UC Berkeley : Lynch effigies found hanging on campus

Earlier today, two black effigies were found hanging on UC Berkeley campus before protests, according to various reports.

The interesting part of this story is many are trying to speculate whether the effigies were of racist terror or allies trying to spread knowledge for the upcoming protests across the nation. It is being reported that both effigies were of black people who were lynched.

I can confirm that one stated their name, the year they were lynched with the phrase “I Can’t Breathe”.

One of the effigies at UC Berkeley is a cardboard cutout of a woman named Laura Nelson. Nelson and her son, L.D. Nelson, were lynched on May 25, 1911, in Oklahoma, according to Wikipedia.

The lynchings happened after the deputy sheriff and three others arrived at the Nelson home on May 2 to investigate the theft of a cow. L.D. Nelson shot and killed the deputy sheriff, and he and Laura Nelson, who had also touched the gun, were charged with murder.

“At around midnight on May 24, Laura and L.D. Nelson were both kidnapped from their cells by a group of between a dozen and 40 men,” according to Wikipedia.

“Sightseers gathered on the bridge the following morning and photographs of the hanging bodies were sold as postcards; the one of Laura is the only known surviving photograph of a female lynching victim. No one was ever charged with the murders; the district judge convened a grand jury, but the killers were never identified.”

In an interview with the Berkelyside, Pastor Michael McBride, who received tweeted photos of the effigies Saturday morning, said “the anonymity connected to that expression, whether it was by antagonists or allies, contributes to the racial terror that black people have to face in the country. We find it radically insensitive at best and a re-inscription of racial terror  … and we need everybody to join with us to say #BlackLivesMatter.”

UC Berkeley police has confirmed that someone strung up an effigy from Sather Gate on the campus around 9 a.m., three hours before a #BlackLivesMatter march was scheduled to begin.

Either way, the effigies are atrocious bringing up painful memories of the past. If the person who put them up was an ally, in my opinion they needed a better way to express their frustrations.