Councilman Garrett introduces City Ordinance to Reign in Discrimination Practices

This past May [2021], Columbus attorney and city councilman Walker Garrett announced a measure meant to give Columbus residents a vehicle to actually enforce latent federal anti-discrimination laws.

It isn't hard to understand why the city ordinance is needed, but too many are against it and he has felt the heat of standing for something as opposed to falling for nothing. 

Though most people keep the continued racism and bigotry in this area under wraps and try to avoid it even at its phenomenal worst, it's almost understood that Columbus considers itself an exception to the rule of federal law when it comes to discrimination.

The layering is simple enough on the superficial level, but not so simple underneath its thick skin/outer shell.

With this being a city (once a much smaller rural area) located within a state that was an adamant veteran leader in the fight for the love of the 1800s confederacy, many local residents might try to understand that just one step backward in progressive politics for Columbus easily takes us all back to the 'horse'n'buggy' days.

Back in the day, when I worked for the Columbus Ledger-Enquirer, Knight-Ridder hired a new Senior Editor by the name of Thomas Kunkel, who had come here from Florida. Though things have changed tremendously since then, and Florida itself has progressed backward over the years, Kunkel immediately asked for a meeting with the African-American employees at the L-E in order to gain an understanding of why he sensed that he "lost one hundred years of progress in time" when he moved to Columbus. That happened in 1983. 

Needless to say, the African-American employees, myself included, were afraid to speak out aloud what they had covered in hushed whispers amongst one another numerous times. But why were they so afraid to speak out about what they knew was blatant racism inside the newsroom?

What Happened?

Kunkel left after one year, he couldn't take the ugliness of denial and refusal to address the racism, but it's 2021 - nearly 40 years have gone by since he left - and if he were to return now, he wouldn't find much of a difference except for a bit of urbanesque sprawl on the other side. 

We can actually drive down Double Churches Road and up Whitesville Road without fear of being lynched...that much is certain. That's about it, along with a few updated caveats. When I left Columbus in 1991, that area was still very much a part of the "hidden bubble racism" that Columbus had held onto for literally more than a century.

No. It's not "just" about Black people, per se. But the people who always bear the largest brunt of historical racial discrimination are -in fact- African-Americans. There are too many people who are in denial about these matters and that does not help any of us.

At the L-E, it wasn't so much the denial as it was the fear of speaking out. It felt like 1883 in that conference room...and Kunkel was right about it.

Law Enforcement is More Than Talk

Councilman Garrett's city ordinance provides a day of reckoning with potential future subpoena powers so that bigots of all who will be called to the carpet for their failure to invoke the milk of human kindness, godly justice, and who do love to imbibe themselves in the types of discrimination that hurt us all.

It's long overdue.

It is a good thing to enforce what is already essentially federal law without having to run to the federal government every time it happens. 

As much as Columbus, in general, would like to think it's exempt from the rest of the nation, the taxpayers here end up paying for that just like everyone else does. It costs money to discriminate and it is becoming more expensive by the minute to keep doing it. 

Localities should take MORE responsibility, not less, for enforcing good law that makes us ALL citizens and levels the playing field as it should. 

What could possibly be wrong with that? 

Normalizing Prejudice is Not a Thing...Watch Some Documentaries on Netflix

If you are a person who normalized prejudicial behaviors and then gaslit people into thinking they are the problem when it's really you, then this ordinance will be very hard on you.

Sadly enough, some people and organizations have to be legislated into doing the right thing, no matter how they feel about it; and Councilman Garrett is especially brave for being so willing to be a man who can finally admit we still have issues to work on.

Why the threats? That's #So1800s

The true intent of Councilman Garrett's ordinance -which was unanimously approved by the City Council, let us say it again - U- N- A- N- I- M- O- U- S- L- Y - seems to have been met by some vehement opposition - but never was it better said that "only hit dogs holler."

The hatred railed against him was so vile that the Councilman has publicly stated that he ended up having a minor stroke "because of all the hate mail" he received for basically trying to do the right thing. But even better than that, what does it say about Columbus that an ordinance like this would have to be proposed in the first place, AND it got approved?

It means the ENTIRE CITY COUNCIL AND THE MAYOR OF COLUMBUS, Skip Henderson, is well aware that there is still quite a bit of work to do to make "justice roll down like a mighty stream."

We talk the talk, but do we walk the walk?

Dirt Under the Rug

Like so much rug dirt, the people who like and enjoy practicing the discrimination, unabated and without interruption or accountability, have become gaslighting champions at hiding it and getting away with it.

