White Trash Lynching

Jim Goad, author of Redneck Manifesto, writes:

So why am I perturbed by all the trash-bashing?" Because they are talking about ME. For the longest time I didn't want to admit it. Realizing you're white trash is like being diagnosed with cancer: First comes denial, then a "lashing-out" phase, the grudging acceptance. If you're fortunate, you'll be able to turn the bad news into something good.

What happened to me at the Wheat Ridge Wreck center is nothing new.

At least twenty times the Wheat Ridge police have iterrogated me and tried to arrest me but didn't have a specific crime to charge me with. It's happened to every white trash man I know in that part of town. The cops always use code words like "you're odd" or "it just seems strange that..." or "you're out-of-the-box." Now that I have gray hair, there's a new twist, "it seems odd that an old guy like you would date younger women."

When I was a kid I visited my father in Clarksdale, Mississippi one summer and saw an African American man hanging from a tree. Being from the North I'd never seen anything that traumatic. My father explained that the man was lynched for talking to a white woman. In Wheat Ridge, if white trash talks to a woman at the Wheat Ridge Wreck Center, he's accused of stalking. This humiliation is called a public lynching.

If any other minority was profiled by the police, accused of a crime with no evidence and attacked from behind and beaten like I was, they'd be classified as a victim. But with white trash like me...well, we don't have the luxury of being victims. Everything that happens to us is our own fault. We are the only minority that is expected to transcend our upbiringing. In their minds I created the attacks myself and got what I deserved. After all I was perturbed by the Wreck Center employees invading my private notebook, stealing my ipod, being rude to me, laughing in my face, talking behind my back, refusing to swipe my gym card unless I handed it to them properly and, of course, making amplified, trash-bashing old guy jokes while I walked by. And so I joined in the fun and mocked them back with my cartoons. Turns out they can dish it out, but can't take it.

Like Rich Swanson implies in his letter posted on my blog, my mere presence is a threat to the safety of his staff. So he, the Mayor, the police made up their minds to get me out of their gym and their city. After they did an intense investigation of me, they realized they had a problem. I hadn't committed a crime. So, they just made one up. Now I'm branded with the Scarlet Letter S on my head.

I was jumped many times when I was a child growing up in Wheat Ridge. After a point, I got sick of it and started fighting back. I got creative at defending myself.

But now I'm too old to fight back. When the thugs from the Wreck Center jumped me on my porch, my mind knew what to do but my body couldn't do it. So, I just turtled and took my beating like a coward. I became their punching bag and kicking post for some built up ethnic rage or projected guilt that had nothing to do with me.

So now I'm sick of these people like Rick Swanson getting away with lies and I'm starting to learn how to fight back with my mind.

Maybe that's what Jim Goad means when he says If you're fortunate you'll be able to turn the bad news into something good.

Other Blogs by Sean H.

Don Juan de Colfax
12 Step Art