Tuesday, November 22, 2016

The United States of Hell No Letter #7


11/22/16

Dear Assailant-in-Chief,

Today I met a woman named Beatrice, at the funeral of a mutual friend. We were chatting about the video going around of some of your more "exuberant" supporters saying "Hail Trump!" and giving Nazi salutes.

"They want to take us back to post-Reconstruction," she said, referring to the backlash that followed the period of relative freedom and equality just after the Civil War, the backlash that led to rulings like Plessy vs. Ferguson and the establishment of Jim Crow. 

I know many women like her...elaborately braided gray hair, self-composed, elegant to her fingertips.  Chair of the Social Justice Committee in her AME church.  Lifelong member of the NAACP.  There are hundreds like her just in Atlanta alone...running civic organizations, volunteering, donating to political campaigns.  Working behind the scenes mostly, just like they have done for decades.  She was wearing a safety pin and made sure I knew what it was for, and also made sure I knew there was going to be a Women's March in January.

I trust women like her.  They re-shaped the world I grew up in, into something better and more just.  They may not be as young as they used to be, but they know how this is done.  They have been here before, and they aren't scared.  And with that kind of example before me, what else can I do but fall in line?  If this is to be a battle for the soul of America, then so be it.  I know whose side I want to be on.

Do you really want to go down in history as a villain?  There's still time.  It doesn't have to be this way.  But if you aren't afraid of the elegant black grandmothers of this world, then you simply do not understand what you are dealing with. If you continue down the path you are on, they will be coming for you.

"I have a six year old grand-daughter.  She is not going to grow up under that. We have fought too hard for too long.  We are not going back."

"No," I agreed.  "We are not."

Yours sincerely,

Sara Amis
Citizen of these United States of America


From Dorine Jennette:

PLEASE JOIN ME IN WRITING THE ASSAILANT-IN-CHIEF
Please join me in bombarding the Assailant-in-Chief with letters: https://www.donaldjtrump.com/contact. I will write to him every day through his first 100 days in office, maybe longer if momentum holds. I am asking others to write just ONE letter. Let's not just vent our grief to each other--let's speak truth to power together. Please WRITE and please SHARE this plan with your friends. Pass it on!
You do not need to be a woman or an assault survivor to address the Assailant-in-Chief as such. If you are a man who has a daughter, a sister, a wife, a woman colleague or friend you respect, or a mother (hint: that last one is all of you!), then you have something to say to the Assailant-in-Chief. Your letter might be a brief one-liner. That's great! Please send it! Women need our allies now. Here's the link to DJT's contact page--this might take you one minute or less! https://www.donaldjtrump.com/contact
Or, maybe you will start a related project addressing any one of the many groups Trump has already harmed . . .
As we talk with each other, let's break the bubble and also send our complaints straight to the source. He won't read them and won't care if he does, so probably this is a placeholder action while we figure out what we're really going to do . . . but it's something.

Dorine's posts can be found here:  https://www.facebook.com/dorine.jennette

PS from Sara:  I've taken to just tweeting these at him.  He's not going to read them anyway, but I might as well use the platform that he actually responds to.  *snort*

No comments:

Post a Comment