In the grand scheme of things, the following story does not rank as high as things like damaging the Atlantic alliance, helping Russia kill Ukrainians, or, say, tanking the stock market on the way to a wholly man-made recession of choice.
But, the title quote from Orwell’s 1984 came to mind when I heard a story on NPR this morning that the Mayor of DC has been bullied by Republicans in Congress to dismantle Black Lives Matter Plaza. They want to rename it “Liberty Plaza.”
It just struck me as the opposite of liberty to threaten the city with the withholding of funds unless the city did what some members of the House wanted them to do. The bill in question was HR 1774.
Fox News reports: DC to begin reconstructing Black Lives Matter Plaza.
[DC Mayor Muriel] Bowser said she does not support H.R. 1774, a bill introduced last week by Rep. Andrew Clyde, R-Ga., that aims to “withhold certain apportionment funds from the District of Columbia unless the Mayor of the District of Columbia removes the phrase Black Lives Matter from the street symbolically designated as Black Lives Matter Plaza, redesignates such street as Liberty Plaza, and removes such phrase from each website, document, and other material under the jurisdiction of the District of Columbia.”
More from the AP, ‘More than brick and mortar:’ DC begins removing ‘Black Lives Matter’ plaza near the White House.
The far right celebrated the shift online, with conservative provocateur Charlie Kirk visiting the site to hail, “the end of this mass race hysteria in our country.”
In Trump’s second term, Bowser has worked to avoid conflict and downplay any points of contention. She traveled to Mar-a-Lago in Florida to meet with Trump after the election and has publicly emphasized their points of agreement.
Trump recently revived a frequent campaign talking point about wanting a federal “takeover” of the nation’s capital, describing Washington as being riddled with crime, graffiti and homeless encampments. Bowser has refused to comment on reports that the White House is preparing an executive order targeting Washington. She publicly said that the greatest threat to the so-called Home Rule autonomy was “some of the people in Congress.”
Congressional Republicans have repeatedly threatened to interfere in city affairs in large and small ways. A measure currently before Congress, named the BOWSER Act, seeks to completely revoke the Home Rule Act of 1973, which grants the capital city limited autonomy.
It is all bullying, plain and simple. It certainly isn’t about liberty (let alone about respect or local autonomy). The taunting of the Mayor by renaming the bill also speaks to the bullying nature of the process.
Some will, no doubt, say that the Democrats started all of this renaming business by taking Confederate names off of roads and buildings. Or, to be even more crude about it, to the victors go the spoils. But do I really have to note that Jefferson Davis led a rebellion against the US Constitution in the name of upholding chattel slavery while Black Lives Matter is a slogan that suggests that maybe being killed because of one’s skin color is unjust? For a little reminder, please see my post, Thinking about the Injustice that Feeds the Flame from May of 2020.
Of course, all of this is a reminder that many people in the GOP don’t want to acknowledge the past. This is part of the anti-DEI crusade that appears to boil down to wanting to utterly ignore any kind of racial inequity in the country and to return to the kind of colorblindness that is blind to history, justice, and inequity. It is a movement whose leader talks about “merit” while elevating Pete Hegseth to run the Defense Department but firing C. Q. Brown from his job as Chairman of the JCS only to replace him with a demonstrably less qualified white guy.
But, of course, this reminds me of another Orwell quote: “Who controls the past controls the future. Who controls the present controls the past.”
And yes, I get that there is an ongoing struggle about what parts of the past to extol and which to ignore, but I will simply note that erasing the words “Black Lives Matter” from the streets of DC is an attempt to bury the past, not to educate or learn.
And if we need another illustration of what many of the right in our politics want to do as it pertains very specifically to the recent past, note the following.
That’s right: Ben Shapiro thinks that Derrick Chauvin (one can find the video, which I have watched, if one wishes), who was convicted of murdering George Floyd, should be pardoned. And Elon Musk agrees.
Some will think that all of this is not worth any attention. And I will confess, I am somewhat at a loss as to what to focus on in the current moment. I fully recognize that my scribblings here have little consequence. But, in my own way, I think that chronicling all of this has some value. At a minimum, it helps me thing through some of this.*
Taken in a vacuum, the renaming of Black Lives Matter Plaza would be a clearly political, and to me objectionable, act. But this isn’t taking place in a vacuum. This is part of the white nationalism that has overtaken the Republican Party and now controls the government. It is part of a broader authoritarian project to bring more to the fore the type of white (and male) dominance that used to be central to our politics and society. If anyone needs a reminder about how “DEI” is used by this administration and its allies, I point back to the immediate aftermath of the plane crash over the Potomac (see here). Or, for that matter, the Baltimore bridge crash last year. Whenever people blame “DEI,” what they are doing is saying, “If a non-white person was involved, it is because we didn’t do merit hires.” Which, ultimately, means that whites are obviously better than non-whites. (Because, you know, whites are the norm!).**
Now, whether talking about all of this is pointless or not, I leave to the readers.
A small additional observation: the work in BLM Plaza costs money, and it is clearly not the more efficient expenditure of resources by the city. Given the GOP’s alleged mania for “efficiency” and cost-cutting, this seems worth noting.
*There is a broader conversation to be had about how to react to the current administration. But this post is already way longer than I thought it would be.
**Let me note that most people don’t really know exactly what DEI is, and I am using the term here the way it is used in popular parlance. I think that in the whole “merit” conversation, it is synonymous with “affirmative action hire” as was used in the past. And the way CRT was used, briefly before DEI took over at the bogeyest of bogeymen.
