When NASCAR’s only black driver, Bubba Wallace, and his racing team learned of a noose at his workplace, the saturation process began.
First the media went into overdrive to discuss ropes, nooses and the history of lynchings historically perpetrated by white folk upon the black community. We even heard mention of the new National Memorial for Peace and Justice, also known as the lynching museum, in Montgomery, Ala., which opened in 2018.
Then, the FBI sent 15 agents to the Talladega Speedway in Alabama to scour the noose territory. But the nation’s top federal investigative arm determined no hate crime occurred. When NASCAR released photos of the rope, we ultimately learned that a noose is still a noose — except when it’s used to pull garage doors at racetracks.
In Chicago on that same Father’s Day weekend, 104 people were shot, the most for a weekend since 2012 in the Windy City, a metropolis long plagued by black-on-black violence. But the trendy Talladega story vacuumed up most of the oxygen.
As Chicago black community activist Tio Hardiman said, “I wasn’t surprised because Bubba Wallace is a celebrity. And you know how the media loves celebrities.” Apparently so.
Still, perhaps the FBI should have shipped, say, 12 of those agents to find out what the hell happened in Chicago that same weekend. Most of the rampant shootings in Chicago traditionally have been black-on-black issues. “Probably 80 percent,” Hardiman estimated. Just another day in the neighborhood, meaning it’s old news for national media.
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