FACING OUR HISTORY

By Ruth A. Sheets

February 6, 2026

 As I listen to and contemplate current news briefs, I am reminded that doing harm to people white men don’t like, as ICE is being permitted to do, has been part of the American experience nearly from the beginning. 

 Slavery happened and Black people were the victims no matter how much white folks want to believe that enslavement saved Black people from ignorance and savagery and want to cut slavery from American history; it won’t happen!  After the Civil War and supposed freedom, in our south and in some northern locations too, Black men and women and their allies were lynched for wanting something better, more fair, more equal.  Those white perpetrators were extremely rarely held accountable.  White women and children came to sites of lynchings and cheered, jeered, and showed themselves and their white male perpetrators to be worse than anything those being lynched could possibly have done. 

People were killed for their faith at least as long as there have been “Christians” in this nation.  There have been reports of possible killings of Irish Catholics working on railroads in the middle 1800s.  KKKers targeted Catholics as well as Black Americans in the south and Chinese and Japanese were attacked for just being who they are, mostly in the West.  Then, there are the many Native Americans who were killed just because white men wanted their land and them gone.  The one thing these events have in common, white people, most of them men.   

 

Trump, Miller, and the rest of the white house white toddler pool have grabbed onto that "right" to be white and hateful, even murderous if they choose.  America until January 20, 2025 was better, but the strains of that old white male destruction are being revived and heard, even in the ICE recruitment ads.  I would bet those ICErs would be delighted to hang a few people and commit the same horrors their ancestors did to those who wanted their right to a piece of the pie.  They’ve already dragged innocent people face-down along the street, including a pregnant woman, smashed car windows, broken into homes, kidnapped people and sent them, even children and old people, into appalling prisons far from home and any legal defense.  They committed murder on several occasions while Donald Trump implies only 2 out of thousands is no big deal. 

Trump and his sycophants forget their heroes:  Trump, Miller, Musk, and a bunch of others have recent immigrant ties, Trump’s mother was not a citizen when he was born and his father a second generation American.  Miller’s Lineage in America is not long, neither is Musk’s (overstayed his visa).  The hypocrisy is astounding!  Those white men don’t care because, well, they’re just so special, you know! 

This country needs to face the reality of who we have been and what we want to become.  I know we don’t want to be what we were, particularly many white Americans don’t.  We have a responsibility to work hard to make things better for more than just the super rich white guys who want to rule.  We do need to be protesting in every way we can, doing our best to stop the violence against women and people of color, citizens and immigrants alike.  That's what we are called to do.

In our protests, we must do everything possible to keep our elections free and untrumped,  and ICE off our streets.  Our Congress needs to be held accountable, anyone in either party who supports ICE and the other things DHS is doing need to be unelected ASAP, every single one!  Some things we can do include:  watching for ICE in our streets, giving warnings, filming, and getting in the way whenever we can show this Trump regime we are done with their hate, anger, fear and resentments that lead to revenge.  We are not in a schoolyard with a bunch of toddleresque bullies; we are ordinary Americans and our allies who are tired of the Trumpian toxic garbage!  We are looking for quality adult leadership!