Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

No Justins, No Peace

I see no possible difficulties whatsoever with this fool-proof plan.

I wonder if trump will be tried as an adult.

Wake up. Grow up. Get in the fight.

Elections aren’t won by handwringing, cowering, and/or bashing your own candidates.

He seems like a smart guy, but JFC, what a dick!

T R E 4 5 O N

If senate republicans had any shame, they’d die of it.

Fight for a just cause, love your fellow man, live a good life.

Fuck these fucking interesting times.

We cannot abandon the truth and remain a free nation.

Let me file that under fuck it.

Why is it so hard for them to condemn hate?

“woke” is the new caravan.

An almost top 10,000 blog!

If West Virginia and San Francisco had a love child.

Good lord, these people are nuts.

Damn right I heard that as a threat.

There is one struggling party in US right now, and it’s not the Democrats.

Republicans are the party of chaos and catastrophe.

Republicans are radicals, not conservatives.

I desperately hope that, yet again, I am wrong.

The words do not have to be perfect.

Nikki Haley, who can’t acknowledge ‘slavery’, is a pathetic shill.

You are here: Home / Civil Rights / Racial Justice / Black Lives Matter / The 1921 Tulsa Massacre: Essential (Harrowing) Reading

The 1921 Tulsa Massacre: Essential (Harrowing) Reading

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And this is not to dismiss Tulsa. I’m just saying that we shouldn’t feed into the narrative that Black ownership and success is extraordinary.

Every time Black people are left to their own devices, excellence emerges.

In fact, the Black section of Tulsa was originally known as “Little Africa.” But in 1906, Booker T. Washington visited and saw the community.

He told them about a district he had started in Tuskegee, Ala. filled with Black-owned businesses.

He named Tuskegee’s “Black Wall Street” after Tuskegee Institute’s first agricultural teacher, C.W. Greene.

He called it “Greenwood.”

Secondly, we have this notion that Greenwood was filled with business owners. Not true.

Here’s the rest of the story…

Except, perhaps, for an odd historical note from the Washington Post:

Reader Interactions

70Comments

  1. 1.

    raven

    Nicole Wallace is having Jason Johnson  screaming about how useless Biden’s speech was. FUCK YEA!!!  Happy now?

  2. 2.

    VeniceRiley

    @raven: Ugh.
    I hope we can keep a spotlight on Tulsa for a loooooong time. I think white Tulsa is just waiting for this to blow over.

  3. 3.

    Elizabelle

    Thank you, Anne.

    @ raven:  Who is Jason Johnson??  Should I care??  If he thinks Biden’s speech was useless, maybe he is better suited to one of those fine restaurant jobs I hear tell are going unfilled …

  5. 5.

    raven

    @Elizabelle: He’s a Professor and, yes, I think you should.

     

    Dr. Jason Johnson

     

    ·

    I can’t believe #Biden went in front of the descendants of the #TulsaMassacre and repeated that same tired trope about interracial couples on television. I wrote about it after the FIRST time he said it

  6. 6.

    raven

    Jason Johnson is an American political scientist, commentator and writer. He is the author of the book Political Consultants and Campaigns: One Day to Sell. Johnson is an associate professor[1] of communication and journalism at Morgan State University. He is a regular political contributor to MSNBC and CNN.

  7. 7.

    Baud

    @raven: 

     and repeated that same tired trope about interracial couples on television

    Why did Biden bring up the Willises?

  9. 9.

    Brachiator

    @raven: 

    Nicole Wallace is having Jason Johnson screaming about how useless Biden’s speech was. FUCK YEA!!! Happy now?

    I don’t know who Jason Johnson is, and don’t much care.

  10. 10.

    Elizabelle

    PDF:  a Harvard study:

    After The Burning:
    The Economic Effects of the 1921 Tulsa Race Massacre

    Found this via the CNBC story, which was a really helpful one, with helpful links.

  11. 11.

