Charleston and the Confederacy: Revenge of America's Dark Past (Der Spiegel, Germany)
"The U.S.
excels at pointing out injustice in other countries. It even often helps other
countries cope with shameful pasts. … However, the U.S. has been less successful
addressing the dark parts of its own past. … This includes its treatment of the American
Indians, who were brutally repressed or even killed because they were an
obstacle to the settlement of the West. They were betrayed, neglected and
disrespected. … Yet when it comes to the history of dealing with Blacks, who
were once snatched from their homes, forced into ship galleys and kept like
animals for centuries - Americans seem even more forgetful."
Why is American
society only now holding a sincere debate about racism? The dead of Charleston
are also the dead of a nation that has so far refused to work through its past
mistakes.
The United State excels at pointing out injustice in other
countries. It even often helps other countries cope with shameful pasts.
Germany will be eternally grateful to the United States for sending American
troops across the Atlantic to defeat the Nazis and for insisting that Germans
be held accountable for crimes they committed. The Nuremberg Trials gave
Germans the opportunity to own up to what they had done. They could no longer
deny it.
However, the U.S. has been less successful addressing the
dark parts of its own past.
This includes its treatment of the American Indians, who
were brutally repressed or even killed because they were an obstacle to the
settlement of the West. They were betrayed, neglected and disrespected. Today
they live on reservations under some of the saddest living conditions the
civilized world has to offer.
Yet when it comes to the history of dealing with Blacks, who
were once snatched from their homes, forced into ship galleys and kept like
animals for centuries - Americans seem even more forgetful. Even after the
Civil War and the official abolition of slavery, it took another hundred years
before discriminatory racial laws were at last officially lifted.
To this day, there has never been a formal apology made on
behalf of the state to Blacks, nor any attempts at redress, let alone
compensate them. Instead, many patterns of institutionalized racism continue to
exist. When there is no clean break from the past, it may be difficult for
people to part with their old ways of thinking. Indeed, not only do many
Americans continue to hold twisted notions about White superiority, such
beliefs have often gone unchallenged.
Imagine: 150 years have passed since the end of the American
Civil War, and only now has a national debate begun over whether some symbols
of Southerners remain appropriate - and only after nine Black people died in
Charleston, executed by a White Nazi who adorned himself with the Confederate
flag and other symbols of alleged White supremacy. There has never been any
doubt that the South went to war against the North in order to defend its
"right" to continue to hold Blacks like animals, put them in chains
or flog when they refused to obey.
How can it be that for many politicians and citizens, this
flag is only now somewhat embarrassing? Why are people only now questioning the
wisdom of naming streets and public spaces after the greatest warriors of the fight
for slavery? They may have been "brave," but monuments should not be
built in their honor for fighting for a despicable cause. That is - unless we
believe that what they stood for is not so reprehensible after all.
How in the West and East, Mass Murderers are Bred (Elsevier, The Netherlands)
On the Mall in Washington, not somewhere in Germany, is one
of the best and most poignant Holocaust museums in the world. Yet similarly
impressive museums dedicated to the history of slavery, racist polices
throughout American history or the treatment of the Native Americans are lacking.
Thomas Jefferson, the author of the Declaration of Independence, is enshrined
on that Mall in a monument fit for a deity. That Jefferson was also a brutal
slave owner is something one learns only at his former estate in Monticello –
and then only if one looks real hard.
Posted By Worldmeets.US
To date, Americans' treatment of their own dark past is so
ignorantly passive, so intentionally vague, so in denial - that it begs the
question: Do a majority of Americans feel any guilt or acknowledge any
wrongdoing toward Blacks and Native Americans? Or is it that they are in fact quite
content for to have the old balance of power somehow linger on?
Every nation has dark spots in its past, and nowhere are they
darker than in Germany. However, the greatness of a country is reflected in how
it deals with this past and whether it examines it critically. In this respect,
the United States is not nearly as great as it believes itself to be.
