âRacism and racial animus is a chronic illness of this country. Itâs not something that just comes in waves in certain places. Itâs always there simmering,â said Gloria Browne-Marshall
Thatâs it in a nutshell. And no one should be surprised by the story of this legislatorâs harassment. Vermont is far from the granola-loving, alternative lifestyle paradise that many have imagined.
Apparently it is âwhat Vermont is aboutâ.
This is a damn shame. And a chilling storyâŚfor all shades. Remind each other that if it can happen to one, it can happen to ANYONE. ANY group or label or box or demographic or sex or orientation or creed. Even yours. And the ONLY, ONLY way to prevent it is to stop it from happening to anyone, any- and everywhere.
Sheâs grateful that the attorney generalâs office and Vermont State Police are now investigating.
Now?
NOW?
Iâm saddened but not surprised by this. I can only begin to try to imagine what this woman must be going through, the fear, the disillusionment, the discouragement. The hippie âparadiseâ that is Vermont needs to undergo some serious self-reflection and meaningful change.
Iâm a New Yorker, and I lived in Northern New England for more than 20 years before moving back for professional reasons. I loved the country and met a lot of very fine and interesting people, but I do remember that there was an undercurrent of very White âconservatismâ even in the more civilized places, and that while the coastal areas are pretty hip, once you get inland a bit things can change fairly starkly.
This is what White Supremacy is all about - just ask Dear Leader Donald J Trump .
It was all economic anxiety, Iâm sure.
Sure is a good thing that right-wing domestic terrorism doesnât exist, because if it did this would check all the boxes.
She apparently reported it to the local gendarmerie, but was ignored:
Morris said she was dissatisfied with the response by Bennington police when she reported the acts against her and her family; the police chief has defended his departmentâs handling of the complaints.
Well, this doesnât fit well with a few comfortable pre-conceived notions about where racist Americans live, now does it?
Oh yesâŚeven in VERMONT. This is the state at the forefront of the LBGT wars in the early aughts. There were the shrugging âwe accept everybody and mind our own businessâ New Englanders and then there were the âTAKE BACK VERMONTâ screeching hyenas. We have a place in Southern Vermont. My spouse grew up there and we spend every summer there. In the early days they would ask him to âcontrolâ me as my âLEFT Coast valuesâ just didnât work there. Once they learned THAT would never fly and my kids grew older and called them out (gotta love those mouthy millenials) AND all their fears did not come to fruition they have mellowed. That being said the racial bias still lingers. I can remember taking the kids to the community pool and a black woman coming over to sit next to me because she heard my âaccentâ (really??? Iâm from WASHINGTON, I have no accent!) and thought that at last she had someone to talk to. So sad.
Iâm telling you for all the talk about the north being friendly toward blacks because of the civil war, folks from above the Mason-Dixon line are some of the most racist folks Iâve encountered in NC. Look at all the white folks in that PA Trump rally the other day. I wouldnât be the least bit surprised if you could find a few confederate flags there too. Hell Donaldâs from NY!
If Blacks only make up 1.4% of the population of Vermont that should tell you something.
On coastal Oregon I saw a confederate flag last year. There are pockets of racism everywhere in this country.
and @schmed
too bad she wasnât a 72-year old teacher talking about an admin official who ate paste. That they would have gotten on top of right away.
The old saying was, âin the south they donât care how close blacks get as long as they donât get too big. In the north they donât care how big blacks get as long as they donât get too close.â
As bad as the deep South. When did you last read that a black official was forced out of office in a Southern state over racial intimidation?
Yeah sadly I think the real motivation for ending slavery is so southern businesses didnât have free labor that northern businesses didnât have. Pretty much just a money issue.
Certainly the huge issue in the run-up to the Civil War. Free Labor/Free Soil was the motto of probably 90% of the opposition to admitting slave states, with the other 10% the vocal abolitionists. That part usually gets overlooked when the guns started going off.
The Emancipation Proclamation? Much as I believe Lincoln wanted it for principled reasons, he had to know that it would disrupt the economies of the states that continued in rebellion and put the fear into them.
Anyone who thinks itâs over or that it ever was, pardon the pun, a black and white issue, is seriously undereducated.