How the 1915 Film, “Birth of a Nation”, Ignited America’s Darkest Racist Era – And Why It Still Haunts Us Today
One of the most racist films ever made was “Birth of a Nation.” It was an old black and white 1915 movie that had no audio and required one to read the captions. The film was an adaption of the white supremacist Thomas Dixon Jr.’ book, “The Clansman.” In this rotten film, which was made to spread the evils of white supremacy, it sought to spread the falsehoods about why the Civil War was fought. The Civil War was centrally about slavery and the racist ideas associated with why the plantation slave owners wanted this war. If slavery were abolished their wealth would be “gone with the wind” and the lazy “gentlemen” of the slave owning class would be forced to do their own digging and picking. This movie created the second birth of the Ku Klux Klan, and used the ignorant rituals of cross burning that are still used by modern day extremists.
The fear created in the film of Black people being allowed to vote and govern was aimed at creating a white supremacist future along with their Confederate statues and symbols. The racists that sought to opposed Black freedom called themselves “Redeemers.” They wanted to redeem their loss of the Civil War and create a false history that never was. They made villains into heroes, like that of Jesse James, an outlaw who robbed banks, but is never mentioned as a slave owner and a man that fought for the Confederate slave owner army. In fact, in one of Jesse James’ train robberies he wore a KKK mask. This was the way white supremacy sought to control history, the arts, and everyday narratives by ignoring the facts—just like MAGA supporters do today. In this way, white racist terrorism is made “holy” and their savagery made into a redemption of an evil sort.
The “Birth of a Nation” film was seen by President Woodrow Willson, another racist president, and much of the film borrowed words from Wilson’s rants in his book. Immediately after the film hit the movie houses, the bloody summer of 1919 took place, a time when over 25 Black communities were burned or people murdered by White racist mobs, and eventually the burning of the Black community of Tulsa, Oklahoma in 1921. This racist film provided the calling for racist terrorism. These racists ruled American culture in almost every area for decades and included the lies talked about in the slave owner war at the Alamo against Mexico. The slogan “Make America Great Again” (MAGA) is a propaganda vehicle being used to return the country to this racist past. Today, there are still racist films but a greater danger is that that of fascism. Fascism is a movement that seeks to hate Blacks, Bowns, immigrants, and others, using a leadership that projects a one-man dictatorship. This explains Donald Trump quite easily.
In the film a White woman goes into the woods and is stalked by a free Black man who is threatening to rape her. She jumps off of a cliff to save herself. This is the old racist stereotype of the Black male rapist that has been used to murder Black men. In the film, the Black free man is hunted down and lynched. The Black man is played by a racist white in Black Face. The film was trying to kill the future of a non-racist society that many have fought for. In our time, we are faced with hulked up racists in military garb threatening people at the polls who won’t vote for their dictator.
