America unmasked: The images that reveal the Ku Klux Klan is alive and kicking in 2009
The USA has a new president but an old problem - and nothing typifies it like today’s Ku Klux Klan. The photographer Anthony Karen gained unprecedented access to the ‘Invisible Empire’
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These images show members of the Ku Klux Klan as they want to be seen, scary and secretive and waiting in the wings for Barack and his colour-blind vision for America to fail. Anthony Karen, a former Marine and self-taught photojournalist was granted access to the innermost sanctum of the Klan. He doesn’t tell us how he did it but he was considered trustworthy enough to be invited into their homes and allowed to photograph their most secretive ceremonies, such as the infamous cross burnings.
When he talks about the Klan members he has encountered he tends not to dwell on the fate of their victims. Karen’s feat is that he takes us to places few photojournalists have been before, into the belly of the beast. The scenes he presents portray a kinder, gentler Klan. The mute photographs present an organisation that is far less threatening than the hate group of our popular imagination. Consciously or otherwise, his photographs hold our imagination in their grip while doing double duty as propaganda for the extremist right, much as Leni Riefenstahl’s work did for the Nazis.
Today the Klan is a mere shadow of what it used to be and there are at least 34 differently named Klan groups. “They are a fairly low-rent bunch of people, many of whom use their local organisations as a way of raising money for themselves,” says Mark Potok, director of the Intelligence Project at the Southern Poverty Law Center in Montgomery, Alabama.
Photographs of the Klan folk in their hooded regalia aren’t all that rare. The archives of America’s newspapers contain plenty of front-page photographs of lynchings throughout the past century. Three years ago, James Cameron, the last survivor of an attempted lynching died, thankfully of natural causes.
The older generation of Black Americans grew up hearing about Klan lynchings whispered over the dinner table but never mentioned outside the home. At the Klan’s height, around the turn of the 20th century, some 30 to 40 lynchings a year were being recorded. It is believed that there were in fact many more unrecorded deaths, especially in the cotton-growing south where the deaths of black field-hands were often not recorded.
Karen’s photographs show an entirely different side of the far right. He presents a 58-year-old, fifth-generation seamstress he calls “Ms Ruth” and he has photographed her running up an outfit for the “Exalted Cyclops” or head of a local KKK chapter. She gets paid about $140 for her trouble. Karen tells us that she uses the earnings to help care for her 40-year-old quadriplegic daughter, who was injured in a car accident 10 years ago.
Karen’s images of the Klan and its supporters regularly appear on the recruiting websites of the far right. Out of context, the images of hooded Klansmen and their families tell us little of the real story – the inexorable rise in the number of extremist organisations in America.
The number of hate-crime victims in the US is also rising and as America’s middle and working class gets thrown out of work, the hate groups behind the crimes are flourishing. As people lose their homes to foreclosure and, without the benefit of a safety net, find themselves slipping into poverty, there is already a search for scapegoats underway. Immigrants from central and South America have become particular targets as the grim economic times take hold.
Anyone who doubts the capacity of the modern KKK for violence need look no further than the recent case of 43-year-old Cynthia Lynch of Tulsa, Oklahoma. She had never been out of her home state before she travelled to Louisiana to be initiated into the Klan. She was met off the bus by two members of a group that calls itself the Sons of Dixie and taken to a campsite in the woods 60 miles north of New Orleans.
There, Lynch’s head was shaven and after 24 hours of Klan boot camp, including chanting and running with torches, she had had enough and asked to be taken to town. After an argument, the group’s “Grand Lordship”, Chuck Foster, is alleged to have shot her to death. He was charged with second-degree murder and is awaiting trial. Just as shocking is that the event happened in Bogalusa, a backwoods Louisiana town that was once known as the Klan capital of the US.
In the 1960s the Klan operated with impunity in Bogalusa and once held a public meeting to decide which black church to burn down next. Local Klan members were suspected of ambushing two black policemen in 1965, killing one and wounding the other. No one was ever tried for the crimes.
Despite all its notoriety the Klan has been a spent force for decades with nothing like the clout it once wielded. At its peak the KKK boasted four million members and controlled the governor’s mansions and legislatures of several states. Since the 1930s the KKK has been in a state of disorganisation and today it probably has 6,000 members. But the economic crisis is swelling their ranks and already, a month after the inauguration of the first black president, the tidal wave of interracial harmony that greeted Obama’s election is starting to recede.
“Things are certain to get worse,” says Potok. “The ingredients are all there: a dire economy that is certain to get worse; high levels of immigration; the white majority that is soon to turn into a minority and a black man in the White House.”
