration with the overall shittiness of life and compares his experiences to those of Keire, who is black:

White Guy: “There’s a certain class of white that’s not — that’s easy to be white in America, but then like if you’re like trailer trash white, then it’s not easy to live in America.”

Another white kid challenges his dismissal of essentially white privilege:

Other White Guy: “I feel like it is easy, like you still could go and cut your hair and go and get a job because they don’t look at you like [they look at Keire].”

Because that’s it, in accessible real language.

That’s white privilege and that’s systemic racism.

White privilege has nothing to do with whether or not your life is or is not set up to succeed. It has nothing to do with how much money you do/don’t have.  

White privilege is often dismissed because it also taps into the underlying free flowing blood which fuels and illustrates systemic racism:

“My life may be complete shit, but at least I’m not black (or a <expletive>).”

And THAT is the systemic underlying racism which many deny.

Most know that life would be “worse” if they were black because they know how unequal this society is.

They just can’t say it because that wouldn’t be “American.”

Well, some people come right out and say they’re happy about institutionalized racism because whites are “better.”

There are all these agnostic whites who I hope are reached because they need to feel involved as it’s “all hands on deck” (agnostic “us”)

and then there are the hard-lined white power racists who most certainly seem to be the ones who are actively trying to bring about another civil war (hard-lined “them”).

And ohhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh it often feels overwhelming and is the shuttle to leave earth ready to go or what?

But, no, we’re stuck here and we have to save our union.

Was America ever the land of the free and the home of the brave? I’d like to think so.

And, honestly, seeing all the people coming together to fight to acknowledge and dismantle systemic racism once and for all? So many different people?

That’s amazing. They represent the free and the brave.

Americans of all races and backgrounds who are coming together because they understand how their life and future as Americans is dependent on how the American government and the state-sponsored police force treat fellow Americans is wonderful.

In this way, it’s different than the first American Civil War.

Maybe not everyone understands how their own life is caught up in the lives of Americans with a different skin color but people are starting to understand that the union of America is in a precarious position and changes have to happen or it will fall.

And if we can address the wrongs which caused the first civil war by owning them and actively working to change these wrongs… we can prevent another civil war.

And truly make America the home of the free and the land of the brave for everyone.

It’s worth fighting for.

I know, for Wisconsin white people, first sports were taken away thanks to the coronavirus which is still trucking and then the local bars were closed and now the Green Bay Packers are speaking out about change.

That’s a lot of change at once.

Many people can’t tolerate or handle change of any kind very well.

But you can’t get away from it. Change is here.

Embrace it or go cheer for the Vikings.

And, if the Stay-at-Home quarantine caused civil unrest, how would white people who don’t want to be involved handle a civil war?

A civil war would bring about extreme change and intense inconvenience to the daily routine. You may never be able to get a hair appointment again.

Our young people would become soldiers, fighting and dying for a cause and you’d be forced to choose a side or flee to Canada.

And Canada is really not taking most of us in.

And preventing another civil war requires everyone’s support.

The pot has bubbled over from the heat which has relentlessly been applied and it won’t cool until the flame is at long last turned down and eventually put out.

(aid to metaphor: systemic racism is the fire, society is the water in the pot)

It’s incredible to think that some of this change that’s happening now could truly save our country and union.

To quote Lincoln’s famous line in the Gettysburg Address which he made to troops mere months after the Civil War had ended:

“…that these dead shall not have died in vain—that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom—and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.”

Meanwhile, having a collection of troops standing in front of the Lincoln Memorial as if they’re facing off against the people they are supposed to protect is not something Lincoln, a politician we revere in this country, a man who is more of a founding father than some of the founding fathers, would tolerate.

It goes against much of what he believed in as it’s solidifying the “state versus the people” mentality which is killing our democratic union.

I wish the Lincoln Memorial would come alive and stand up and shake the earth with his voice:

“NO MORE.”

But the Lincoln Memorial is not going to come alive to save us.

And the Bible President Trump was holding upside down after using the military to violently force their way through a peaceful crowd of protestors and the press was not going to catch fire.

Sadly. Come on, God, that would have been really cool.

In any case, the current state of affairs cannot continue and it’s up to us to make sure it doesn’t.

We have to allow change. We cannot go back to some fictional time. We need to support each other and envision a country which lives up to the billing.

I live in Milwaukee which remains one of the most racially-segregated cities in the country. And I hear the National Guard Black Hawk helicopters circling above, surveying the city, every night for hours and hours.

Since Thursday night and through Sunday, the city buses are also shutting down at 10PM to haul National Guard troops in.

The protests here in Milwaukee have generally, consistently, been peaceful which is remarkable considering the underlying issues which intimately involve race and power.

And yet, it feels like the city and its police are preparing for war.

When I was a kid, I remember running after police cars because they gave out free Brewers baseball cards.

If my kid did that now, in this environment, their life may be in danger.

This cannot continue.

I really hope and pray that the Milwaukee Police Department and city administration are able to see the big picture.

Instead of throwing everything they’ve got at the protestors, the city should focus more energy on embracing reforms to the way policing is done in a city with atrocious community-police relations.

And also support the protestors who are marching for a change that Milwaukee and this country desperately need.

Or else we don’t stand a chance.

I’m a white girl posting a black man’s song but I love Sam Cooke’s “A Change Is Gonna Come,” and, while it often brings tears to my eyes, this is the first time in my life I believe the change really could come.