    Elizabelle

    WaPost roundup; they don’t have a story up yet.

    President Biden on Tuesday commemorated the 100th anniversary of the Tulsa race massacre, the ravaging of a once-prosperous Black business district and neighborhood by a White mob that stands as one of the worst episodes of racial violence in U.S. history. “As painful as it is, only in remembrance do wounds heal. We just have to choose to remember, memorialize what happened here in Tulsa, so it can’t be erased,” the president said in a speech.

    While in Oklahoma, Biden promoted initiatives to reduce the Black-White wealth gapand said he had tapped Vice President Harris to lead the push for voting rights in response to states imposing ballot restrictions.

  12. 12.

    dww44

    @raven: I’ve not been a fan of Jason Johnson for quite some time.  He’s too angry.  He’s never happy with anything that Democrats do and when he described Biden as like a lot of other 70 plus year old white men…belittling him in that way, I switched channels.  I know there’s the overused terms of ABM or ABL, but the truth is, angry people who scream at you all the time are never gonna gain any ground. No matter what their political persuasion or their skin color.  He needs to go to Anger Management Class.

  13. 13.

    raven

    @Brachiator: Well we have people bitching because there are former republicans on the goddamn show so we should be all fucking happy that we also get an African American who calls bullshit on the whole deal, shouldn’t we? Isn’t that “criticism”?

  15. 15.

    Elizabelle

    I think I’ve seen some stuff by Jason Johnson before and liked it.

    Maybe he’s not always running around with his hair (if he has any) on fire.

    Not helpful, dude.

  16. 16.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @raven: Well we have people bitching because there are former republicans on the goddamn show s

    For those not following (and it’s not really worth following) I made one (1) off-hand comment about Matthew Dowd and Nicolle Wallace in the previous thread. That’s “people bitching”.

    I don’t know  (also don’t really care) why I touched a nerve with you by pointing out that Dowd and Wallace were framing an issue stupidly, but as I explained to you: Jason Johnson hadn’t yet said anything, stupid or not. What Wallace and Dowd said was still stupid.

    As you so often advise: If you don’t like what’s on your TV, you can turn it off.

  18. 18.

    NotMax

    @dww44

    He’s never happy with anything that Democrats do

    Reminded of a comment made by author/humorist Peter De Vries.

    “My father hated radio and could not wait for television to be invented so he could hate that too.”

    ;)

  19. 19.

    taumaturgo

    From JJ and many more blacks’ perspectives, the visit and speech were fine, the lack of concrete actions -like announcing a panel to study reparations for the descendants and any survivors of the massacre – would have been a most welcome step and avoided the let down of another of many virtue-signaling events that characterize the Democrats.

  20. 20.

    Brachiator

    @raven:

    Well we have people bitching because there are former republicans on the goddamn show so we should be all fucking happy that we also get an African American who calls bullshit on the whole deal, shouldn’t we? Isn’t that “criticism”?

    No. Not really.

  22. 22.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    @dww44: but the truth is, angry people who scream at you all the time are never gonna gain any ground.

    True, but they are good for the network’s ratings.

  24. 24.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @raven: No, because I wanted to see what others had to say, and to see Biden’s talk. Like I said, it was an off-hand comment. I can’t for the life of me figure out why it got you so riled up.

    Also, again, don’t really care.

  26. 26.

    Elizabelle

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist:  “The island of misfit black girls.”  LOL.

    … During an interview last week on SiriusXM’s The Karen Hunter Show, Johnson claimed “racist white liberals” support Sanders and that the senator has done “nothing for intersectionality.”

    The MSNBC contributor then took aim at the women of color who work for Sanders. “I don’t care how many people from the island of misfit black girls you throw out there to defend you,” Johnson exclaimed.

  27. 27.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @raven:

    you’re good people and always have been.

    Well, thanks. And again, backatcha.

    I guess I mis-, or over-, interpreted your comments. Sorry.

