This is a tough one. My title is a hook back to my last post on bridge. In this post, though I suppose I have the game pinochle in mind; I am calling spades as a way of naming the trump suit -- more on that later.. But my title is also a play on the awful colloquialism of spade meaning African American and the historical colloquial saying "to call a spade a spade," meaning "to speak honestly and openly about something." My post is about seeing, saying, and meaning.
I spent the thanksgiving day at the home of a relative; I ate and talked under the shadow of a swastika spray painted onto a silo. Next to it were the digits 2022 (the year, according to some David Duke propaganda (not linking -- you can search 2022 and David Duke), the US will be a non-white majority).
They were on the silo last year. We couldn't figure out what the 2022 stood for last year -- a google search on Aryan and 2022/white supremacy and 2022 filled me in this year -- but the Wizard and I hoped we had talked enough about the swastika and had spoken in such a way that it would be gone this year. It was not.
Why didn't we turn around and leave? We had our reasons; they are not up for discussion here.
On the one hand, my bitter self reminded me, there is a harsh and painful irony that, in this particular prairie state with its terrible history of relations between Native Americans and settlers on this particular day -- the day that the mainstream US celebrates the destruction of one people by another -- that I was able to see how scared the descendants of the white settlers feel of being displaced. On the other hand, my non-white, disabled, justice and equality for all self just shriveled up; I felt numb. Shocked. It was still there. And no one seemed to care.
The graffiti was painted by a late-teen/young adult male. His mother said he was "acting out." He said he was trying to scare trespassers away. 2022 was identified as a piece of class graffiti -- the five year olds had got a little wild. No one -- not the painter or his family -- admitted to having the actual political views that swastika and David Duke propaganda would suggest. I assume that to them the literal and specific meaning of these signs enabled them to function as a generalized symbol of badness, rebellion, and resistance, a symbol in which the literal meaning no longer had resonance. A friend I talked with said they might have functioned in the same way that the Obama/Nazi comparisons worked for Newt Gingrich and other members of the right wing. (Though we both shook our heads at the thought -- there has to be a point at which a genuine neo-Nazi is going to figure out that Obama's race is a major stumbling block being accepted by followers of the Aryan ideology).
Me, though? I look at a swastika and see a swastika. You might call that an interpretational limitation. I know that the symbol had a deep and rich history before its occurrence in twentieth century fascism, but when I see it, I see the symbol of a hate and prejudice that endures unto this day. This link goes to the google news for "swastika disabled." It brings back the story of three men who used a hanger to brand a swastika into the arm of a disabled Navajo man; they allegedly also shaved the symbol into his head and did other violence to this man's body. I see the symbol that is emblazoned in people's minds as the symbol of fascism and all that comes with it. It's an interpretational limitation that I am proud of.
What does that graffiti mean? What does it say about my relationship with my extended family -- would they have celebrated my death, too? Or am I somehow not that despicable "Other them," because I had a tenuous connection to them? What to do next? What to say to the painter and to the rest of the family? What does the agreement -- I suppose I should wait before calling it a conspiracy -- to excuse away its existence mean? Is the painter an actual or wannabe neo-Nazi who scares his family? Why would they invite me? Why should I accept? I don't believe that you can, in this day and age, separate the symbol of a swastika from its fascistic context, but what then?
One thing is clear: they don't seem to be under meaningful community pressure to remove these things. The display and/or wearing of a swastika is not illegal in the US, as far as I know. And no one in the community has come up with an argument or situation strong enough to convince them to remove it. They aren't ashamed enough to remove it. How widespread is this hatred? A couple of people? The whole damned town? If I never return, they've won (on a lot of fronts that aren't clear in this post). If I continue to return, I will continue to confront the signs of hatred. I don't believe change is possible here; it's bigger than the family and the son.
I assume, if I return, that I will be physically safe. I am not so sure about my psychic self. The pain of being there, of talking and smiling, of pretending it wasn't there, of family conviviality is too much.
I call spades -- I suppose in a sense I am calling their bluff. I don't suppose I can actually win the game. But I am going to name the terms by which the game will be played from now on.
If I return, there will be no more fake politeness. You may feel uncomfortable and inhospitable. You may feel your cultural preferences and mores have been slighted. You may not get to see yourselves as you would like to believe that you are. You will not be given any more passes or benefits of any doubts. I won't keep your secrets and stay silent for you any more. If I stay away, you will not get what you want either.
I see your swastika, and I raise you with truth.
OMG.
ReplyDeleteThis title is a pretty good book title. Just thinkin.
ReplyDeleteAlso, this:
"Why didn't we turn around and leave? We had our reasons; they are not up for discussion here."
Yes, and yes. And yes. JD and I make the same decision every time we go to Alabama. It is not up for discussion; it exists in the realm of muscle. The heart is a muscle.
Love.
Thanks for your heartfelt post. I must admit to finding Thanksgiving a most painful holiday. The rising racism, homophobia, and greed seem only to highlight the gulf between the holiday's intent and our culture's stance in the world. Obviously, this is tension is amplified for First Nations People.
ReplyDeleteI’m overwhelmed, and –perhaps most disturbingly—not shocked.
ReplyDeleteI imagine that for you there is a) the personal/layered awfulness and complications of family tangles, as well as b) the personal/layered horrors of power and social structures and hate. At least from my own experience, when I am most disturbed, most numbed, and shaken to my core it is because I am shaken at both of those levels—and when they are intertwined.
You are right to call a spade a spade. That takes courage. And you are right that there is clearly not enough meaningful community pressure to remove those things. And you are right that there is an agreement, likely unspoken and unacknowledged, to excuse away the existence and meanings of the swastika. To do so forces recognition of themselves, their community, and their very family—forces recognition of the everyday-ness of evil and our too-often comfort with it.
Your blog entry made me think of the bell hooks piece “Theory as Liberatory Practice.” When we go through the painful process of theorizing, when we genuinely seek to understand, we initiate the healing process. Sometimes it’s just for ourselves, sometimes it’s also for others we love, and sometimes it’s for our larger communities.
But yuck.
This saddens me because I am still a small town Northern Minnesota girl whose soul is fed by the low hills, the clanking of the hog feeders, the lakes, the trees, and the sounds and smells of the region bordering the lake country and plains. Many individuals there, from Meridel LeSueur to the aged women who did their best to support me by sending me lap quilts, cards and cookies while I was in grad school, have created and sustained me. I can read silos—knowing what the size, brand and condition of the silo means about the economic status and stability of its landholder. For me, there is beauty and nobility there. Simultaneously, however, I know that the place I love is a place of insidious evil, of incest, of violence, of manipulation, of herbicides and pesticides and environmental destruction, of land too often soaked in blood, and of lies. There are destroyed people attracted to easy explanations, avoided truths, and deflections, and who don’t want to heal themselves. I know this on an intellectual level and on a profoundly personal level.
Calling a spade a spade is the right thing to do.
This is a disturbing coincidence. The swastika will never lose its original connotation, so your reaction is perfectly understandable. Why you didn't turn around and leave is what bothers me.
ReplyDeleteThe saddest thing of all is that the swastika is a symbol of the footprints of Buddha and the juxtaposition of such a peaceful philosophy with such vile ignorance.
ReplyDeleteMajorities (be they white, able-bodied or whatever) just seem utterly indifferent to the hurt caused by words, actions and symbols. If it doesn't offend them then it's ok and we're just being over-sensitive.
I am trying to write a blog in response to THIS but I just don't know where to begin unpacking it. Worst thing is, he's done it before.