Dear Reader, I find myself pondering what you see in this photograph, one of the many troubling images that emerged from the events in Charlottesville last weekend. While this particular image is firmly etched in my memory, I’ve come to realize that we may interpret it very differently. According to our president, one of the individuals in this image is a “very fine” person. The other is my child.
One of these individuals had a “permit” to protest the removal of Confederate symbols while chanting “Jews will not replace us!” The other was labeled as “also very violent.” Our president insists there are “many sides” to this situation.
Indeed, this photo does not convey the complete narrative. It fails to show the banner my child and friends held that proclaimed “The Confederacy Lost and So Will You.” This message incited the man in makeshift riot gear to seize the banner, grab my child by the shirt, and strike him with a baton.
What the photo also omits are the moments that followed, during which this man stumbled, allowing my child to wrest the baton from him and retaliate.
There’s a YouTube video of this confrontation, but I haven’t watched it, nor do I wish to. My mind is already flooded with enough images as a concerned parent. However, I’ve heard that the person filming initially captured the chaos around them before turning to document the brawl—the final moments where my child struck a “very fine” person with a stick.
I can only imagine that if our president were to view it, that would be the sole aspect he would focus on, the only perspective his supporters would acknowledge. “Look at the violent left,” they would proclaim, and suddenly my child would become a representation of their narrative of moral equivalence, embodying their “violence on all sides” rhetoric. I can already envision a troll somewhere altering the image to add an Antifa logo to my child’s back, sharing it with captions implying that he—and the dearly departed Heather Heyer—somehow deserved what happened.
From my perspective, however, I see my child through a lens of maternal pride and admiration, someone I urged not to attend that rally. I wish everyone could see him the same way. But then, on Tuesday, as the president labeled the protesters as radical alt-left and insinuated that the “very fine” individual with the baton had justifiable reasons for attacking my child, I was consumed by anger. Various shades of red rushed through me: blood red, molten lava red, and MAGA-hat red.
“But how can you blame Trump?” his supporters challenge me during fruitless debates on social media, as we stare at our screens in disbelief, unable to reconcile our differing viewpoints. “How can anyone be that blind?” we each wonder. It’s uncertain what sort of corrective lens might aid those unwilling to see.
While I wasn’t present at Charlottesville, this much remains vivid in my memory: the “very fine” man wielded a stick, while my child stood with a historical truth. Our president and his supporters can choose to ignore this fact, look past it, or even fabricate an alternative narrative.
Even if Trump fails to acknowledge it, the rest of the GOP would be wise to open their eyes to the undeniable message on the banner carried by those brave Americans who refuse to back down. Racist ideologies, Confederate symbols, and Jim Crow statues lost their legitimacy in the eyes of the American public long ago. Ignore this truth, and you too will face the consequences.
This article was originally published on Aug. 19, 2017.
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Summary
This article reflects on a troubling photograph from Charlottesville, exploring the different interpretations of the events captured in it. The author contrasts the perspectives of a mother protective of her child with the narratives pushed by political figures, emphasizing the need for recognition of the underlying truths about racism and historical context.