#Confederate hate

[supernova-o7]

Dear Confederates,

You, and everything you claim to believe in, are a stain on not only the history of America, but history in general. Your identity is based on a rebellion of entitled pricks who were too much of a pussy to go out and grow their own crops. The Confederacy only managed to last 5 years. 5 years. The annoying Orange outlasted you, John Cena's career has lapped you 4 times over in terms of longevity, hell, Obama's presidency lasted longer than you. Your existence was a waste of space on this plant we called home, and no one meaningful cried when you were destroyed. I pray that a patriotic America will take the time out of their day to beat some sense into your empty head.

TL:DR: Get fucked Traitors.

[dear-ao3]

robert e lee was a fucking idiot and a terrible general and im not sorry for saying so

[dontmean2bepoliticalbut]

[cookie-nom-nom]

“The only thing that we're not doing is we're not shooting [immigrants] who come across the border, because of course, the Biden administration would charge us with murder.” -Greg Abbott, Texas governor

Hey, so in case y'all aren't aware, the governor of Texas is defying the Supreme Court's order to take out razor wire on the border that severely endangers the lives of people trying to cross, under the grounds that Texas is protecting itself from invasion. Abbott is threatening to pit the Texas national guard against Federal troops. It's probably a bluff, but praying for Republicans to be rational rarely works. Extremists are literally calling for succession from the United States.

I don't think it'll come to fighting, but the fact Abbott is so openly defying federal orders and blatantly threatening militant action is pretty terrifying. Especially if he's just allowed to do this, which would set a very dangerous precedent for what states can get away with.

[depressedcatgirl]

No, you are not a "redneck" you were born and raised in a new england suburb. Driving a pickup truck with confederate bumper stickers does not make you a redneck.

[frasohei]

When you finally get some motivation to paint… and then you have to wait for the wash to dry…

[hajimeme1]

the feminine urge to blast "Union Dixie" outside of the homes of anyone who flies a Confederate flag

[jomtones-bussy]

I'm always so confused when a conservative posts "I miss the south" or some dumb shit like that like bro they didn't go anywhere 😭

racists watching the south break off from the USA and become a floating island idk:

[cephalonsuda]

yknow, not to be a cunt but i am so who give a shit. i generally don't judge ocs, UNLESS they're the author's Perfect Person power fantasy and they're a bougie bitch. like... genuinely Rich. maybe im too commiepilled to enjoy things anymore, but it's always like... your perfect person is someone who exploits others' labor? ok... cringe...

[fuckmeyer]

I saw a post about racist Jasper stans bitching bc they’re not able to enjoy shitty J*sper content bc of tags or whatever lol and someone said: “What is there even to enjoy?”. I had to laugh and I thought if you bc it’s so true. Most Jasper content isn’t even that enjoyable. It’s mostly the same boring white-supremacist garbage that I’ve seen before; even the jalice stuff is played out.

The only J*sper content I enjoy is content where he is worshipping Maria, thinking about Maria, talking about Maria, loving Maria, doing anything for Maria tbh. Is that bad? XD I owe it to you and your writing! idk something about a 19/20 year old dumbass confederate falling madly in love with a native brown woman and literally seeing her as a god-like figure as she’s basically handing him his karma for his racist crimes sends me. Ppl act like he was this awesome person before Maria and that it’s her fault he’s gutter trash now with the C*llens but he was gutter trash BEFORE he met Maria. She honestly made him so much better, stronger and MUCH more interesting. She literally created the man these stans thirst over so much. She is the blueprint.

the thing anti-María Jalice stans don't get is, without María, you do not have Jasper. for everything Jasper is, María is the catalyst ❤️

canonically, all we know about Jasper Hale pre-change is 1) he was born in Texas, 2) faked his age to join the Confederate Army* where he became the youngest major in Texas, & 3) was persuasive

beyond that, María made Jasper into the man the fandom adores. you like that he's an empath? guess whose venom made him one. you like that he's a warmonger? guess whose war he fought for. you like that he has a troubled past? guess who put the trouble in it. you like that he's "soft" "empath" "baby" (tbh i don't see it but ok)? guess who made him want to be that way. you like that he's submissive to Alice? guess who broke him in first.

you want Jasper with Alice but wish the María era didn't exist? lol just say you want the hot faceless Confederate to get with the psychic Mississippian & go

as for me, MARÍA ALL DAY BAYBEEEEE

here we have a woman who has suffered all her life at the hands of colonizers. born "1800s or earlier," we can suppose she has firsthand experience with colonization (at least Napoleon's invasion) & lived through Mexico's War of Independence. i.e., she has a deep familiarity with what it means to have your way of life ripped from you by invaders. PLUS she was a victim of Benito's army in the Southern Vampire Wars; her entire coven including her mate was killed.

