Black America Knows What Real Patriotism Looks Like
By : Danielle C . Belton Guest Columnist
It used to happen every Fourth of July . Our homeowners association would place little , cheap American flags on each lawn , and every year ours ended up in the trash . Every year my parents - born in America , raised in America , the only country they ’ ve ever known and will know , who had no desire to leave and will die here - were only outwardly patriotic about once every four years , when the Olympics were on . And even then , that was more of a benign nationalism .
Black America Real Patriotism Danielle C . Belton Selma , Alabama April 2015
My parents , like countless others who were part of America ’ s outsiders trapped on the inside , had a complicated relationship with their mother country , especially since their mother country was also an abusive neglector who constantly victim-blamed . “ Why are you hitting yourself ?” was her motto as she crafted an environment ripe for self-inflicted wounds .
You don ’ t get to choose your parents . Or your country . My parents , like millions of other black people , were just here , descendants of Africans brought here against their will , then told that they must love this country and their oppressors , no matter what horrors were inflicted upon them . Slavery . Segregation . Jim Crow . Lynchings . Bombings . Beatings . Discrimination .
For those unwilling to face what our country has done in the name of “ liberty ” for some , they charge black Americans a price for acceptance - for patriotism - and that price is to forget the pain inflicted . Forget the anguish . Let it wash away with your patriotism . You can ’ t love America and hate her ways . You must eat the whole of our union , consume it , even if it renders you sick .
Why do you people hate America ?
My parents were supposed to get over segregated water fountains and the abject poverty they were raised in . My sisters and I were supposed to forget how , even today , there are neighborhoods in our hometown of St . Louis where black people simply don ’ t go . From Rodney King to Michael Brown , we were supposed to get on board the “ I Love America ” train and leave our pain in the rearview . But our family couldn ’ t . We would be good citizens and productive members of society , but we weren ’ t going to pretend the bad things didn ’ t happen . Patriots we were , but our loyalty could not be forged out of ignorance .
And yet , forgetting America ’ s transgressions against black Americans is what is asked of us by those who appoint themselves protectors of America ’ s history . These are the individuals who dislike the ugliness of America ’ s past but can ’ t reconcile that we live in an ambitious , prosperous and plentiful country founded on contradictions . Founded on “ all men are created equal ... except for the slaves I presently own as I write this .” Founded on liberty , thievery and free labor .
These are the people who try to rewrite textbooks and silence critics , painting them as un-American for daring to remember things that “ happened so long ago .” Or things that happened 50 years ago , like
Thousands of people walk across the Ed Selma , Ala ., during the 50th-ann
Selma-to-Montgomery , JUSTIN SULLIVAN / GETTY IMAGES
“ Bloody Sunday ” in Selma , Ala . Or people who remember things that happened five minutes ago , like another young black man shot and killed by a police officer in Madison , Wis .
Case in point : an Oklahoma Republican who thinks American history has an anti-American slant : “ In essence , we have a new emphasis on what is bad about America ,” said state Rep . Dan Fisher , the measure ’ s chief sponsor . “[ The new framework ] trades an emphasis on America ’ s founding principles of constitutional government in favor of robust analyses of gender and racial oppression and class ethnicity and the lives of marginalized people , where the emphasis on instruction is of America as a nation of oppressors and exploiters ,” Fisher lamented at a legislative committee hearing Tuesday .
And then there ’ s this , courtesy of former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani : “ I do not believe , and I know this is a horrible thing to say , but I do not believe that the president loves America ,” Giuliani said during the dinner at the 21 Club , a former Prohibition-era speakeasy in midtown Manhattan . “ He doesn ’ t love you . And he doesn ’ t love me . He wasn ’ t brought up the way you were brought up and I was brought up through love of this country .”