Black workers at an Amazon site keep finding noose. The company must act.

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In May, workers building a new Amazon facility in the city of Windsor, Connecticut, encountered a noose on the property. It was the eighth noose they had encountered since construction began on the facility in late 2020. Repeated events have forced Amazon to delay construction on several occasions and have created a lot of tension among local residents. Almost 40 percent of Windsor’s 28,733 residents are black and about 9 percent of residents are Hispanic or Latino.

The emergence of these nooses has also sparked political organizing in recent months, as workers in Windsor draw attention to the racism they face on a daily basis. At a press conference in May, Carlos Best, a foreman and ironworker, said he witnessed symbols of hatred at the site: I saw Confederate flags on people’s hats, in the backs of their cars . I have personally heard racist remarks.

In many ways, the noose is the quintessential American symbol, albeit deeply disturbing.

Despite the addition of new security cameras and a $ 100,000 offer from the company for any advice leading to an arrest, law enforcement officials were unable to determine the source of the hate symbols. As the FBI is now working with the Windsor Police Department to locate the culprits, many Windsor residents and activists are demanding that Amazon and local authorities take these developments seriously.

Their concerns mirror those of others across the country. Since 2015, black workers in various states, including Iowa, New Jersey, North Carolina and Maryland, have reported finding more than 50 noose on construction sites, according to a Washington Post analysis.

The continued emergence of nozzles in these workplaces and other private and public spaces speaks volumes about the prevalence of racism in American life and culture. In many ways, the noose is the quintessential American symbol, albeit deeply disturbing. Its persistence in American life and culture today attests to the fact that white supremacist ideas have always been dominant.

Noose, which is associated with acts of lynching in the United States, are one of the dominant symbols of hatred, violence and white supremacy. Since the end of the Civil War, white supremacists have relied on nooses to terrorize black people. While it’s difficult to pinpoint exactly when the noose first became the preferred instrument of racial terror by white supremacists, one thing is certain: Its popularity among hate groups has coincided with black Americans’ quest for rights. and expanded political opportunities.

Much like the Confederate Battle Flag, which gained popularity as black Americans strove to improve their socio-economic conditions, nooses have become a key weapon for those who resist racial equality. It’s no wonder that members of the Ku Klux Klan frequently used the symbol during the 20th century as part of its nationwide campaign of racial terrorism. These symbols of hatred send a powerful message to blacks and other marginalized groups, a message of exclusion, racial subjugation and looming violence.

According to Kidada E. Williams, associate professor of history at Wayne State University and author of They Left Great Marks on Me, the hangman’s noose is the most powerful artifact in the history of lynching and other forms of racist violence in the United States.

When racists hang them up in public places, Williams told me, adding that they communicate their belief in black availability and cite a story of its reality.

The frequency of lynchings in the United States during the 19th and 20th centuries underscores why nooses extend far beyond mere symbols. While lynching victims varied, black Americans made up the majority of those targeted by the white attackers. According to researchers from the Equal Justice Initiative, approximately 4,084 black Americans were lynched between 1877 and 1950. These acts of violence mainly took place in the southern region of the United States such as Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana and Mississippi. However, they were by no means isolated in the South.

The lynching was a national issue that black activists were on the front lines to challenge. In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, Ida B. Wells-Barnett, one of the co-founders of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, or NAACP, became one of the most prominent anti -lynching of the country. .

Born in 1862, Wells-Barnett worked as a teacher in Memphis, Tennessee, before becoming a journalist. In 1895, she published her landmark study The Red Record, which denounces the lynching and urges readers to call for a federal inquiry into white mob violence. She was then instrumental in the search for federal anti-lynching legislation and protections for African Americans. As Wells-Barnett has often pointed out in his writings, the practice of lynching was a national crime incompatible with the principles of liberty, justice and equality.

Likewise, the noose symbol is contrary to the vision of an inclusive democracy. Those who use it in public and private spaces are unlikely to ignore its significance and the terror it arouses among black Americans and other marginalized groups.

Like their lynching ancestors, Williams reminded us, people who hang ropes in public places such as workplaces, schools, museums use symbolism to project the power of white supremacy and intimidate blacks and browns. .

The power of the noose as an undemocratic and racist symbol extends far beyond the South, and the residents of Windsor are currently grappling with this story. These recent events underscore how the legacy of the lynching continues as a national crime.

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