& despite her losses, she rallied to take back her land & drive out her oppressors. baseline, she is a strong, cunning, powerful indigenous woman with a deep love for her community and her people. HOT

now let's look at Jasper, a bright leader in the Civil War who suffered defeat at the hands of the Union army. yes, María changed him. but did she force him to stay? to go to war? the newborn vamp with the strength & speed to overcome a "grown" vamp chose not to do so. the empath with the power to make anyone disregard him chose not to use it. some say María was "abusive" & "manipulative," but few acknowledge that Jasper had a choice.

why didn't Jasper leave? because he's submissive to anyone more powerful than him. because he was a loser. because the Southern Vampire Wars gave him a second chance at victory. because "empath" or no, he wanted to play war & win.

that's what's compelling about Jasper/María. as wrong as Jasper was for fighting for the Confederacy, he believed he was fighting for the same thing as she. he saw his way of life destroyed by "invaders" & fought back. it's a sick & twisted parallel between oppressor & oppressed that becomes subverted as their relationship goes on... & one that can heal them both.

María's experience with colonizers gives her a visceral picture of what it means to be oppressed... but her relationship with Jasper gives her the victory & emotional reflection she needs to move on. Jasper's military training gives him the hunger & knowledge for war... but his "curse" of empathy provides him with the tools he needs to recognize & address the horrors of his problematic past & move on.

tbh, i find Jasper & María are perfectly suited for a delicious character-driven narrative. Maria's story is that of a traumatized indigenous woman on a path from colonization to decolonization, & the sacrifices & destruction she endures realize that vision. Jasper's story is that of a troubled man on the path from self-hate to self-love, & what it means to undo the societal teachings/traumas & forge a life of empathy & forgiveness.

& that is something Alice alone can never give Jasper.

tl;dr all hail Queen María

[samasmith23]

So here's some really fun trivia for y’all!

For my "Idea of the American South" graduate school class, we just had to read William Faulkner's novel Absalom, Absalom! this week, since Faulkner is highly regarded by historians for his nuanced portrayal about the darker side & systemic injustices of the Deep South. But this was actually not my first exposure to Faulkner, since one of his other novels, Go Down, Moses, was actually directly referenced in The Adamantium Men arc of Jason Aaron's Wolverine run. In the arc, the evil Roxxon corporation managed to duplicate the Weapon X procedure which gave Logan his adamantium claws to a bunch of private mercenary henchman in order to act as bodyguards for the company's illegal activities overseas. And they all have lightsaber claws!

One of the titular Adamantium Men was apparently a huge Faulkner fan and was even reading a first edition copy of Go Down, Moses before being told by a Roxxon higher-up to assassinate Wolverine. But when said-mercenary realizes that he's about to lose the fight, he actually asks Logan to spoil the ending of the novel for him before he dies, and Logan honors his request!

I was told that the copy of Go Down, Moses displayed in the comic is actually the original first-edition copy from the guest-lecturer for said-class since it was the only version to ever feature the subtitle “And Other Stories” on the front cover.

And it honestly makes sense that Aaron would reference Faulkner's work since he's similarly written stories which are highly critical of the American South such as his Image Comic series Southern Bastards. One issue of that series even had a variant cover featuring glorious sight of a dog ripping a Confederate flag to shreds!

So beautiful! I would love to train my dog Zoe to do the same thing to one of those AWFUL flags! Plus, the royalties for that variant cover were even donated to the survivors & families of the Charleston mass-shooting in 2015.

From Wolverine: Weapon X #4 by Jason Aaron & Ron Garney.

[ausetkmt]

The national conversation about police violence against civilians grows louder every day. Recent killings of African Americans have fueled a lack of trust between communities of color and police. In 1866, a mass killing happened at the hands of police in downtown New Orleans. That was during Reconstruction, the era Clint Bruce studies.

“White people, I believe, do not understand the mistrust that many black people in the United States have of police and of authorities.”

Bruce says this sitting at his little kitchen table in the Bayou St. John apartment he’s staying in while doing research in town. He’s a professor at Université Sainte-Anne in Nova Scotia, and is working on translating a collection of 70 French language poems that were published during the Civil War and Reconstruction eras in The New Orleans Tribune, a radical newspaper run by mostly people of color.

Two of these poems were written in response to the 1866 massacre. “It was seminal in creating deep feelings of mistrust that I believe black people still have that they will not be protected, and even that they can be killed with impunity” says Bruce about the massacre, who didn’t learn about anything like this growing up in Shreveport in the 1980s.

“A lot of us really looked up to the Civil War as something that was glorious. We played Confederate soldiers, you know, those sorts of things. And it was only later through my studies and interest that I developed as a young adult that a lot of what shaped our world happened during Reconstruction.”

This is when Bruce started to see why black people in America were and are in fear of the police.

Back to 1866 — one year after the Civil War ended — it was a tense year. Back then. Louisiana Republicans wanted to explore giving blacks the right to vote. They called a convention to consider it in the state constitution. “It seems very noble and in many ways it was,” says Bruce. “But everything was politicking, right? And people change loyalties strategically.”

