Racist Reaction To The Election

Twelve days ago an amazing thing happened. America elected its first African-American president. A nation with a long history of slavery, segregation, lynchings and other racist activities actually overcame its history and elected an African-American as its president. It was mind-boggling.

Many of us thought a seminal moment in American history had happened. That the country had made a statement, because this didn't just happen with the minority vote. At least 40% of whites in America also marked their ballots for Obama. It looked like the decent folk of all races had stepped forward and declared the old ways of dealing with each other had to change, and that change would start now.

But there is a certain segment of our society that is not ready for that change. They cling to the old hate, and since the election there have been hundreds of incidents of blatant racism and racist threats. It is as though the election of Barack Obama has ripped the thin veneer off and exposed the remaining racism in America. Some examples of this kind of behavior are:

• Four North Carolina State University students admitted writing anti-Obama comments in a tunnel designated for free speech expression, including one that said: "Let's shoot that (N-word) in the head."
• Second- and third-grade students on a school bus in Rexburg, Idaho, chanted "assassinate Obama," a district official said.
• University of Alabama professor Marsha L. Houston said a poster of the Obama family was ripped off her office door. A replacement poster was defaced with a death threat and a racial slur. "It seems the election brought the racist rats out of the woodwork," Houston said.
• Black figures were hanged by nooses from trees on Mount Desert Island, Maine, the Bangor Daily News reported. The president of Baylor University in Waco, Texas said a rope found hanging from a campus tree was apparently an abandoned swing and not a noose.
• Crosses were burned in yards of Obama supporters in Hardwick, N.J., and Apolacan Township, Pa.
• A black teenager in New York City said he was attacked with a bat on election night by four white men who shouted 'Obama.'
• In the Pittsburgh suburb of Forest Hills, a black man said he found a note with a racial slur on his car windshield, saying "now that you voted for Obama, just watch out for your house."

These are just a few of the hundreds of incidents that have happened. The racists seem to think the election gives them permission to act this way, and that their fellow citizens approve of it. Well, I have news for them. The huge majority of your fellow citizens do NOT approve of this kind of vicious and cowardly behavior.

Barack Obama is the new president-elect, and on January 20th he will become the president. If you don't like it, you'd better learn to deal with it -- in a decent and non-violent way. This is not pre-1960 America, and the behavior listed above will not be tolerated. The racist jokes are not funny and the behavior is criminal.

Stop it now, or suffer the consequences.