Posts by and pertaining to featured contributor Mark Naison
By Mark Naison (December 17, 2018) Because of things we have in common-age, race, gender and size- I often compare myself to Donald Trump. Why didn’t I turn out the way that he did? Why am I not, in my public persona, filled with rage and bitterness? Why is spreading happiness more important to me than appealing to people’s fears…
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By Mark Naison (November 5, 2018) There are going to be a lot of people who are going to wake up November 7 shocked at how many people voted for candidates who embraced a message of hatred and division. I won’t be. I am an historian of race and immigration in the United States. Electoral majorities passed the Jim Crow…
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By Mark Naison (October 27, 2018) My heart goes out to the families and friends of those killed and wounded in the Pittsburgh synagogue shooting, and to everyone who feels a little more vulnerable and a little less secure as a result of this horrendous act. Everyone stoking the flames of hatred bears some responsibility for the political climate that…
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By James Rotten (October 12, 2018) I met S. at the Alamo Drafthouse to have lunch and see Monsters & Men, which centers around a murder by cop. When it ended, she left and I stayed to pay our bill. There was just one other person in the theater, sitting next to me, with one empty seat between us. I’ve…
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By Mark Naison (September 27, 2018) I didn’t watch Christine Ford’s testimony, but the pain it has inspired among so many friends, which they have expressed with an eloquence and courage that has moved me to the core, is something I will never forget. This is a profound historical moment. I just ask for the wisdom and strength to show…
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By Mark Naison (July 26, 2018) Those who think that the low official unemployment rate signals a return to prosperity for working class and middle class Americans or that it guarantees Donald Trump’s re-election in 2020 are not seeing what I am seeing on the ground. In the working class neighborhood of Eastern Long Island where we have a home…
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By Mark Naison (July 17, 2018) I understand being angry at liberals and leftists. But when you are willing to first tolerate, and then applaud open appeals to racism to get back at them, you are walking down a very dangerous path, the path trod by Hitler and his German supporters. Make no mistake about it, those who continue to…
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By Mark Naison (June 24, 2018) Those of you who are shocked that Donald Trump successfully employed a politics of cruelty and rage to take him to the Presidency might want to revisit two events which prefigured his campaign: the excommunication of the Dixie Chicks from country music radio; 2. and the selection of Sarah Palin as John McCain’s Vice…
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By Mark Naison (June 5, 2018) Two key areas where President Trump either distorts historical trends or cynically presents false information for political gain are the following: First, the notion that our “ inner cities are plagued by crime” and face a terrible crisis which liberals have ignored. If this was 1995, those remarks might have been relevant, but in…
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By Laila Nur (June 1, 2018) The gun shots in my hood don’t make feel unsafe. The drunk yelling match at 2am between neighbors don’t make me feel unsafe. The random ass dogs running up and down the street don’t make me feel unsafe. The sex workers on the corner (who mean mug me on the daily lol) don’t make…
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By Mark Naison (April 30, 2018) My Black friends have always told me “Mark, if you were Black, saying the things you do, acting the way you do, you would have been dead a long time ago.” If you think they were exaggerating, read the article in the Chronicle of Higher Education about the death threats and insults the African…
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