Don’t Wear the Hat to the Past

Why Trump’s campaign slogan turns our national clock back.

We each see things that offend us. It could be a t-shirt, slogan, or hat. Usually, we take notice and move on, but sometimes the urge to speak to the offender is almost too great to bear. However, we remain quiet to ruminate and avoid conflict.

A few days ago, I was in the blistering hot atmosphere of my native Louisiana. My car sustained a flat tire after a road trip of almost a thousand miles, so I took it to the local shop for repairs.

I walked into the shop dabbing sweat from my brow and proceeded to the counter. Ahead of me was an older and quite Southern white gentleman. His back was turned to me as he explained to the technician what’s wrong with his car.

When he finished, he turned and resting atop his grey crown was a Trump 2020 campaign hat. I’ve seen many of these on television and other places. I was slightly taken aback by the sight of it.

We glanced at each other momentarily, but we exchanged no greeting. Since Trump began his campaign in 2016, I’ve seen plenty of “Make America Great Again,” hats adorning the tops of thousands of heads. It’s become synonymous with the president. However, when I see one, my skin tingles and causes me to ponder when was America ever great. Our past is peppered with all manners of inhumanity and bloodshed.

There is so much ugly history attached to that phrase.

I am an African American, and my history in America of the past was brutal and devoid of hope. I think about the year 1619 when 20 odd Africans arrived in Virginia. I imagine their fear as they disembarked into slavery. The countless beatings they took at the hand of cruel slave masters.

I think about the raping of Black women at the hands of greedy slavemasters who only saw them as property to destroy at their leisure.

I witness in my mind’s eye slaves running from baying hounds as white men with chains and pistols on their hip chased them across the night.

I think of Jim Crow and how it ate Emmitt Till and spat him out deformed with a hole in his head. He died for a lie told by white women, who in 2017 admitted she wasn’t truthful. It was easy for her to make this statement because Black men have insatiable sexual appetites.

Injustice abounded when millions of acres of black land were stolen thru intimidation and fraud. There is nothing exceptional about watching your property disappear into the hands of whites across the nation. 40 Acres and a Mule never arrived into the hands of the former Black slaves. Instead, they were forced into sharecropping which robbed them thru everlasting debt.

Redlining kept Blacks from buying houses in specific neighborhoods and helped to build the modern ghetto’s we have today. Whites left these neighborhoods in droves and watched as the property values plummeted. Schools were segregated, and children received out of date books. Students walked past pristine white schools to deteriorating buildings with few necessities.

Recently Trump told several women of color to return to their countries. In the past women couldn’t vote. Going to work outside the home was a task in a male-dominated world. She was only suitable for the kitchen or the bedroom. She was not equal to her male counterpart. A woman stayed home with a child on one hip and a load of laundry on the other.

Now we have a man in the White House who states sexually abusing women is ok. We had an outcry, but he was still elected.

We push the clock back when members of the LGBTQ community are marginalized. We don’t want to return to the days of DOMA(Defense of Marriage Act), which denied gays the right to marry. Why? Based on religious doctrine. I am a Christian, but the separation of church and state is still in the constitution. Human beings have a right to live their lives in any manner they see fit. Who am I judge?

Transgender rights in the military have been pushed back to the days of don’t ask and don’t tell. We are now telling enlisted members if they are transgender they must serve as their original sex. Furthermore, they are banned from seeking surgery or hormones. The denial of services for a diagnosed medical condition is appalling. Additionally, if a person is taking hormones or underwent sex reassignment surgery, they cannot enlist.

In the brief moment, I looked upon the MAGA hat on the head of that elderly southern gentleman I was reminded of all the ugliness which led to the birth of this nation. I was reminded of how fragile the existence of minorities, women, Native Americans, and immigrants are in this so-called land of the free.

It seems we are reverting too much darker days in our nation’s history.

A mass shooter a few weeks ago killed over 20 people because he believed Latin immigrants are overrunning the country. Almost two years ago, an angry white man ran down a woman in Charlottesville. Furthermore, let us not forget good people were on both sides of the conflict — a life lost over statues which symbolize the bondage and dehumanization of an entire race of people.

In the brief moment, I looked upon the MAGA hat on the head of that elderly southern gentleman I was reminded of all the ugliness which led to the birth of this nation. I was reminded of how fragile the existence of minorities, women, Native Americans, and immigrants are in this so-called land of the free.

I beg you as a human being the next time you see a Trump hat to take a moment and think about when America was ever great for anyone not wearing white skin or packing male genitalia. I honestly believe you will come to the only conclusion available, which is that America was never great for minorities.

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