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Hatewatch is managed by the staff of the Intelligence Report, an investigative magazine published by the Alabama-based civil rights group Southern Poverty Law Center.
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[AL]
Mixed-Race Couple’s Home Defaced With ‘White Power’ Graffiti
The Birmingham News
/June 28, 2008
Vandals spray-painted a swastika, “Black is Death,” and a White Power symbol on the home of a mixed-race couple who moved to nearly all-white Cullman County in January.
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on July 10th, 2008 at 10:24 am
Saddened, maddened and disillusioned. I live in Pennsylvania and I have witnessed a more intense racism, since the last ten years that all the time that I incurred in North Carolina, South Carolina (1970 – 1999) and Fontana ( 1989-1993) , California, when I went into a known White Supremaciast venue (2000)
on July 10th, 2008 at 12:10 pm
Why am I not surprised that such a racist incident occurred? Because they have happened to me and my wife several times over the 36 years we have been married. I was almost killed in 2004 when I was attacked and hit over the head with a club while just riding my bike. I was in the hospital for 14 days and barely survived. What was the result? They told the EMS people that a dog ran out in front of my bike, and I fell over and hit my head. I was totally unconcious and couldn’t tell the truth. After I recovered I tried to get the ones who did it. No investigation was ever done. The entire town covered up the lie and no one was ever brought to justice. I lived on a small farm just outside of the town where it happened. There were no Black people on that side of the railroad tracks, and they had harrassed my wife and I for 20 years while I was serving our country in the Air Force. That was the last straw. It was either move or be killed. We sold the farm we loved and moved to another state. We have lived in several states over our 36 years of marriage. The racial harassment never stops, anywhere in this country. Sad but true from one who has been through it, and continues to experience it. It happens because those who see it and could stop it, very seldom ever do. It is like a bushel of apples. One bad apple slowly destroys the entire bushel. Can it ever be stopped? Sure it can. We are a FREE people who can make decisions and stand for what is right for all. I hope our nation can do what Mr. Obama is trying to do. That the good people can begin to accept each other for who they are, rather than the color of their skin. Let us begin while we are still able to do so, and before the whole bushel spoils, and our Great Nation is Great no more. LOVE is the GREATEST healer this world will ever know. It is time for all of us to practice what our nation preaches to the rest of the world. FREEDOM for ALL PEOPLE, of all races and colors. I am white and my wife is black. We have never harrassed anyone back who bothered us. We just bow our heads and pray that God will protect us from evil. AMEN
on July 10th, 2008 at 2:08 pm
It is laughable to hear the phrase “racism doesn’t exist here anymore”, especially pertaining to small southern towns. I was reared in the Deep South and know discrimination and prejudice in all its wicked forms. My parents were the only interracial couple in town for years, if not decades! I recall the stares, hateful remarks, offensive names, and outright ostracism my family all endured. That lovely charming veneer so often celebrated is just a tarp covering the truth; I don’t think things will ever change in this country….history proves that time and again.
on July 12th, 2008 at 11:12 am
My heart goes out to this Alabama couple, and to you Mr. Harmon. I have felt the stares and demeaning slights anyone in the South does who dares to associate outside his proscibed racial lines.
It is extremely hard to understand the fears that can engender such mindless hatred as shown by the people who torment you. I think you are struggling hard to keep that torment from poisoning your life with hatred as well. I wish you well in that struggle. It is perhaps the most unsettling thing that we ever learn in our life’s progress, that there are people in the world who hate us, not because of what we have done, or what we say, nor what we truly are, but because of some presumed difference which is in fact a thin veneer of appearance.
I do not believe that we cannot change things though. We must each of us look for evidence in those closest to us that they might be falling into this perverse mindset of treating others they do not know as rightful objects of scorn and hatred. In the face of any adversity, we must keep up the good fight.
on July 31st, 2008 at 11:55 am
C Harmon,
My heart bleeds from hearing your story. I am sorry you and your wife had to suffer the way you did. May God continue to watch over you. Amen