More than 400 hate-related incidents, from cross-burnings to effigies of President Obama hanging from nooses have been reported, according to law-enforcement authorities and Potok’s organisation, which files lawsuits against hate groups aimed at making them bankrupt.
Late last year, two suspected skinheads who had links to a violent Klan chapter in Kentucky were charged with plotting to kill 88 black students. They were then going to assassinate President Obama by blasting him from a speeding car while wearing white tuxedos and top hats. They were never going to succeed, given the huge security net around Obama, but the fact that they had planned such an outlandish attack may be a harbinger of things to come.
“There is a tremendous backlash to Obama’s election,” says Richard Barrett, the leader of the Nationalist Movement, another white supremacist group. “Many people look at the flag of the Republic of New Africa that was hoisted over the White House as an act of war.
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Comments
I am sorry that the pig ignorant and racist swine in these pictures might be construed as representing America as a whole. I am very sorry that they are allowed to raise children and to poison the minds of those children.
Something ought to be done about that. Giving the parents a nine gram high velocity lead injection to the cerebrum might be a good starting point.
The states with the lowest graduation and literacy rates are also (surprise!) the poorest states. Maybe what folks there need is a bit more of the wealth enjoyed by those in liberal states such as New York and Connecticut. But then, why would the rich want to share their resources to help people improve themselves? Then they'd have no one to look down on.
The world has moved on. Any Klan member who intends to sow hate or cause pandemonium will face the wrath of the law. Besides, they will not escape the vigilance of respectable men and women of decency.
Incidentally, the article fails to mention that every single 'governor and legislator' with Klan membership during it's heyday was a Democrat, including current longserving blowhard Senator Robert Byrd of West Virginia. The party of Obama was the exclusive home of those who would hate Obama.
And that begs the question that "Why were the bombers on 911 not American but all the 7/7 bombers home grown?". Whilst the US has tried to address it problems of divisions and appears to have moved on, Europe still struggles with it. Today it is the Muslim extremists, yesterday it was the NF, BNP, Nazis, etc. the common link among these groups being lack of tolerance for others.
For all those pointing out some Democrats as being ex-Klan members, my answer is exactly that, that they are ex-members. America has moved on while Europe struggles to address its equalities. It would be interesting to know what kind of strength the European groups garner and whether their strength is waning or on the rise.
You can look it up.
You can look it up.
"were" being the operative word...now it's the Republicans, who used to be the "Party of Lincoln." Reminds me of a Who song....
As for which hate group kills more people every year, I'm not sure "Muslim terrorists" is a proper moniker. After all, the Klan considers itself to be on the vanguard of upholding Christian values, but I don't think too many people would think of them -- despite their self-avowed "Christianity" -- as "Christian terrorists."
Plus bear in mind that the US has rejected that leftist version of racism known as 'Multiculturalism', which arbitrarily pigeon-holes people based on either their religion or ethnicity, regardless of the true opinion or beliefs of the person involved. Given that the prevailing attitude is that Multiculturalism is not racist in Eur and that rejection of it is, its not too big of a jump to see why Eur hacks (want to) see racism everywhere in the US.
The issue of contention may be caused / exacerbated by differences in interpretation of TOPIC of media coverage. I believe the subject article of THE INDEPENDENT may be more related to the socio-economic dynamics that drive the attitudes and behavior of individuals in society as it relates to the emergence of revolutionary movements. Viewing the behavior of the KKK through the cold, sterile lens of historical analysis - the group is fundamentally no different than any other 'extremist' group.
A relatively small proportion of the general populous can have a significant impact on the evolution of the society as a whole. Sometimes the impact is considered "good" (civil rights movement as judged by the consensus of contemporary history) or "bad" (Al Queda). [Yes, I understand that one example is a 'group' and the other is a 'movement', but I am attempting to avoid controversy in my drive to make a point]
The media tends to be reactionary, reporting the violent after-effects of social discord and decent, focusing on the "what", "when", and "how"; while often remaining silent on the larger questions of "why" - the latter being a tricky subject to handle due to a misalignment of interests between funding the news agency and fulfilling its charter.
I believe THE INDEPENDENT is making an attempt to highlight the onset of effervescence as opposed to waiting until the pressure cooker explodes, then covering the sensation of the resultant third-degree burns - as is often the case. Whether or not the article wishes to make the KKK relevant may not matter so much as to whether the KKK has the Desire, Capability, Support, and Opportunity to make THEMSELVES relevant. In calamity, there is always Opportunity.
1. Nobody in America takes the Klan seriously anymore, except those looking to make money by scaring people.
2. Cynthia Lynch's murder was simply that: a homocide. It wasn't a "hate crime" as both parties were White, and seriously, the victim was a KKK wannabe... Is the author seriously lamenting the death of an overt "racist"?
