Racists intimidate and threaten black family at child's birthday party

by Richard Mellor
Afscme Local 444, retired

Look at these fascists turning up at a black child's birthday party and they were armed. The cops according to what I read, say they never arrested anyone because they never saw any laws being broken. When has that ever stopped cops arresting people they want to arrest?

I have to say that what has to happen to stop these racists is that we have to turn up thousands of people and ensure they can't spread their racist crap or feel safe showing themselves like this. What's happened here is that the refusal of black folks to go along with this crap as well as forcing the removal of their racist symbol from public spaces is that it is forcing these racists more in to the open, they feel compelled to defend their racist views.

And my last comment. Shame on the heads of organized labor whose deafening silence on these issues is shameful and nothing less than criminal.  There are State labor bodies in SC and no doubt in Georgia. But most of all, nationally, the labor movement has huge resources including money, structure and members. These white racists are harmful to the workers movement as well. They are the enemies of all of us and the labor movement in particular should be mobilized against them.  Workers, the poor, communities of color can't rely on the police to protect us from these racists. Broad, multi-racial defense bodies must be built in the working class communities that are ready to turn up with a massive show of strength when these pigs dare to show their faces.

Here is the report from the Atlanta Journal  Constitution.

Melissa Alford says videos show the aftermath of an ugly incident — a convoy of Confederate flag-bearing pickup trucks and their passengers interrupting a black child’s birthday party with threats and racial epithets.

Levi Bush, who was driving one of the trucks, says the videos show the unfortunate ending of an unintentional encounter — one triggered, in fact, by the people at that birthday party.
Whatever they show, the two cellphone videos from the Saturday afternoon incident off Douglasville’s Chapel Hill Road have been seen more than 200,000 times on Facebook. Authorities are now reviewing them to see if anything criminal occurred.

“Officers on scene were given conflicting statements as to what led up to the confrontation,” the Douglasville Police Department said in an emailed statement.

In one of the videos, Douglasville officers can be seen holding back a group of black men and women as at least seven pickup trucks drive off. The trucks’ white passengers wave as the Confederate, American and military flags mounted on the vehicles flap in the air.

“This is a child’s birthday party,” one woman in the crowd can be heard saying.
A second video shows the trucks gathered on a grassy area, and at least one racial slur can be heard. Alford, the woman hosting a family member’s birthday party, said the trucks drove by several times before parking in the field next to her house.

“One had a gun, saying he was gonna kill the [racial slur],” Alford told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. “Then one of them said gimme the gun, I’ll shoot them [racial slur].”
Bush, the leader of the caravan of trucks, told the AJC that his group is called “Protect the Flag” and is not a hateful one. They “drive around and sell flags,” he said, with all of the proceeds going to veterans or toward purchasing new American flags for those in need.

Bush said his group was leaving a nearby event when they drove by Alford’s home and the partygoers started yelling at the trucks in front of him. They then threw rocks at his vehicle, he said.
Bush said he fishtailed while trying to drive away, then ran over a median and got a flat tire. When he pulled into a nearby driveway, the partygoers swarmed and made threats, and his friends backed him up, he said.

“Basically about eight of us had to hold 15 to 20 of them back,” Bush said, admitting that a specific racial slur was likely used by members of his group.

Someone called 911 and police eventually arrived to separate the factions. Authorities said neither side claimed anything physical took place, and no injuries were reported. They are now reviewing videos to “see if any criminal activity occurred.”

Alford said she doesn’t care if people want to “ride around with their flags,” but said the incident went too far. She said she hasn’t stayed at her home since the incident.

“I don’t have a problem if that’s their culture,” Alford said. “… If they want to make a statement that these flags mean something to them, I’m OK with that. But you’ve got to do it right. You can’t go around just blatantly terrorizing people.”