It’s been over 10 years since I lived in Centreville, VA. When I lived there, the town was in the process of being transformed into a bustling DC suburb for white collar Federal government employees. The one thing those locals drilled into my mind was that Federal employees generally shy away from discussing their personal political beliefs. I’d have to think the criticism of Cox Farms signage comes from neighboring towns, the ones that still maintain their ‘good ole boy’ images and not the actual locals (customers) in Centreville.
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Or the narrative becomes, “whatabout Antifa??” without acknowledging that the real opponents of Neo-Nazis aren’t those guys, but ones that go under the name of “Freedom Loving Americans Who Aren’t Pieces of Shit”
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Not to diminish any anti fascist activity by those who don’t identify as ‘antifa,’ but to put it simply, the lion’s share of anti fascist organizing is essentially clerical- ferreting fascists out of their hidey-holes and exposing them to “the greatest disinfectant” whereby “Freedom Loving Americans Who Aren’t Pieces of Shit” can thus act accordingly.
If a fascist got fired today, you most likely have antifa to thank for that.
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I wish all businesses would put their feelings on signs. It would be much easier to choose where to shop.
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I really love this. I love their history of messaging, and the fact that they take the time to patiently and lovingly explain why they believe the way they believe. This - the commentary they replied with - is how minds are softened and hearts are changed.
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Jesus Christ, some of those facebook posters are toxic.
A certain type of white people just cannot get over the phrase Black Lives Matter.
No matter how many times you explain to them how and why All Lives Matter and Blue Lives Matter are nearly as offensive as the National Association for the Advancement of White People, they just don't get it. They just cannot abide the “special treatment” that they perceive is being allotted to a group not their own. (They probably did abide the “special treatment” allotted to a group not their own during the Jim Crow era.)
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Good for Cox.
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one of these things is not like the others, one of these things just doesn’t belong
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Talking of which, Hope Not Hate found out that Cloudflare are storing some sites by a fascist proscribed terrorist organisation in Manchester and London. Now that it is publicly known, Cloudflare are legally required to remove them.
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Many Trump voters don’t think they’re white supremacists. And they refuse to admit Trump is a white supremacist. But their support of Trump is a major part of their identity, and they know it is for a lot of white supremacists as well. And that sense of Trump voter identity is more important to them than rejecting white supremacy. So they take personal affront to good people of principle standing up to their white supremacist comrades. This is how fascism creeps into the tent.
They should know though, in the end history will judge them by the company they keep.
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I don’t have a sign to post, but I do put my position as a signature at the bottom of my emails. My current one is from Teddy Roosevelt - “To announce that there must be no criticism of the president… is morally treasonable to the American public.”
I usually change it once a week.
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I love when they start referring to “BLM Terrorists” that kill cops. I pretend ignorance, let them explain, then hit them with the facts that there’s no such thing (that guy in Austin was as associated with BLM as the kid in Orlando was with ISIS), and then tell them I’m confused because I thought they meant the people who terrorize the Bureau of Land Management offices out West and have armed standoffs with hostages.
That either forces them to shut up or sound more crazy. Either way, I hope the not crazy, not asshole contingent learns from my feeding poison to a troll.
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Thanks Boing Boing for posting this! I live in Northern VA, and while it’s a bit of a hike to Centreville, this sounds like a nice weekend trip.
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Cox Farm neighbors received gifts this weekend.
Guessing Jeff Sessions has a weekend house nearby.
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A trump nation. He didn’t give us this, it was already there, but he ripped open the old racial wounds of hate for not only brown folks, but everyone else the white haters think are different.
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DC tends to be fairly liberal. The central and southern parts of Virginia are deeply Republican. Not quite watch out for banjo music Republican, but Sessions would be right at home in Richmond. Loudoun County is in the zone between, more Republican than the nation’s capital, but more liberal than the rest of Virginia. I suspect it’s too liberal for the likes of Sessions. But I haven’t been there in years, so maybe it’s changed, and if it hasn’t, I’m sure it’s on the Klan’s to-do list.
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Nazis are scum. To treat them as if they have valid ideas can only lead to your being complicit in genocide, or else a victim of it.
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This is great, I applaud Cox for doing this and for being a force of good in their community.
I see a few businesses starting to be more vocal about social issues, one of them being my favorite spice vendor, Penzey’s, whose newsletter now includes a lot of condemnation of the current administration as well as calls to action and messages of inclusiveness similar to the ones expressed in the Cox letter here. I’m sure they have received their fair share of hate mail and loss of customers as well.
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Not a triple malt scotch, I hope.
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