By R. G.

The events that happened in Charlottesville shine a light on the devastating number of Americans that still believe in the idea of white supremacy. If their message of insurrection wasn’t displayed enough on the University of Virginia campus, the President’s remarks on the rally clearly define what they wanted to convey: we are still here and we are just getting started.

When I heard that there had been a march of neo-nazi groups in Charlottesville, Virginia, I remember feeling only one thing: disappointment. Because the idea that this march occurred was not shocking or confusing to me. I knew that neo-nazis still existed and racism was still rampant in our society. The only thing that this rally made me feel was frustration—frustration that people now felt unsafe, that there had been a loss of young life for no reason but hatred, that I would only hear about Nazis and white supremacists for the next two weeks on the news, that I had to wait and hear what my president was going to say about the events, already knowing, however, that I would be thoroughly disappointed. Not until I saw the widely circulated documentary video by Vice news did I see something truly horrific. I lost the feeling of frustration, and adopted the feeling of panic and fear.

Watching the Vice documentary made me realize that while I had been keeping up with the news, I was being sheltered from seeing this kind of domestic terrorism. I never witnessed what true hatred towards a race or religion looked like in this day and age. I had read the news articles on police shootings of unarmed black men and women, and synagogues getting vandalized with anti-semitic rhetoric. There is a difference between reading about something and seeing something unfold in front of your eyes.

I’m a young, white woman and I have never been pulled over by the police or bullied because of my skin color. I’m Jewish, but that is not obvious if you just glance at me. I’m privileged, and seeing the events in Charlottesville opened my eyes to the hatred that is behind those anti-semitic and racist memes. Behind the internet is people, and those people are the ones who organized the event in Charlottesville.

The anger felt between the opposing groups that day was obvious. The fault for Heather Heyer’s death, however, belonged on only one side. Not to Donald Trump, however. In an unscripted press conference, President Donald Trump took to the podium to tell the nation that the actions in Charlottesville were terrible, and the blame was on many sides. I remember watching this whole debacle with my mom. Prior to the conference, I had been telling my mom that I was scared about the future, my safety, and my friends’ safety. Only Trump could render me absolutely speechless when I heard him utter those words. My mother shook her head in disbelief, muttering “Jesus” under her breath. Jesus? I remember thinking, No, more like oh my god, what a colossal f—k up! That’s our president saying that the Nazis weren’t to blame for her death! Get more angry! Why wasn’t she angry like me? Did she not care? Turns out that it’s neither of those, because she doesn’t understand. She doesn’t share the Jewish faith like I do, nor is she white.
My mother had never been to a whites only school, and she’s never walked past a Nazi propaganda poster. She never even saw the Vice video. My mother was never subjected to seeing something like Charlottesville, she didn’t see the behind the scenes look into these men’s lives. This was just something terrible that happened in Virginia. Nothing more, nothing less. Which is why it’s crucial for people to see things like the Vice video. Because when you see this in its entirety, it’s more than just something that happened in the past. This racism and fascism was not only prevalent in the 1940s. To people like my mother, it only seems to exist in the past. They must think that surely, nothing like that could ever happen nowadays. Sure, that white supremacist rally happened, but so what? Yeah, that Jewish cemetery headstone was broken and vandalised, but it only happened once. Yes, that shooting of Philando Castile was terrible and heart-breaking, but our police around here would never!

It is always easier to ignore, until you become the victim. Because yes, those heartbreaking acts of violence happened and they will continue to happen until something is said and done. Because when you have a president that says Nazis are fine people, those egregious attacks like the one on Heather Heyer will continue to occur until suddenly you’re seeing something eerily familiar emerging in your society. Then, finally, when it becomes clear that your country has decided to go back sixty years, you won’t be able to speak up. None of us will, because they took that right away while you were looking away from it all.