Face the fascist threat

Like it or not, fascism is on the rise in America. The Ku Klux Klan rally scheduled for March 30 is projected to be three times the size of the one they held in 1998.

If the Klan arrives in Memphis completely unopposed it will grant them an air of legitimacy and the room to maneuver, to recruit and to infiltrate the police and the local government (a process we can witness in the state legislature). This is not science fiction. These are the lessons of history.

These are lessons we can learn from the present condition of Greece and the rise of the Golden Dawn. We have recently heard the word “austerity” arrive on our shores.

We cannot challenge the Klan’s constitutional right to free speech, but we can, as a community, demonstrate that they are not and never will be welcome. To do this we must protest face to face with the monster itself. Anything else is making way for them and offering them a pedestal to speak from. Some of us may choose to face them nonviolently, but we must face them.

Martin Luther King Jr. said that only love can cast out darkness, but he never flinched from confronting that darkness with love. It is profoundly unfortunate that the organizations that claim to march in his footsteps, the Mid-South Peace and Justice Center along with the NAACP, are the very organizations leading the retreat. We are discussing a fascist organization whose political ambition is the revolutionary overthrow of the government and a program of genocide. Meanwhile I have heard rumors that some liberals are baking them cupcakes. What an embarrassment!

Would we be so eager to sit at home and ignore an al-Qaida rally? Our mainstream has followed this line of utter passivity so willingly and uncritically. to have a dialogue on just why we need to preserve this history that is singularly responsible for today’s subjugation of the black community?

Reconstruction very rarely gets attention — the very segment of black history that gave rise and purpose to the Klan, as this was precisely the time the black community pulled itself up by nonexistent bootstraps and created businesses, communities, self-education; when literacy rates soared, marriages and families galvanized, politics and politicians flowered and black citizenship became an example across the South.

This was the purpose of the Klan’s origin — to drag the black community back into subjugation, to reinstitute not white supremacy as much as black inferiority.

And they succeeded, which evidences itself in the myriad issues of crime, health, education, etc., that beset our communities in 2013, which were largely and effectively self-eradicated during Reconstruction and only re-established coincidental with the intentioned rise and ride of the Klan.

This is an opportune time to begin a discussion of just why the black community is in the shape it is in and what factors keep us there.

We should appreciate the Klan’s coming to Memphis, that it might well help our understanding of just how so they are on the wrong side of history; but more important, they may be the opening into a realization of just how we might try to be on the right side of the future. A Feb. 25 story at commercialappeal.com reported that Bass Pro Shops wants to install oval signs 90 feet wide and 66 feet high, bearing the outdoor retailer’s logo, on each face of The Pyramid as part of its redevelopment of the riverfront landmark. The company will ask the Downtown Memphis Commission Design Review Board for approval of the lighted signs and other design elements at a meeting on Wednesday. Bass Pro’s $191 million retrofit of the vacant, city-owned former sports and entertainment arena is aimed at turning the 32-story building and surrounding area into a destination retail attraction. Here are excerpts from comments online readers of The Commercial Appeal posted on the story:

WILLIE_WATKINS WROTE:

Who honestly cares at this point?

OBSERVER99 WROTE:

Too funny. Here is my idea for their sign. A 90-foot fishing pole with the line halfway down, having caught a big fish. The 30-foot fish is formed with letters. M-E-M-P-H-I-S.

JULIUSJONES WROTE:

The fun has just begun with these scoundrels. They have a well-documented history of over-promising, under-delivering and causing mayhem wherever they go.

AMBROSE WROTE:

Mr. (Robert) Lipscomb, this is something that you negotiate inside the lease agreement and prior to signing anything. The fact that signage on the exterior of the building is being negotiated now, after the fact, is ridiculous.

CAPT_MAL WROTE:

Needs more hipster influence. Maybe neon

I reject the KKK utterly and loathe its existence. I do not want them here making a spectacle of us and bringing shame on our community. The best thing that the KKK can do for white Southerners like me is to just go away and stay there. — or perhaps a vintage take on their current logo. I’m not sure how that works with the bizarre building, though.

UOFMARK WROTE:

... Bass Pro has saved The Pyramid from becoming the world’s largest pigeon roost. They’re pumping millions into this project which will benefit Memphis greatly. They deserve the right to advertise their store. No one complains about the giant lettering on the FedExForum sides or roof.

JOE4444 WROTE:

Bass Pro’s plans were released 2.5 years ago, which included their preferred sign. Why does this now become an issue?

LIBERALVIEWER WROTE:

It is a shame that such a building has been transformed into bait shop. ... How about a sign that reads “Welcome To “Redneckville”?

KOKO WROTE:

Just wait until you see the lighted rotating Skoal chewing tobacco sign at the top of The Pyramid. ...

RDL WROTE:

... If it’s so “iconic,” it wouldn’t have looked like a decayed glass building over the past decade. I’m fine with the signage; we need things Downtown that announce their presence in a bold way.

LONGTIMELISTENER WROTE:

Hey, they are saving it from being demolished. They can put whatever kind of sign on it they want.

MLCIS1 WROTE:

... I’m all for a (Bass Pro) mega store in Memphis, think it’s a great thing, but not in the city’s landmark building. It would be like opening a mega McDonald’s across the span of the Gateway Arch in St. Louis.