    I’m gonna go fertilize my trees.

  32. 32.

    dww44

    @NotMax:  heh. I guess, to be fair to Professor Johnson, he’s not necessarily not pleased with Democratic party actions, whatever those changes are they never seem to be enough. While I get why he’s angry about the lack of reparations and the whole Tulsa thing, I am not likely to be persuaded by someone who shouts and demands all the time. Incremental change is better than no change. Long term lasting change is almost always incremental. But then, I’m a senior and I witnessed all the events since WWII.

  33. 33.

    NotMax

    @dww44

    Quoting De Vries again.

    “We all learn by experience, but some of us have to go to summer school.”

    ;)

  37. 37.

    terraformer

    I amazed anew each time I read about this topic.

    Count me as one of those who’s first inkling this happened with through a fvcking HBO miniseries. Other than innate hate and/or an inability to admit error, too many white people care to learn about this moment in our history, much less recognize its metamorphosis to the flavor and activity of white supremacy we see today.

    I say along with reparations, we should use some portion of our national treasure to REBUILD Greenwood and all other such towns and cities, and populate them with first-choice descendants of those massacred, else at least with families of color in need who want to move there.

    We have a lot to answer for, which may or may not be related to the current environment of extreme voter suppression and gerrymandering. That is – those behind such schemes KNOW this shit is getting real and that people are waking up. And they are dead set on not letting their greatest – imagined – fear be realized: that they’ll be “replaced.”

  38. 38.

    Brachiator

    @Elizabelle:

    PDF:  a Harvard study

    I already knew a lot about Tulsa, but appreciate these links to later studies on the impact of the attack on the community.

    And of course, what happened there is hardly unique, but part of  a history of a long assault on communities of color.

  41. 41.

    Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)

    @Brachiator:

    One thing I never knew was that there were “internment centers” for the captured black Tulsans. That was chilling to read

  42. 42.

    dmsilev

    @Elizabelle:

    SiriusXM’s The Karen Hunter Show

    I have a completely inappropriate mental image of someone lying in wait for a wild Karen, having baited the trap with a store manager or something.

  43. 43.

    Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)

    @SiubhanDuinne:

    One of the first inmates on death row set for execution is 65-year-old Frank Atwood, who was convicted of killing a child in 1984 but  Atwood’s legal team have objected, saying that the state is in a hurry to set an execution date despite an ongoing investigation their client’s possible innocence.

    They have also argued that the potassium cyanide purchased by the corrections department does not meet the state’s execution protocol which explicitly demands that only sodium cyanide be used. This is not an insignificant detail, attorney Joseph Perkovich said.

    “Frank Atwood is prepared to die. He is a man of Greek Orthodox faith and is preparing for this moment. But he does not want to be tortured and subjected to a botched execution,” Perkovich added.

    Despite Arizona’s efforts to present their planned execution method as acceptable and reputable, the name Zyklon B is inextricably linked to the horrors of the past, when over a million Jews and others were murdered in Nazi gas chambers using the lethal gas between 1942 and 1945.

    Evil people. I’m glad the Jerusalem Post is emphasizing the Holocaust implications of this. Absolutely disgusting how much Republicans want to kill people so badly, who will never be a danger to anyone else ever again

  45. 45.

    Geminid

     

     

    @Goku (aka Amerikan Baka): The Root recently put up a review of their reporting since 2009 on the Tulsa Massacre, with excerpts. There is also at least one contemporary article. The excellant Michael Harriot writes for The Root, and may well put up an article tonight. The Root is a good source for news about the Black community generally, and it’s encounters with racist white people and institutions in particular.

  47. 47.

    Poe Larity

    Who were the White perpetrators?

    All of them. How big was Tulsa back then? Get the phone/address lookup from the library, cross them with obits and have a Henry Louis Gates mini-series.

    Let the ancestors howl and shriek.

  48. 48.