3. After summing up this heinous Klan "rampage", Mr. Doyle had to travel 600 miles and more than FORTY years to find another alleged Klan killing? Doesn't sound like much of a track record to me. Is this what passes for journalism in the UK today?
4. Finally, and perhaps most importantly, the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) is NOT... I repeat...NOT a legitimate source of information. The SPLC was founded in 1971 by multimillionaire, Morris Dees. It is an entirely self-proclaimed "watchdog" group that has no mandate and is subject to no external review or regulation.
The SPLC uses a never ending fear campaign to frighten donors, many of them elderly, into making ongoing contributions. In its most recently posted tax report, the SPLC states that it took in over $55 million dollars in 2007, spent $7 million on "legal costs" and dumped over $25 million into its "Endowment Fund". This fund now totals over $200 million tax-free dollars. (http://www.splcenter.org/pdf/static/SP
Multimillionaire Dees compensates himself more than $320,000 a year from the donation pot, and charges $10,000 in speaking fees, which can easily add up to additional hundreds of thousands of dollars each year. Mark Potok, the SPLC's Public Relations chief, draws $138,000 a year in donor dollars as well, and I don't know what he charges to speak. See pages 10 and 40 of the document linked above.
The SPLC has an undisputed financial interest in exaggerating the number of "hate groups" and "hate crimes. It maintains a 'hate map" that is so grossly bloated with "groups" that often are nothing more than a single individual out in the boondocks or groups like the League of the South that seek to restore the Confederacy. I live in Virginia, the capital of the old South and I don't know of ANYONE who fears the return of the Confederacy. It's a sad joke. What's not as amusing is some of the other groups the SPLC has labeled as "haters". There are publishers, church groups, legitimate immigration reform groups and "radical traditionalist Catholics". No doubt, many of your readers fall into one or more of these catagories.
People and groups arrive on the SPLC's "hate list" solely at the whim of Mr. Dees and that is also how they would be removed from the list, IF, they were allowed to. Mr. Potok maintains the list and sees to it that the numbers grow an average of 4% to 5% a year. Even when he announces publicly that a group is defunct, like the alleged Klan "group" in tiny Winchester, New Hampshire, it remains on the map indefinitely (http://www.religionnewsblog.com/21174
Literally dozens of groups on the map are not affilliated with any city or town, such as the first 12 of California's 80 alleged groups. That's 15% of the count for that state that only exists in Mr. Potok's imagination. But it pads the figures nicely. See it for yourself.
In closing, Mr. Dees' SPLC is one of the most profitable non-profit organizations in the USA. The Better Business Bureau no longer accredits the SPLC as a responsible charity due to "...a lack of commitment to transparency."
(http://us.bbb.org/WWWRoot/SitePage.asp
Mr. Dees brags on page 81 of his autobiography, "A Season for Justice" that he made $5,000 dollars representing a violent Klansman in 1962 who was indicted for attacking a group of "Freedom Riders."
The Klan is a joke. More people are murdered in Brixton or East London each year than have been killed by the Klan in the past fifty years combined. Britain has more than enough of its own racial problems without listening to the disreputable press releases of the SPLC. This is very sloppy journalism, at best.
Papers such as The Independent, The Guardian, and The Times are desperately fighting the swathe of tabloid crap that most UK newspaper-gobblers eagerly inhale, but it's a losing battle. Alas we British are just as capable of being disappointingly stupid as any other nationality.
Fair's fair, at least this article states repeatedly that the KKK are a mere shadow of their former selves. Perhaps it's less lazy journalism and more lazy reading.
Remember, this is a ridiculous article written by a European journalist try to impress a European audience. These aren't Americans, black, white, or the politically correct crowd trying to cause problems. They are Europeans.
They financed his incredibly expensive campaign and his "advisors" are all old faces who represent the old power structure. The clever "marketing campaign" that they organised with Obama as the figurehead was designed to give the people what they wanted. Hence the pathetically corny "Change" slogan.
It is already very clear that there is going to be only superficial change and that the new government will continue the old policies of persuing more wars in Euro/Asia, protecting and financing Israel and continuing the economic and financial destruction of America from within.
The title of your article is both unfounded and slanderious. Frankly Mr. Doyle it sounds like you are hoping America fails ethically and morally, as well as politically. Perhaps this is to fullfill some need of yours to gloat or something.
And as far as your last quote from Mr. Barrett "Many people look at the flag of the Republic of New Africa that was hoisted over the White House as an act of war" that was just plain assanine Mr. Doyle. This man is a racist, clearly not very intelligent, and he's wrong both morally and intellectually. And yet you end your ridiciolus article with his quote insinuating some degree of credibility?
