Greetings one and all. First off, I would love to say what a pleasure it is to be able to submit something regarding this young man Emmett Till, because as the majority of us know, Mr. Till was and is an integral piece of our history which is of course the civil rights movement. For instance, Rosa Parks stated, “There were several cases of people I knew personally who met the end of their lives in this manner and other manners of brutality without even a ripple being made publicly by it.” The custom, Parks noted, about killings such as Till’s was “to keep such things covered up.” So what Rosa Parks was basically saying is that this was nothing new — the hate, brutality, torture, rape and murder was ignored, turned a blind eye to, acting like everything was OK — until that day of August 28, 1955.
So what happened on August 28, 1955? To be honest, I wasn’t even born till 21 years later, however, my grandparents, aunts, uncles, and cousins were there to experience the horror of what occurred that dreadful day. The story begins with a young boy who was in Money, Mississippi visiting family members. Mr. Till (respectfully) was with cousins when he visited Bryant Grocery Store. He purchased two cents worth of bubble gum and apparently said “Bye baby” over his shoulder to the clerk Carolyn Bryant ( the liar) as he exited the premises. Later on that night Roy Bryant and J.W. Milam ran into Emmett’s uncle’s house, dragged him from his bed, beat him to the point of disfigurement, and shot him like he was nothing, before tossing his body in the Tallahatchie River with a cotton-gin fan attached with a barbed wire laced to his neck to weigh him down.
Now, imma stop right there — we are talking about a 14-year-old child. 14!!! Can we imagine the pain he went through? The hate he witnessed? The evil he saw in the eyes of these two individuals? How many times have our children come to us with minor cuts and we put a Band-Aid on and kiss it to make the pain go away? Yet, Emmett was alone and nobody was there to comfort him. Can you imagine for the moment the tears this young man cried? Can you imagine how he cried out for his mother? Just like George Floyd, his final words were crying out in pain and agony to the one person who always gave him comfort his “Mother.” Now, upon finding his body mutilated, his mother Mamie Till made the decision to show the world what racism has done to her “Baby.”
What have we learned from that as a community, as a people, and as a nation? What have we taken away from that experience? That racism in any form is ugly and evil. And we as a community need to come together and say we will not permit such a disease in our lives. Carolyn Bryant was finally found out to be a liar — and hopefully one day she will face the justice system!!! Words are power, either positive or negative/life or death. And there are consequences for our actions and the words we speak out of our mouths. I ask that each of us take a moment to think about these things before we speak words of hate. Think about Emmett Till and think about the many African Americans who were forcefully brought here without a choice. Think about the words we are teaching our children. Teach them the truth, teach them the truth in our history. We cannot put a Band-Aid on these things and make them go away we must acknowledge them, heal and move forward together. Yes, we have made strides but there is still so much more work to be done — especially when children are still being called N’’’’s in the Massachusetts public school system in 2022.
My question is, are these people who are teaching their children to hate people of color, are they also showing them pictures of African Americans hanging from trees, are they showing them the scars of whips across the backs of slaves? Because if the truth was there and not hidden like it always has been maybe we could heal together instead of hating each other. The Greenfield Human Rights Commission will be at the Greenfield Garden Cinemas on Thursday Nov. 3 at 7:15 p.m. for the showing of the new film “Till” and invites the public to participate in a Q&A session after the movie. If you would like to participate in this discussion please feel free to come and speak your mind. I would also like to thank Garden Cinemas for bringing this movie to our city. And I thank you for allowing me to speak my mind.
Mpress “Bennu” Nembhard lives in Greenfield.