Republicans, arguably, supported giving blacks the right to vote in hopes it would help their party maintain political power. Louisiana was under Union occupation during the Civil War, and had a Republican governor by the end of it. But in 1866, Andrew Johnson was the president of the United States, and a big fan of Home Rule — letting former Confederate states make their own decisions again — as long as they also obeyed federal laws. This concerned Republicans in the South, who felt they would lose ground under Home Rule. At such a pivotal moment, Republicans realized they needed the support of freed black men to maintain political power.

Credit The Historic New Orleans Collection The Mechanic's Institute. 1974.25.3.272.

 “When they got here, I guess about the middle of the block here, they were assaulted by white attackers," she says. "They were verbally and physically assaulted, someone actually shot at them. They fired back, no one was injured. They fought off the attackers and proceeded right down here on Roosevelt Way to what is today the Roosevelt Hotel. Back then it was the Mechanics' Institute.”

This convention had been highly publicized, everyone around town knew it was happening, whether they were for or against blacks gaining the right to vote.  

Bell crosses Canal Street to the entrance of what is now the famous luxury hotel. “So this is where the street was filled with men, women and children, again who were jubilant at the thought of an interracial democracy, the hopes of an interracial democracy.”

The parade of marchers had thwarted off the mob on the other side of Canal, but once they made it to the Mechanics' Institute, where the convention was taking place inside, they were beset by more violence. A gang of white supremacists and ex-Confederates attacked. Fire sirens went off, signaling police to attack. They were sent by the mayor.

“There was panic because the police and firemen, armed, surrounded that building and began advancing,” says Bell. “The attack was premeditated. Lead police chief Harry T. Hayes, what he was doing at the time was recruiting policemen from Confederate veterans. They stormed in and started shooting, chasing people down the street.”

When the attackers finally ran out of bullets, nearly 50 people lay dead, mostly black.

Bell says there were over a hundred injured in all of this. “That's very conservative though, it’s thought that as many as 200, maybe more people were injured in all of this.”

Federal troops had also been called in, well after things got bloody, and it was obviously too late. People lay limp, heads bashed in with bricks, broken bodies thrown from windows, landing on top of emptied bullet casings and abandoned knives.

Justin Nystrom is an associate professor of history at Loyola University, and Co-director of the Center for the Study of New Orleans. “Of course as the saying goes, it was an absolute massacre. Because it was.”

Nystrom is currently writing about the massacre, and says there were immediate consequences.

Credit Historic New Orleans Collection Four scenes from the riot in New Orleans.

He says the Mechanics’ Institute Massacre, combined with another massacre that happened two months earlier in Memphis, Tennessee, essentially served as a reset button for post-war policy in the South. These events were top stories in the national media, and influenced voters who headed to the polls that fall.

“And of course elect a radical super majority to Congress” adds Nystrom. “The radical super majority enacts the Reconstruction Acts which breaks up the South into military districts. I often teach my students that if you don't have the riot of 1866, you probably don't have the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments in the way that they appear.”

The 14th Amendment granted citizenship to former enslaved people in 1868. The Fifteenth Amendment, giving black men the right to vote, passed in 1870. Despite the progress it helped achieve, the massacre was a tragedy. There were no convictions in the aftermath. Nobody went to jail.

This reminds Clint Bruce of many recent, contemporary incidents of police violence against people of color. “So I'm thinking of Tamir Rice, the 12-year-old who was gunned down. That was settled, it wasn’t considered a murder.”

And the country’s waiting to see what will happen to the officers who shot and killed Philando Castile, in his car in Minnesota, with his girlfriend beside him. And the day before that, Alton Sterling in Baton Rouge.

After the Mechanics' Institute Massacre, The New Orleans Tribune continued to follow the incident for months, both in news coverage — and poetry. Remember those published poems written by Afro-Creoles that Bruce is translating? Camille Naudin was one of the most militant voices among the poets of the Tribune. He wrote a poem to commemorate the massacre called "Ode to the Martyrs."

“It was written for the one-year anniversary of the 1866 Massacre, so it was printed on the day the following year,” Bruce explains. “The same day that there was a memorial ceremony at the Mechanics' Institute. ‘Ode to the Martyrs’ is really an elegy that enumerates a number of the victims who were killed, in pretty dramatic fashion, and celebrates their sacrifice.”

The poet mourns that victims of the mob were brutally massacred, while former Confederate leader Jefferson Davis remained alive — and free — at the time.

“There was a perception among Unionists that he was getting off scot free. In an earlier stanza he references a former Black Union soldier Victor Lacroix, who is from a really well known New Orleans family, who was pretty much torn to shreds by the mob. At the end  he writes 'Mais je dirai toujours mulâtres, noirs, blancs, Victor Lacroix est mort, Jeff Davis est vivant.' which I've translated as, 'But for mulattos, blacks and whites, this fact I must tell: Victor Lacroix is dead. Jeff Davis lives still.'”

[phil-dwyer-stan-account]

What do you have to say for the J*sper stans now that Edward actually ended up winning the poll?

This account is not and has never been a safe space for Jasper stans

[dog-violet]

my mom just walks into my room and says “do you think that makes me a genuine grave robber now?”

[bidoofenergy]

free bird live is a high i think i'll be chasing for the rest of my life