I recommend you spend more of your energy on exposing the gradual Islamic takeover of Europe as opposed to trying to give strength to an tired old, low browed ideology like the KKK.
A quote from Diane McWhorter's recent essay in USA Today, comparing the activities of the KKK to Abu Ghraib.
http://blogs.usatoday.com/oped/2009/0
Bob in Alabama
Odd isn't it that the only peaceful period in European history is after WWII when the USA was there to act as policeman.
Without them the hate and bigotry of the Europeans just keeps boiling over.
So why is it they try to act superior?
Not the best photographs under the sun would wipe out the crimes the Nazis committed, or the Israelis carried out, or indeed, the KKK practiced for decades against fellow human beings. The art of Mr. Karen is a despicable use of the medium - and the material. It should be viewed as a distortion of essential human values.
I wonder what is next? Kind and gentle poems by Himmler? Riveting prose by Olmert, or a modern Cross sculpture burning by a gentle and kind KKK lyncher?
The great backlash the media bloviates about like Pavlov's dog after 9/11 and every other terrorist attacks is a fiction.
You can look that up.
Actually, you should look that up shouldn't you?
Being a journalist and all, isn't that part of the deal?
Try something called 'google'.
Seems the only time Europe has been peaceful is when those hate filled KKK marching, racist, hillbilly, big Mac eating, slope foreheaded, mouth breathing hick Yanks from the colonies have been there to stop it.
So how are Europeans so superior to those horrible Yanks?
The only peaceful time in Europe's history comes courtesy of the Yanks, and the European history of genocides and racism and class warfare is hundreds of times as bad as theirs, so it might be time to shut the old pie hole and look in the mirror.
Or look out the window and see the antisemitism and racism from the muslims and the plain old Europeans that is everywhere.
I worked in Central Asia with Euros and Australians and Yanks, and the people that treated the locals the worst were the Europeans.
Their sense of being upper class and being better than the locals was appalling.
There were a few incidents of hard boiled old miners telling the Europeans that the locals were doing the same job they were so they were entitled to the same respect and benefits and quality of food that the expats got.
So about that mirror......?
That has also been my experience on assignments all over the world.
The most important thing for President Obama to do now is to make American society more equitable. However, he will have a tough time fighting the vested interest groups on Capitol Hill...
They are real and they kill real people. And they do it every day.
When was the last time the Klan murdered anyone?
If we are going to fight racism and violence and intolerance, by all means let's fight it.
But digging up the past and trying to ignore the present atrocities by the muslims isn't helping anyone except the muslim terrorists.
Meltdown by Joe Priestly blows all the bullshit away. See for yourself.
http://bnp.org.uk/category/columnists/j
Affirmative Action and the Civil Rights statutes of the 60s are essentially bones tossed to the rest of us. Prior to the 1960s, it wasn't possible for non-white men or any women to be firefighters, police, paramedics or hold high political office. Even in 2009, how many people of color are there in the House? I hear there is just ONE black man in the whole Senate.
People of color and women still earn less than white men, but we all have the same expenses. The "At Will" employment policy supersedes the Civil Rights statutes and what's left of Affirmative Action. Employers may hire (or not hire) whoever they wish without explanation and they may take away a job with no warning or explanation. In the entertainment industry, production is upfront; they say outright that for employment, more than 7 out of every 10 jobs will go to a white person.
White men have never needed special legislature for the freedom to go, be, and do as one wished in the US and certainly don't in 2009. White men have always entered by the front door, lived wherever they wished, gained employment everywhere and were paid fair money for their efforts. If any of this does not happen to one white man, it was solely because another white man stands in the way. Never ultimately anyone else. So I wonder--WHAT is the point of a formal "white supremacist" movement when at no time has the white man NOT been the supreme policy-makers.
Please give me real proof that real crimes are being committed by the KKK.
Seems the vast majority of this comes from some overheated 'journalists' imagination.
Google 'muslim inbreeding'.
Odd how all those arranged marriages of 8 year olds to middle aged cousins and uncles has polluted the ol' gene pool.
"She went on to quote the report she commissioned in say that that the Pakistani community accounted for 30 per cent of all births with recessive disorders, despite representing 3.4 per cent of the birth rate nationwide and that 55 per cent of British Pakistanis are married to first cousins, resulting in an increasing rate of genetic defects and high rates of infant mortality."
And the media gives them tongue baths and brings up some worn out old racist group from the past to make them feel brave and heroic.
I'll tell you what would be heroic; any of these pathetic jokes of journalists actually standing up to the real danger of the muslims terrorist groups.
Any sap can write about the KKK.
Writing about the muslim terrorists can get you killed.