Other notes on
Part 1:
- Till's mother, in dealing with the press after her son's murder, comes across as such as amazing person, and watching her at the funeral just broke my heart — especially thinking back to Matthew Jr.'s mother getting that call from jail.
- I couldn't help but see Chicago as linking Till and Obama. If I cry tomorrow, it'll partly be for Emmett.
- It's odd, I guess, how racist langage and institutions can be more enraging as racial violence. Reexperiencing Till's death made me sad, but hearing Tallahatchie County Sheriff H.C. Strider say, in the middle of the Till case, "We never have any trouble until some of our southern niggers go up north, and the NAACP talks to them, and they come back home," that's what made me angry and blood-thirsty. That and the self-satisfaction I read in the faces of the all-white jury.
- The second half of the film, covering the Montgomery bus boycott, isn't as tightly put together, but still very good (of course).
- Martin Luther King, Jr.: "If we are wrong, God Almighty is wrong." So powerful.
- One really fascinating thing was hearing Coretta Scott King recall that, in the early stages of the boycott, "we didn't even ask for desegregation." That, according to her, seemed too far-fetched. All they were asking for was a more fair system of segregation! Only when they were totally rebuffed did the leaders of the boycott figure they might as well go all in.
- Hearing Martin Luther King, Jr., talk about how the cause was greater than him and how an individual must stand up and be counted again brought me back to thinking about Obama and the path of the last two years and the possibilities of the next four years. Hope.
- Rev. Shuttlesworth uses the great metaphor, "You can't shame segregation. ... Rattlesnakes don't commit suicide." I need to find a way to work that into conversation.
- From this remove, the Ku Klux Klan is f—king hilarious. All the pageantry and the histronics, walking down the street in robes thinking they're reservoir dogs or some shit but just looking absolutely ridiculous, I couldn't help but laugh a little. I mean, come on, so pathetic.
- On the flipside, young Martin Luther King Jr. is pretty f—king hot. He's even crazy dapper in his mug shot.
Man as man, indeed! I've got my eyes on that prize. Rawr.
(Happy birthday, Martin.)
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