Black Lives Matter Comes to Vidor—Yes, Vidor

June 9, 2020 7:09 AM

So when word started to circulate that a Black Lives Matter rally was being planned in Vidor, many people on social media thought it was a trap. On Saturday, 150 people showed up in Texas’s “most hate-filled town” to turn their backs on Vidor’s past.

Other links in the article:
A Q&A With the Organizer of the Black Lives Matter March in Vidor
Vidor in Black And White

posted by jozifd (8 comments total)

I'm in East Texas and I've been amazed by the sustained protests happening in towns big and small. But yeah, that one in Vidor took me by surprise. That is courage.
posted by mcdoublewide at 8:02 AM on June 9, 2020 [9 favorites]

It really did look suspicious when it showed up on Twitter on Thursday. Maddy Malone wasn't doing a great job of allaying peoples' fears. She used the 'I have black friends' canard, she seemed more concerned about her town's reputation than anything else, and she pointed people to her Instagram to prove that she's real... and her account was set to private. She could have benefited from the advice of someone more experienced. Finding out it was for real and that it happened peacefully is a pleasant surprise.
posted by LindsayIrene at 8:18 AM on June 9, 2020 [3 favorites]

I know journalists have certain stock phrases that they use more to sound journalistic than because they've really thought through the implication, but I was really struck by the article's sub-headline claim that protestors were "turn[ing] their backs on the town’s past". I think this is quite toxic because it serves the 'erasing history' framing that conservatives and white supremacists bring to racism discourse. The article describes people not turning their backs on the past, but literally highlighting it. They simply have a different vision for the future.
posted by dusty potato at 8:28 AM on June 9, 2020 [16 favorites]

Wow. Vidor. Thibodeaux, too!!! these towns were sites of awful lynching, the kinds of towns I would have never thought. amazing.

I mean, the levee administrator of Lafourche Parish was making lynching jokes in public as of last year.

In regards to the past, this does fall short of the kinds of Truth and Reconciliation that Vidor and Thibodeaux need. I agree with what you are saying, it's not that the towns are turning away from a "past" as much as they are building cadre to deviate from the present culture of white supremacy, that is just a given in small towns.
posted by eustatic at 6:30 PM on June 9, 2020 [2 favorites]

Over twenty five years ago two colleagues and I traveled to Houston, Beaumont, Vidor and Lake Charles for work. It wasn’t until we were on the way that I realized what kind of trouble we were in. One of my coworkers was Indian. We spent a few hours at the location in Vidor and the asked the local staff whether we should stay in town and eat.

We were told we should drive out of town, and that our Indian colleague should lay down in the backseat and try to avoid being seen.
posted by grimjeer at 7:32 PM on June 9, 2020 [3 favorites]

This was covered last night on Chris Hayes' All In. They don't seem to have clips available but transcript of the episode. They showed what looked like NBC News footage from ~25 years ago where someone was willing to tell a national reporter:

You know, my parents raised me without going to school with no blacks and that`s why I want my kids go to school with no blacks.

Absolutely shocking.
posted by mmascolino at 8:22 PM on June 9, 2020

Vidor Texas? That is something else. I know Vidor only from The Thin Blue Line, where it's described as a Klan town. And the story doesn't reflect well on Vidor, as we all know.
posted by hilberseimer at 7:24 PM on June 10, 2020

Belle Chasse! 200 people marched to the sheriff s office today. In the seat of Perez.
posted by eustatic at 6:10 AM on June 13, 2020