You may have missed it, but back in August, amid all the fuss and concern over Civil War memorials in Charlottesville, Virginia and NFL players kneeling in protest during the national anthem, journalist Chuck Todd interviewed former Atlanta mayor Andrew Young on Meet The Press. It was a remarkable interview, but quickly forgotten in the over-heated, emotional atmosphere of the time, but at one point, Todd asked Young what he thought about the alt-right protesters and other supporters of preserving Confederate statues and memorials. I was expecting a scathing and dismissive answer, but Young surprised me by stating that he refused to condemn the white protesters, explaining:
"Most of the issues that we’re dealing with now are related to poverty. But we still want to put everything in a racial context. The problem with the – and the reason I feel uncomfortable condemning the Klan types is – they are almost the poorest of the poor. They are the forgotten Americans. And they have been used and abused and neglected. Instead of giving them affordable health care, they give them black lung jobs, and they’re happy.
And that just doesn’t make sense in today’s world. And they see progress in the black community and on television and everywhere, and they don’t share it. Now it’s not our fault. We’ve had a struggle from slavery. . . Our job was not to put down white people. Our job was to lift everybody up together. To come – so that we would learn to live together as brothers and sisters rather than perish together as fools."
I thought at the time and still think now that his answer was remarkably compassionate, as well as accurate and true. Later in the interview, when asked if he felt that the President needed to apologize for his defense of the alt-right protesters ("many fine people") Young said, "I think the president needs to apologize for McConnell, for giving people black-lung jobs instead of affordable health care. I don't want to pick on the uneducated white people and blame them. We got a lot of educated, powerful white people who abuse themselves, their own people, and us more than any violence then the Klan has, can inflict on us."
The conversation went on to address the situation here in Atlanta, and Young noted that there are now 2,500 German companies in and around the city of Atlanta creating jobs. They’re not taking jobs away from Germany, but they’re hiring Americans, black and white and Hispanic and Asian.
"And that’s a long way because I grew up in New Orleans in 1936. . . The German American Bund and headquarters of the Nazi party was 50 yards from where I was born. So I’ve been dealing with Nazism and white supremacy since I was four years old. And my father said, 'Look, that’s a sickness. You don’t ever let them get you upset and don’t ever get angry at sick people. You don’t get mad. You get smart. You don’t want – they cannot help you. But if you can help them, you ought to try.'
"From 4-years-old," Young explained, "my father use to tap me in the face to try to get me upset and if I swung back at him, he would slap me upside my head. He said 'See, if you start getting emotional in a fight, you’re going to lose the fight. Don't get mad, get smart.'"
When Todd brought up the topic of Confederate symbols in Atlanta, such as the statues on Stone Mountain, Young reminded him what it cost the State of Georgia when we took down the Confederate flag. "It cost us an election and that election cost us $14.9 billion and 70,000 health-care jobs that we would have had in Georgia if we had not gotten to foolin’ with that flag." Young went on to describe traffic and transit options that he felt were lost due to the flag issue, concluding people ought to "wave the Confederate flag and be happy while you’re sitting in traffic."
On the subject of militants on both sides of the issue - the alt-right militants and the so-called Antifa militants - Young said, "They ought to quiet down and get to work. Register some voters, teach some children, treat their wives a little better, and learn what it means to be man in the 21st century. It doesn’t matter what color you are. That lesson goes for everybody and any color."
I had the privilege of meeting Andrew Young on a couple of occasions when he was an executive at Law Engineering. I was impressed then by his poise and confidence, and I'm impressed now by his compassion and wisdom. As the saying goes, they don't make them like that anymore.
When Todd brought up the topic of Confederate symbols in Atlanta, such as the statues on Stone Mountain, Young reminded him what it cost the State of Georgia when we took down the Confederate flag. "It cost us an election and that election cost us $14.9 billion and 70,000 health-care jobs that we would have had in Georgia if we had not gotten to foolin’ with that flag." Young went on to describe traffic and transit options that he felt were lost due to the flag issue, concluding people ought to "wave the Confederate flag and be happy while you’re sitting in traffic."
On the subject of militants on both sides of the issue - the alt-right militants and the so-called Antifa militants - Young said, "They ought to quiet down and get to work. Register some voters, teach some children, treat their wives a little better, and learn what it means to be man in the 21st century. It doesn’t matter what color you are. That lesson goes for everybody and any color."
I had the privilege of meeting Andrew Young on a couple of occasions when he was an executive at Law Engineering. I was impressed then by his poise and confidence, and I'm impressed now by his compassion and wisdom. As the saying goes, they don't make them like that anymore.
No comments:
Post a Comment