Rednecks for Black Lives!
Posted by Collectivist
"Up until June of this year, Greg Reese of Campton, Kentucky, proudly featured a Confederate flag magnet on the trunk of his car.
But after a series of realizations, including the police killing of George Floyd, Reese removed the magnet and created a new decal — one that read “Rednecks for Black Lives.” The bumper sticker he designed features a new inclusive, and colorful, Southern pride flag.
Although he says it took him a while to admit the problem, he now feels “disgust” at ever flying the Confederate flag.
“Some of us still are in the dark or want to stay in the dark about [the Confederate flag],” he says. “And it was an icon growing up as a child. You saw it everywhere.”
He started a Facebook group to engage people to join the movement. He also connected with Southern Crossroads, a group of self-described hillbilly rednecks from Kentucky, in order to educate himself and others.
“You can sit back and say, you know, ‘Hey, this ain't my fight.’ And a lot of us did for a long time,” he says. “But I want to be one of those out there pulling people into it because it is their fight. It always has been our fight. South, North, white, Black, Brown, Latinos — everyone needs to get in this.”
Beth Howard, organizing director of Southern Crossroads, came up with the slogan Red Necks for Black Lives and wrote about the meaning behind the word “redneck” on Medium.
While the term "rednecks" originated in the mid-1800s as a derogatory description of poor southern farmers with sunburnt necks, it was reclaimed by southerners by 1900. Records show that many called themselves "proud rednecks" and wore red scarves to political rallies.
The tradition was continued when a major labor uprising occurred in 1921, she writes. Multiracial coal miners in Appalachia wore red bandanas to indicate they were in favor of unionizing.
The full force of the government was brought down on these miners in what became known as the Battle of Blair Mountain in West Virginia. Many of them died fighting for a union that never came to fruition.
“I want us to reclaim the word redneck,” she says. “And our history and that history is made up of people rising up together. That gives us hope — and we need a lot of hope right now.”
Howard, who grew up in a poor, working-class mining family in rural Kentucky, says she was often angry at living a life where “poor people are sacrificed for a few to be rich.” She says society taught poor white people to divert blame onto people of color for their struggles instead of the real culprits — money-hungry billionaires, politicians and big businesses.
But that narrative, for her, changed when she learned about the original rednecks’ struggle for justice. As she writes, she’s now “showing up in defense of Black lives” and invites other rednecks to do the same.
Interview Highlights
On the Confederate flag and the Black Lives Matter movement
Greg Reese: “First of all, let me say that like most people in Appalachia, many, many people in the South, I was never against Black Lives Matter. The Confederate flag to us, it held a different meaning. We were told differently. We grew up that way. We didn't know any better until we got older and our eyes opened up a little and we started seeing things. And it took me a while to take it off. And it took me a while to admit the problem. But I was well aware that it wasn't a good thing by the time I was in my 20s.
“... A lot of people down here never did see [the Confederate flag] as a racist thing, even though it's blaringly racist. We realize that now, a lot of us. Some of us still are in the dark or want to stay in the dark about it. . ."
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