That's the only thing that would explain folks who have been hiding their dirt and want to keep doing it. Let's just say, don't break the law, and it automatically does not apply to you.

There is scripture that supports this ... James 2:"But if you show favoritism, you sin and are convicted by the law as transgressors. 10 Whoever keeps the whole law but stumbles at just one point is guilty of breaking all of it. 11 For He who said, “Do not commit adultery,” also said, “Do not murder.” If you do not commit adultery, but do commit murder, you have become a lawbreaker..."

That's The Word. However, many who break the commandments of God end up with government laws that have to explain it to them in another form, because, well maybe just may be ... they didn't get it when the Lord God said it from the very start and whispered His Word into our hearts.

Oathkeeping by Councilpersons

This type of city ordinance, such a one as proposed by Garrett and co-sponsored by city councilors Jerry "Pops" Barnes and Toyia Tucker - is a better and more perfected and united way to hold those who practice all types of bigotry accountable, and not just those pertaining to the skin color racism.

Nobody who claims to be a "Christian" would literally threaten a man for trying to follow the laws and principles of godliness in the way he lives his life. 

It Should Never  Have Been 'Us -v- Them' in The First Place

No, of course not.

Good versus Evil is a fact of life, and we all end up having to pick a side. But 'Us -v- Them' takes 'Good -v- Evil' to a whole other level.

Evil does not come pre-packaged in a skin color or a sexual preference, or an ethnicity or a choice of religious preferences. It's just evil. Period. But we didn't start the fire. It's been burning since the world's been turning.

Nearly 160 years after the confederacy was ended during the Civil War, the fact that we are still having this VERBAL fight says a lot.

The people trying to get around it may even believe that the folks experiencing the prejudice are ignorant about it and should remain that way forever, but most are not ignorant - they've just learned how to ignore it and "keep it moving." 

Yet, the only thing that has come about by the intentional ignorance surrounding being non-open and non-inclusive has the effect of running in place like the characters on the "Alice in Wonderland" cartoon -- their feet are moving, but they are getting nowhere fast.

The Economics of Continued Discrimination

Columbus is a town with "five to seven churches on every corner, plenty of thrift shops and [way too many] restaurants..." and also with a substandard educational system that is sorely lacking if it should every try to compete to hold a place on the list of the Top 100 Best Places to Get An Education in the U.S.

The discrimination keeps the entire city down and makes it a blight on the State as well as the entire nation. This is a state that can't afford to gain any more notoriety than it already has of being one of the most prejudiced places to live in the United States. I've lived other places, and it comes as no surprise that people still think all Columbuses are in Ohio.

We can no longer afford, literally, to act as if the rest of the world doesn't exist and still expect the rest of the world to want to come here to boost the economy and make us better at being able to offer the kinds of fiscal opportunities that make us economically prosperous. This is a digital and high-tech information age that no longer tolerates the insufficiency of vitriolic hatred.

One of Georgia's own grown, Newt Gingrich, recently said to Maria Bartiromo on Fox News, that 'immigrants' are "being brought in to replace white [traditional classic] Americans."

Whatever that is supposed to mean.

One has to wonder how someone so blatantly ignorant got a national platform to pitch-represent a state that should be trying much harder not to be viewed as the last slobber of drooling spittle on the mouth of Old Tom Dixie.

San Diego?

It was told online that a man was approached by a woman at a restaurant in San Diego (California) because she heard him speaking 'en espanol.'

She told him, "This is San Diego. You need to learn to speak English." So he turned to her and said "I certainly will. As soon as you teach me how to say San Diego in English."

The Gritty Nitty

Taking into consideration that the U.S. is not "America," but is just a part of the continental Americas and that no one from here actually speaks English, but its next-door neighbor "American English," which is nearly entirely different than U.K. (British) English from ENGLAND; and taking into consideration that most, if not all U.S. citizens -by hook or by crook- are immigrants themselves, and also that not all ' traditional classic Americans ' (as per Gingrich) who are here are from England themselves, but are actually immigrants from other European nations on that other continent ...

All of us are a long way removed from being able to legitimately discriminate against anyone.

The Need Is There to Have a Talk About the Ugly Part

If the Columbus City Council, and all concerned, saw a need for localized anti-discrimination legislation that follows federal law (the need has been here all along, but no one has been brave enough to address it in a meaningful way), it says that Columbus has HUGE room for deep improvement when it comes to tempering its treatment of others who are not 'traditional classic' US citizens, whatever that means, Gingrich.

It's trite and over-used, but here it comes again ... we've come a long way...and we still got a long way to go.

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