    Mike in NC

    @SiubhanDuinne:  Competing with South Carolina, where they want to bring back firing squads and the electric chair if there’s ever a shortage of lethal injections. Insane.

  52. 52.

    Steeplejack

    @SiubhanDuinne:

    I have often wondered: why not a fatal dose of heroin or something similar? Not painful but lethal. Or whatever drug they give to humanely put down pets. Is the problem that it wouldn’t be “cruel and unusual” enough?

    I am against the death penalty, in any case.

  53. 53.

    raven

    @Steeplejack:

    An occasional cause of accidental death in humans, inert gas asphyxia with gases including helium, nitrogen, methane and argon has been used as a suicide method. Inert gas asphyxia has been advocated by proponents of euthanasia, using a gas-retaining plastic hood device colloquially referred to as a suicide bag.

    Nitrogen asphyxiation has been suggested as a new way to carry out capital punishment. In April 2015, the Oklahoma Governor Mary Fallin signed a bill authorizing nitrogen asphyxiation as an alternative execution method in cases where the state’s primary method of lethal injection was not available.[5][6] In March 2018, Oklahoma attorney general Mike Hunter and corrections director Joe M. Allbaugh announced plans to implement nitrogen executions,[7] but after struggling for years to design a nitrogen execution protocol, the state announced in February 2020 it abandoned the project and will resume executions by lethal injection.[8]

  54. 54.

    Steeplejack

    @dmsilev:

    “[. . .] having baited the trap with a store manager or something a black person doing something innocuous in public.”

    Fix’d. The store manager comes later.

  56. 56.

    Steeplejack

    @raven:

    That seems plausible, if it’s painless. Or just gassing them with carbon monoxide. The euthanasia literature must be full of painless ways to die.

  58. 58.

    burnspbesq

    @taumaturgo:

    ‘If you know anybody who has a concrete, achievable plan to get a reparations plan through Congress, I’d love to hear about it.

  60. 60.

    WaterGirl

    @ljt: I asked John to buy the software that lets you take a tweet series and make it into a .pdf file.  He bought it.

    If you want to I’ve me link to the thread you are talking about, I’m sure we can get that done.

    Oh, and totally OT, when you decide that your spicy sloppy joes needs a little more chili powder, do not accidentally add an extra 2 tablespoons worth when it comes out faster than you expected.

  64. 64.

    Omnes Omnibus

    @WaterGirl:  This is not our Platonic self. It may be who we have been and who we currently are, but, to paraphrase an old army ad, we still haven’t been able to be all we can be.

  65. 65.

    prostratedragon

    @WaterGirl:  Hmm. Sounds like as bad an idea as the cup of cider vinegar spasm-dumped into otherwise excellent spaghetti sauce.  You know,  to give it a little more tang.

  67. 67.

    NotMax

    @WaterGirl

    This is why, when shaking out dry spices without measuring, you shake them into the palm of your free hand, not directly into the food.

  68. 68.

    WaterGirl

    @NotMax: My other hand was holding the lid of the pan!

    But yes, clearly my technique could use some work.  In all my life, this has never happened to me before.  But I am a quick study!

    Not quick enough, however, to have scooped out the part that had the avalanche of chili powder on it.  In my defense, I didn’t know just how bad it was until I tried to stir it in.  oh well.

  69. 69.

    ljt

    @WaterGirl: The Michael Harriot thread is the one linked at the top. Anne Laurie showed the first several tweets, with a link to the “rest of the story.” I have trouble following beyond a half a dozen or so tweets, but I think this is an important thread.

    Hope your spicy sloppy joes aren’t too spicy!

  70. 70.

    Miss Bianca

    @dmsilev:

    I have a completely inappropriate mental image of someone lying in wait for a wild Karen, having baited the trap with a store manager or something.

    I will now NEVER be able to hear the name “Karen Hunter” again without that image in my head, THANKS, guy!//

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