A.G. Gancarski
The Ku Klux Klan, arguably the first domestic terror group, has weighed in on Jacksonville’s community conversations on HRO expansion.
Weighed in literally, according to reports, putting flyers from “the Loyal White Knights of the KKK” in bags and throwing them, mixed in with rice, in people’s yards.
This is on the heels of a bomb threat just a few days ago.
The flyers read “Stop AIDS; support gay bashing.” They say “homosexual men and their sexual acts are disgusting and inhumane.”
And they also call for the deportation of “mud people.”
There are, apparently, multiple versions of these flyers going around.
Jimmy Midyette of the Jacksonville Coalition for Equality, weighs in on this latest attempt to cow Human Rights Ordinance expansion advocates to stop advocating.
“These flyers have begun to appear at the homes of LGBT people – and surely others – in Jacksonville,” Midyette posted to Facebook.
“This is an unfortunate consequence of our recent success. Both with marriage equality and the progress we’re making on equality in Jacksonville, we sadly can expect the vocal minority to freak out,” Midyette added.
“Between this and the bomb threat made yesterday, our vigilance is required,” Midyette continued.
The Jacksonville Sheriff’s Office is definitely aware of these threats. So too is the mayor.
The latter, who definitely messaged around the Syrian refugee issue, has been silent as Jacksonville heads into church this Sunday.
When will he speak out?
When will he address this very tangible manifestation of discrimination?
When will he admit that discrimination clearly exists in Jacksonville, based on this and yesterday’s assertion, by prominent local resident Dawn Emerick, that “approximately 20-25 people standing on the Chaffee / I-10 overpass holding really large Confederate flags waving to the drivers below. Flags were affixed along the safety fence too.”
The mayor needs to take a stand against this posturing by people fronting for a domestic terror group that, even though it’s a shadow of itself, has been in continuous operation domestically for almost a century and a half.
Personally, I know a little something about these kind of threats.
In the 1980s, my parents were the first on our block in the Brierwood area of Baymeadows to rent out a house to an African-American family.
Soon thereafter, the letters KKK were painted on the garage door.
Removing them was a matter of sanding and repainting, and nothing came of it. And likely nothing will come of this either.
Likely.
The real question for those who oppose the HRO expansion is this: What does it say about your position that the people lining up beside you are resorting to these tactics?
We hear that local minister Ken Adkins, who has flipped on this issue at least once already, is assembling a meeting of local pastors and Houston pastors to coordinate response, or messaging, or something, on this bill.
These pastors are like hotel rooms, bought and paid for by the day.
Except we don’t even get Bed Tax out of them to throw toward a new amphitheater.
Lenny Curry, it’s time to “be bold.”
You ran on a public safety platform.
This is where you assure us that we’re safe. And where you come out and say, unambiguously, that this embodies the very discrimination you were “unconvinced” existed in Jacksonville.
This is where you tell us that the mayor’s office recognizes what this is about and, at long last, this kind of wanton intimidation by the westside cracker set will not be tolerated.
In the words of the immortal Shad Khan, it’s time to be “All In.”
And those on City Council who oppose expanding the HRO: you guys need to speak up too, and repudiate these extremists who seem to share your position, and, while you’re at it, maybe take a hard look at what this says about the true motivations of those who oppose protective legislation for the LGBT community.
There may not be Tiffany champagne flutes available afterward.
But it’s the right thing to do.
