Jackson Free Press

What a week. Not only did Chokwe Lumumba come out on top in the Democratic runoff for mayor, but he caused an explosion in racist comments like we haven't seen in these parts in years. Or at least since President Barack Obama was re-elected last fall.

And while many of the ugliest comments were from outside the city limits, we were shocked by race rhetoric from Jackson voters, as well as efforts to tamp down real conversations about race in social media because, some believe, talking about race keeps racism alive.

This, of course, is twisted logic, even when well-meaning. It never works to push people's racist thoughts just below the audible surface and then pretend it's not there. And unity has never been built on denial.

It is vital for our residents to understand that racial understanding only awaits on the other side of uncomfortable, in-depth dialogue. "Unity" is not about blacks and whites deciding to support the same candidate, even if for different reasons, and then proclaiming that unity has been achieved if they are successful. If that was true, Frank Melton would have brought remarkable racial harmony to city hall eight years ago, and there would be no need to discuss race.

But there clearly is a serious need. Some of the comments we saw were remarkably ignorant and illogical. One man, on the JFP Facebook page, equated Mr. Lumumba with former Gov. Ross Barnett. What is remarkable and offensive about that comparison, as Mr. Lumumba points out in an interview with R.L. Nave (see page 7), is that the presumptive mayor has long been an advocate for equal rights of African Americans, and there is no evidence that he has wanted to take away rights of white Mississippians. His past activism may seem radical by today's more integrated standards, but in the wake of the 1970 Jackson State shootings by police officers, there was a certain logic to moving people to a safe space they could call their own.

Agree with that idea then or not, there is simply no comparison between Mr. Lumumba's past activism and that of Barnett--who stood against ending government-enforced Jim Crow segregation against African Americans, against allowing blacks to vote, against integrating the schools, against allowing our friend James Meredith to attend Ole Miss. And, yet, we have a reservoir named after Barnett, and his name appears on a huge green sign hanging above Interstate 55.

This kind of false equivalency is not going to promote unity in our city or state. Neither is pretending that race division no longer exists and ignoring that the biggest challenges in our city directly resulted from past white supremacy.

Yes, we hope and believe that Mr. Lumumba will help have those conversations. But it is not up to him to heal these divisions and cure the willful ignorance about our racist history, which led to groups like the Republican of New Afrika, not the other way around. It is up to the rest of us to ask, listen and engage--and not tell others that they shouldn't have the dialogues. We must.