Hate hits the streets of America ........
Three lives lost and a country in shock – America counts the cost of its shameful far-right protests
THEY arrived in darkness, clutching flaming torches and chanting racist slogans. White supremacists on a mission to shock and intimidate – just like they’ve done at many other low points in American history. But the big difference this time was that instead of being just a few cowardly bigots hiding behind masks there were hundreds of them and they were proud to show their faces.
Waving Confederate flags and banners adorned with swastikas they shouted Nazi phrases like “blood and soil”. And it wasn’t just empty talk. The next day blood flowed in the streets of Charlottesville, Virginia.
It’s being described as “America’s day of shame”. With several hundred taking part, it’s thought to have been the largest gathering of right-wingers in the US in decades. And at the end of it all three people lay dead and a couple of dozen others were injured.
The world was aghast. How could this be happening – in America of all places, which has one of the most liberal constitutions on earth? But happen it did.
The Unite the Right rally was ostensibly in protest of a decision by local officials to remove a statue of Robert E Lee, a top general who fought for the confederacy of southern states in the US Civil War in a bid to maintain white supremacy and stop the abolition of slavery. Yet commentators reckon it’s about so much more than just a historical figure atop a horse.
For years right-wingers have been arguing that white Americans are under attack. They maintain that “diversity” is just another word for white genocide. In the past these extremists have been forced to keep a low profile because they’ve been seen as a lunatic fringe but with the election of President Donald Trump they feel they at last have an ally in the White House.
Many of them supported Trump’s presidential bid, cheering him on as he made racist and sexist comments on the campaign trail. And now that he’s calling the shots they feel they’re part of the mainstream political landscape, and are demanding to be seen and heard.
THE Charlottesville rally was organised by Jason Kessler (34), an activist who belongs to America’s alternative right, or alt-right – a group that rejects mainstream conservatism in favour of white nationalism (see box right). But as the rally took to the streets it also saw more hardcore rightwing groups such as neo-Nazis and the Ku Klux Klan coming out of the woodwork.
It also triggered a major backlash. As hundreds of right-wingers marched through Charlottesville they were met by counter-protesters, many of whom were carrying “black lives matter” signs.
And then all hell broke loose. Bottles were hurled, punches were exchanged
and blood flowed. In the chaos hardly anyone noticed the young man sitting in the driver’s seat of a grey 2010 Dodge Challenger until it accelerated, ploughing into a crowd of counter-protesters.
Shocking video footage shows bodies sent flying by the force of the impact. This was clearly no accident. After hurtling into the crowd the car reversed, hitting more people, and then drove off, leaving anti-racist protester Heather Heyer (32) dead and 19 others injured.
Police later arrested the driver of the car, James Fields (20), and charged him with second-degree murder, one count of hit-and-run and three counts of malicious wounding.
Fields’ Facebook account shows that he’s an ardent supporter of the alt-right. In postings he often speaks out in favour of Nazism, racism and President Trump.
At the end of the day with two more people dead – state troopers who’d been policing the march from the air and who were killed when their helicopter crashed – and an injury count of around 30, Virginia governor Terry McAuliffe declared a state of emergency. And in a hard-hitting speech he made it clear exactly who he thought was to blame.
“I have a message to the white supremacists and the Nazis who came into Charlottesville today,” he said. “Go home. You are not wanted in this great commonwealth. You pretend that you are patriots, but you are anything but patriots.”
Meanwhile across town Kessler was trying to give his version of events at another press conference.
“Today I just want to come before you, and I want to tell you the story of what really happened before this narrative is allowed to continue spinning out of control,” he said in a speech that was largely drowned out by chants of “murderer”, “shame” and “thug”.
“The hate that you hear around you? That is the anti-white hate that fuelled what happened yesterday.”
People were more keen to hear Trump’s take on things but instead of speaking out unequivocally against the rightwingers the president seemed to be sitting on the fence, apparently in a bid not to lose their support.
“I love the people of our country. I love all of the people of our country. We’re going to make America great again, but we’re going to make it for all of the people of the United States of America,” he said. But as his lukewarm comment sparked outrage he was forced to issue a stronger response.
“Racism is evil,” he said. “And those who cause violence in its name are criminals and thugs, including the KKK, neo-Nazis, white supremacists and other hate groups that are repugnant to everything we hold dear as Americans.” But for some it was too little, too late. “In an opinion piece for USA Today television personality Montel Williams called President Trump out for his apparent hypocrisy.
“If there’s one lesson we have to learn from what’s happened, it’s that a large number of people hear, ‘Make America Great Again’ as, ‘It’s okay to hate publicly and commit hate crimes again’.”