KKK in the News, Globally
There's such a vast supply of racism in the news, it's impossible to keep up with posting about all of it here (and there are other folks who are making a valiant effort at doing that). So, here I try to focus on news reporting or research I happen upon about racism where there's either a 1) global connection, 2) Internet tie-in, or 3) preferrably both. Today's entry falls within category #1, there's a global connection, if only in my view.
The first story is the one out of Mississippi, U.S.A. that's been much in the news the past day or so about the has been conviction of Edgar Ray Killen, in the murder of three civil rights workers in 1964. The story has, deservedly so, gotten a lot of international coverage. The global coverage can lead to some interesting twists. Killen, who goes by the name "preacher," was reported to be a "priest" in one Turkish news version. Killen, 80, has been sentenced to 60 years in Parchman Farm, otherwise known as Mississippi State Penitentiary. While I usually argue for the abolition of the current prison-industrial complex, I'm gratified to know that Killen will most likely die in prison.
Around the globe, there's quite a bru-ha-ha in Australia after an investigative report by The Daily Telegraph into a photo of Aussie soldiers dressed in KKK hoods in order to intimidate and humiliate black soldiers in their own unit. Now, it looks as if the who dressed as members of the Ku Klux Klan will face disciplinary action and possible dismissal. From The Daily Telegraph:
Chief of Army, Lieutenant-General Peter Leahy, said yesterday the senior officer who ordered his men to cut eyeholes out of their laundry bags and wear them as hoods had been hauled before the top brass and faced demotion or possible expulsion. The incident occurred at Townsville's Lavarack Barracks in late 2000, just weeks before the unit left for East Timor."
Seems like an example of the globalization of hate, to me. Perhaps not directly related to the Internet, but one wonders about the role of mass (broadcast) media in both the examples I mention here. In the Killen example, lots of the national and international coverage has mentioned the film, "Mississippi Burning," just one of the plethora of Hollywood-exported movies that's brought US-culture to the world. In the second example, I suspect the guys in the Oz-army wouldn't have had any awareness of KKK-hoods except via mass media given that the KKK is such a uniquely American phenomenon.
The first story is the one out of Mississippi, U.S.A. that's been much in the news the past day or so about the has been conviction of Edgar Ray Killen, in the murder of three civil rights workers in 1964. The story has, deservedly so, gotten a lot of international coverage. The global coverage can lead to some interesting twists. Killen, who goes by the name "preacher," was reported to be a "priest" in one Turkish news version. Killen, 80, has been sentenced to 60 years in Parchman Farm, otherwise known as Mississippi State Penitentiary. While I usually argue for the abolition of the current prison-industrial complex, I'm gratified to know that Killen will most likely die in prison.
Around the globe, there's quite a bru-ha-ha in Australia after an investigative report by The Daily Telegraph into a photo of Aussie soldiers dressed in KKK hoods in order to intimidate and humiliate black soldiers in their own unit. Now, it looks as if the who dressed as members of the Ku Klux Klan will face disciplinary action and possible dismissal. From The Daily Telegraph:
Chief of Army, Lieutenant-General Peter Leahy, said yesterday the senior officer who ordered his men to cut eyeholes out of their laundry bags and wear them as hoods had been hauled before the top brass and faced demotion or possible expulsion. The incident occurred at Townsville's Lavarack Barracks in late 2000, just weeks before the unit left for East Timor."
Seems like an example of the globalization of hate, to me. Perhaps not directly related to the Internet, but one wonders about the role of mass (broadcast) media in both the examples I mention here. In the Killen example, lots of the national and international coverage has mentioned the film, "Mississippi Burning," just one of the plethora of Hollywood-exported movies that's brought US-culture to the world. In the second example, I suspect the guys in the Oz-army wouldn't have had any awareness of KKK-hoods except via mass media given that the KKK is such a uniquely American phenomenon.
posted by Jessie Daniels at
1:45 PM
