I've chosen to use this mugshot of Shuttlesworth because to me it symbolizes how oppression and adversity can reveal strength, and how defiance in and of itself can be a kind of grace. As the Times obituary recounts, Shuttlesworth was arrested dozens of times, brutally assaulted, targeted by politicians and police, and the victim of repeated attempted murder. He neither backed down nor succumbed to cynicism or the use of violence himself.
What's more, Shuttlesworth demonstrates that pacifism is natural partners with radicalism, pugnacity, and a refusal to compromise. Malcolm X and Martin Luther King are such toweringly complex and symbolically rich figures-- and our public consciousness has such little space for history-- that there is an unfortunate tendency to think of the Civil Rights movement as being defined only by the conciliatory message of King and the combative message of Malcolm X. This itself is a reductive reading of history. But Shuttlesworth was at once dedicated to the vehicle of nonviolence that King espoused and yet was fiery and obstinate as well. And he came from the same poor background that defined the lives of many of the black Americans living during the Civil Rights era and continues to define the lives of too many today.
A culture makes choices in the virtues it celebrates. What is celebrated determines what is valued and what is valued determines what endures. It is necessary for us to remember men like Fred Shuttlesworth, and in doing so to remember that what should endure in memory is real heroism, real sacrifice, and real principle.
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Seriously?
To channel you for a moment: "Steve Jobs was a real person. He really existed. Here's a picture of him or whatever. Now he is dead."
I'm sincerely amazed that you're actually bringing up the usual anti-Apple, anti-consumerist blah blah when a man has just died, ffs. Yeah, culture is so shallow or whatever! How dare people mourn someone who had a real impact on their lives! It's so 'late capitalism' of them!
You'd be hard pressed to find an opinion other than yours, there, paul h. I guessin' you're hard pressed.
... Who is talking about Steve Jobs, at all, here? I assume that anyone who wants to find Steve Jobs eulogized can find that in many places today.
So, by sheer coincidence, within an hour of the announcement of Steve Jobs' death, you just happen to publish a post that ends with "A culture makes choices in the virtues it celebrates. What is celebrated determines what is valued and what is valued determines what endures. It is necessary for us to remember men like Fred Shuttlesworth, and in doing so to remember that what should endure in memory is real heroism, real sacrifice, and real principle."
But I'm guessing this has nothing at all to do with the fact that our culture will be celebrating the (very real) contributions that Steve Jobs made instead of those of Fred Shuttlesworth? There's nothing to see here?
Steve Jobs, a real person, has just died, and there's no need to snark at people eulogizing him (yeah, how dare they remember someone who didn't have "real heroism").
Writing a counter-eulogy to Steve Jobs eulogies (my hero is better than your hero!) does not do any justice to your cause.
This is precisely it, paul.
You are not the cosmos. Your concerns are not the concerns of the entire world. Your commitments are not my commitments. Your issues are not the only issues worthy of discussion.
I have been following the lives and careers of the nonviolent resisters who were involved in the Civil Rights era since I was 14 years old. I have read and written and thought about Revered Shuttlesworth since before I was fully myself. I have looked to these people for inspiration and hope for as long as I can remember. They teach me about the uses of pacifism. They teach me that nonviolence can be embraced by the majority, if only when it is safely in the past. They teach me about moral courage. I have read dozens of books and written hundreds of pages on these people.
But no. You can only imagine that your mental life is the only mental life. You presume that everything is about you, your concerns, and the things and people you love. You come here into my house on a day of mourning for me and my concerns, spit on the floor, and declare to me what I am concerned with.
Is it a coincidence? Do you not understand how blinkered and myopic that question is? The majority of the people in this country have never heard the name Steve Jobs. Most of the people out there are blissfully unaware that he lived, let alone died. But since you can't escape the boundaries of your own perceptions and your own commitments, you not only can't permit me to be concerned with other things, you have to insist that I am actually writing about what you are thinking about. I cannot imagine solipsism that powerful and complete. I truly can't.
Was I aware that Steve Jobs was dead? Of course. Could I have written a post doing what you're accusing me of doing? Sure. Yes, I could write a post about Steve Jobs and Fred Shuttlesworth and what their memories mean for our society. Do you think I wouldn't do that if I was inspired to, paul? Do you know me to be shy? To worry about what people say about me? But doing that would be vulgar and cruel to exactly the person I am trying to honor here. I wouldn't do it not out of concern for Steve Jobs but out of concern for Fred Shuttlesworth, for his memory.
So congratulations, Paul. Like every other corner of the Internet, this space is now about Steve Jobs. It wasn't enough that every popular website out there was dedicated to his memory today. You had to come in here and make this space about him, too. You've done exactly what I wanted to avoid: you've made this space about someone other than Fred Shuttlesworth. Fucking congratulations, dude. You must be very proud.
I don't think I'd ever heard of Rev. Fred Shuttlesworth before reading this blog post. Or if I had, I'd forgotten. This surprises me, because I've read a lot about the Civil Rights movement lately.
I read the NYT obituary, and did some other cursory research on him just now. Given his eventful life, it is all the more remarkable that I hadn't heard of him.
And so I just wanted to thank you, Freddie, for posting this, as I probably would not have learned about him otherwise.
I mourn the loss of the Fred Shuttlesworth who championed his and his black brothers' and sisters' civil rights in the '60s; I do not mourn the Fred Shuttlesworth who campaigned against full equality for LGBT Americans -- invoking his own struggles as indicative of his expertise on all civil rights -- in his later years.
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