What’s hotter than July? An anxiety-filled, hot, summer, August day in Money, Mississippi because a teen relative has been kidnapped at the hands of the rogue white “authority” trying to save a white woman’s honor.
Southern Dirt Road
The roads are still because it is the South; people aren’t really moving around much because of the sun’s bulls eye on the extremities of every person’s body, penetrating its overwhelming heat underneath the skin—almost to the bones. Black skin glistens from the pooling sweat that settles into the crevices of the neck, armpits, and forehead frown lines. Every now and then birds fly around, but even they submit to the sun’s might as they hide in the shadows created by big trees and even faint shrubs. What never takes a break is the sea of gnats in little malevolent gangs, seemingly moving around arbitrarily, but certainly for the purpose of bothering people. Also, the mosquitos wage their own civil rights movement as they buzz, bite, and sit-in on all of the moist, exposed bodies without discriminating.
14 Years Old
It’s August 28th, 1955 and a fourteen year-old, out-of-towner has been brutally murdered by two savage men who are unfortunately parents and regrettably citizens of the United States of America. The fourteen year old victim is Emmett Louis Till. He is a whistle-blower. When his body is submerged under a 70 lb. cotton gin fan, his foot rises to unveil the open secret of racial violence in America. His mother is his accomplice. She demands an open casket funeral. And, America is subpoenaed to testify about the racism and violence that now has a national logo thanks to the publications of JET and The Chicago Defender of Emmett’s terribly bloated, and horrendously tortured body.
Emmett and Mamie Till
Love!
There are still hot summers in August, only it is fifty-eight years later. The streets are not still but the sun is a little more forgiving. People are marching, protesting, and carrying on with their everyday lives rather than living in fear of being kidnapped and lynched. They are also sitting in air-conditioned offices writing legislation and discussing ways to finally fix the problems of the past. For
Emmett Till’s Testimony
decades prior, nameless men, women and children were lynched—their spirits still haunt the rivers, trees, and various other places where they lost their lives. Ida B. Wells was their crusader, even at the very risk of losing her life. In essence, she is a whistle-blower, too. Decades after Till’s lynching, there has been no resolve to the prejudicial and discriminatory violence killing our young people–17 year-old Trayvon Martin has had to be inducted into the whistle blowers club, too–helping to bring public and national attention to the wrongs of racial, discriminatory, and profiling injustice in his death.
On Wednesday, August 28th, 2013 when President Obama and former Presidents Clinton and Carter stand before America to address the 50th anniversary of the March on Washington, Emmett Till will stand with them as well on the 58th day of the remembrance of his death. This fourteen year-old, man-child is the wind beneath the march’s fervor, holding the government accountable to its promise even in death. He is the catalyst to the Civil Rights Movement and we will never forget him.
Presidential Medal of Freedom
President Obama will be awarding 16 people from various walks of life to receive the Presidential Medal of Freedom. The Presidential Medal of Freedom is the Nation’s highest civilian honor, presented to individuals who have made especially meritorious contributions to the security or national interests of the United States, to world peace, or to cultural or other significant public or private endeavors. The awards will be presented at the White House later this year (Whitehouse.gov).
The seventeenth recipient should be America’s man-child whistle-blower, Emmett Louis Till.
DID YOU KNOW?
Emmett Till’s murderers sold their story to a British magazine, Look, for $4000. They made money from taking Emmett Till’s life.
George Zimmerman, Trayvon Martin’s killer, is now asking the state of Florida to cover his court costs for about $250,000.00. Sad!
To lean more information about the life of Emmett Till go to:
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/till/
To learn more about the life of Ida B. Wells go to:
ThePoliDay Report 