Ethan Webb
140 Years Overdue
There’s an old phrase, “History is written by the winners.” And, as Napoleon once said, “What is history, but a fable agreed upon?”
Such is the case of the Tulsa Race Riots. At the time of their happenstance, the African American was nothing but “the negro”—or, in other words, a second-class citizen akin to an unruly nuisance worth no more respect than that given to a stray dog.
In an incident similar to the fate of Emmett Till—which would come decades later—the Tulsa Race Riots were caused by a fabricated sexual assault by a black boy on a white girl. Dick Rowland (a 19-year-old black shoe shiner), in the eyes of Caucasians, deserved retribution for his “sexual assault” on Sarah Page (a 17-year-old white elevator operator). In other words, what has been called "the single worst incident of racial violence in American history” was catalyzed by white men and their eager spawn who hunted a black youth for a crime he did not commit.
And while Mr. Rowland was caught anything but red-handed, white folks verily had blood upon their hands—a travesty omitted by history curriculums in schools and the textbooks that accompany them. Indeed, during an all-too-forgotten era—when white men were free to extract their wrath upon the likes of Emmett Till and Dick Rowland without any legal repercussions nor moral condemnation—they were busy committing crimes; during the Tulsa Race Riots, they made their rounds in Tulsa by murdering people of color as well as burning their houses and businesses down to the ground. Ashes and blood; cinder and smoke; bigotry and prejudice: anything but emancipation hung like a smog in the air.
It is more than tragedy & travesty combined that America—of all nations—not only allowed the Tulsa Race Riots to blight its short history, but also proactively attempted to pretend it did not occur. To call this turn of events “shameful” rings hollow and does not offer this facticity the justice it deserves. While the U.S. Military sacrifices the lives of its young men & women—to go abroad and stake its claim in countries by “fixing” their lack of democracy and liberty—it is ironic that we lack any accountability for our own lack of propriety. In my opinion, it is a turn of events akin to the Nazis who tried to destroy their concentration camps as a last-ditch effort to redeem themselves once they came to the harrowing awakening that they were to be defeated in the Second World War—and would not be the ones to write the history books.
It’s enough to wonder why the United States government didn’t intervene and do a thorough investigation of what happened after the fact. If they had, perhaps the deaths of folks like Emmett Till could have been prevented. But it’s even more confounding that they chose to hide an ugly truth when “We the People” tout our nation as one based upon the principles of “Equality And Justice For All.” The American creed proves to be a fallacy, more and more with each coming day, especially when the United States takes measures to throw the Tulsa Race Riots under a velvet curtain. It might be ancient history to The Proud Boys and those blindly hollering with their Confederate flags tailing them as they ride the doomed bandwagon of Trumpism, but those who do not study history and heed its lessons are bound to repeat it. There are hypocrites and there are monsters, and America is evidently toeing a very thin, red line.
Seemingly, such history is currently repeating itself. We’ve entered a new phase of negligence toward African Americans on behalf of the United States government. One only has to look at the ever-growing list of African American citizens murdered in cold blood by those meant to be “Serving & Protecting” in their Blue uniform—that has long been compiling—or the modernized slavery implemented by the rampantly unjust prison-industrial complex (Read: Ebony & Ivy by Craig Steven Wilder).
Whether it be the War on Drugs throwing a disproportionate amount of minorities in jail or the Fortune 500 companies that reap enormous dividends from the fruits of their back-breaking & penniless labor, time is of the essence for those who seek Revolution—we need to make a change now, or a change will never come. As the revolutionary African American poet and musician, Gil Scott Heron, once said, “You can't depend on the train from Washington; it's 100 years overdue.” And the train from Washington has been turning more and more into a Fascist missile, with the bigoted ideologies of Donald Trump boasted by the Republican Parties and the two-faced propositions of Democratic lawmakers turning friend into foe.
Our nation has come a long way in the grand scheme of time—with somewhat-significant progress—but that progress is far from sufficient. We have a long way to go, and victims such as Trayvon Martin & Eric Gardner will merely be forgotten if not for the social justice our generation will hopefully bring to the fore. If we are to ensure the history books recount the ugly side of America, then it is up to us to confirm that their names are not lost in the annals of time. Because if the Revolution is not only televised but made a certainty, there will be fewer stains for America to hide in the books that accompany its biased history curriculums. If Revolution does not happen, however, days like Columbus Day will remain Holidays while days like MLK Day will be remembered less and less.