Selma's 'Bloody Sunday' Turns 40
Today is the 40th anniversary of "Bloody Sunday" in Selma, Ala., when civil rights activitists planning to march from Selma to Montgomery were beaten and gassed by Alabama State Troopers.
Each year Selma has a "Bloody Sunday Jubilee" on the weekend around March 7. There's a "mass meeting" at Brown Chapel, site of many historical march deployments; a parade on the same route marchers took; and a festival of sorts with food, entertainment, etc.
The original march and its commemoration were part of my dissertation on Selmians' struggle for civil rights in 1965. I still find these "public displays" fascinating.
posted by Cliff Vaughn at 3/07/2005 08:52:00 AM
3 Comments:
I find the fact that Selma celebrates on this day disgusting. As a nation, we do not celebrate on 9/11, we mourn those that have passed. Bloody Sunday should be a day for reflection, mourning, and perhaps a day for togetherness. But not a "jubilee".
Thursday, July 21, 2005 11:37:00 AM
Certainly your feelings are genuine, but you may want to consider a different perspective.
Perhaps the 'celebration' is not about the carnage; maybe it is about the progress - in the pursuit of human rights - that is the cause for a "jubilee".
One day, its a caterpiller, the next, a butterfly. I suspect that the people who were there and lived that day, as well as the issues leading up to that day, see that Sunday as the butterfly.
Through their march, and the sacrifices thereof, the bondage of inequality and racism were lossened - not released - but loosened; just as the the caterpiller morphings into a butterfly. It was what it was, now it is, what it is.
Personally, I see it as something that should be celebrated. The lives and sacrifices of those of that day should be honored. There is plenty of time for solemn introspect, but so little time for the 'celebrations' of good things.
And, by the way: I am 51,white, grew up and live in Springfield, IL, among the hated and the haters.
Saturday, December 17, 2005 10:32:00 AM
you people are disgusting you are celebrating peoples death you should be ashame of yourselves thats a disgrace to me and other people who thinks the same thing as me because you should be praying for those who risked their lives for us black people they sacrificed themselves and you celebrate their deaths what kind of garbage is that but may god rest the souls in heaven of those who fought for us
Monday, July 16, 2007 7:07:00 PM
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