So I'm making my way through Paula Giddings wonderful biography of Ida B. Wells, who may well me the mother of all black journalists--and even that understates her significance. But the incident that really kicks off Wells's career is a race riot in Memphis. The blacks in the town, fearing such an occurrence, had organized themselves into a fraternity/militia called the Tennessee Rifles. And you know who sold these cats guns? A local merchant who just happened to be a member of Memphis relatively small Jewish community, who defied his fellow Southern whites. Now that's what a call a black-Jewish coalition. Screw getting our asses kicked together, lets get some guns...
The Beautiful Struggle: A Father, Two Sons, and an Unlikely Road to Manhood 
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Count me as horrified at the "lets get some guns" reference. It brought this recent story to mind, where blak-jewish relations had severely deteriorated in NYC...
"The racial tension between Black and Jews that exploded in the New York City neighborhood of Crown Heights in 1991 has resurfaced with a vengeance. In recent weeks, a Black man was severely beaten, and an Orthodox Jewish teen was attacked. The latter incident prompted Jewish residents to hit the streets with signs like “Jewish blood is not cheap!” and “Every Jew a .22,”..."
http://blogs.bet.com/news/newsyoushouldknow/black-jewish-tensions-flare-up-in-new-york/
The headline on Yahoo is "Obama urges blacks to take more responsibility for their actions," which strikes me as oddly like "Black/Jewish tension flares in New York."
Yeah, blacks should take more responsibility for their actions. So should, y'know, whites, Jews, Asians, Mormons, men, women, the young and the old. So thanks for that urgent report: and what's the agenda, again?
And yeah, there's trouble with black/Jewish tension and violence. Who'd have guessed that two groups that contain both the black/white and the Jewish/non-Jewish conflicts will ... conflict. (Leaving aside, for a moment, the lucky few who are black -and- Jewish.)
And there's trouble with black/white tension and violence, and non-Jewish/Jewish tension and violence, black/black tension and violence, Jewish/Jewish tension and violence. And I'd bet, more than any other, there's trouble with white/white and Christian/Christian tension and violence.
I dunno. Of course when there's violence between Jews and blacks, it oughtta be reported as violence between Jews and blacks. But somehow ... something there gives me pause.
And yeesh, I'm all over Ta-Nehisi's blog today. Starting to think I'm one of those trolls ...
I'm not sure why it's horrifying. The locals down South were terrorizing black folks. They were trying to defend themselves, and the only guy that would help them was Jewish merchant in Memphis.
I wouldn't call myself anti-gun, though some nra types might. I've owned the same gun for 20 years but have only fired a few rounds with it twice that I can remember at targets. I'm ok with most gun rights except the right to own an assault rifle or any gun that can so easily be converted to fully automatic. I'm fine with concealed weapons permits as long as there are background checks and hopefully some sort of gun safety course requirement...
All that said, I'm horrified anytime anyone cavalierly advocates getting guns as a solution to a problem in this day and age, especially so when it involves a group one might call a militia or a gang. In the days before cellphones and video cameras when Jim Crow was the barbarie du jour, perhaps, but not now imho.
Bill,
I think we're missing each other. This was in the 1890s. Ida B. Wells has been dead for over 80 years. The incident I'm referencing happened as lynchings were spiking in the South. The militia organized to defend black folks against hooliganism. And the only person willing to help them, was a Jewish guy.
Gussie,
You most certainly are not a troll.
Actually Ta-Nehisi, (as with most matters, which is why I frequent your virtual digs) I think we're pretty close to on the same page. As I mentioned above, back in the day ("when Jim Crow was the barbarie du jour") I could understand that point, and it sounds like a great book that I'm going to have to check out. My apprehension was only with your closing of the post by projecting it in a current context -- "lets get some guns."
In today's context, if there were any of that going on we'd be able to easily take those redneck backwater bigots and their enabling gun dealers who wouldn't extend even the opportunity for minorities to assert their second amendment right to a national stage. I would hardly advocate mounting an armed resistance when instead via video, the internet, and a host of civil rights groups that are millions of members strong we could push that story to the populous-at-large and to political leaders, news media and law enforcement that by-and-large won't stand for that racist shit anymore.