Mississippi Gov. Tate Reeves has sparked backlash this week, after proclaiming April to be both Confederate Heritage Month and Genocide Awareness Month.
“April is the month when, in 1861, the American Civil War began between the Confederate and Union armies, reportedly the costliest and deadliest war ever fought on American soil,” the proclamation said.
Earlier in March, Reeves declared April to be Genocide Awareness Month, tweeting, “The systematic destruction of lives has spanned areas and cultures from Armenia to Darfur, the Holodomor to the Holocaust. Genocide has no place in society, and we must do everything we can to prevent it.”
The proclamation obviously eludes mentioning anything about wiping out Native Americans or slavery as an inseparable part of US history. During the Civil War in the United States, forces of the Confederacy, a group of southern states, sought to preserve the institution of slavery.
“Mississippi governor proclaims April both Confederate Heritage Month and Genocide Awareness and Prevention Month, sparking backlash #SmartNews Can you believe this garbage? Does he know what the confederacy stood for? Slavery that’s what. Racist idiot,” one user tweeted.
Ironically, in April last year, Reeves appeared on-air claiming, “There is no systemic racism in America,” though statistics indicate otherwise.
US media has reported that thousands of indigenous women and girls have been reported killed or missing for years, while families and activists say their cases are often ignored by law enforcement, which has forced them to bring the spotlight on the issue through social media campaigns, marches and protests.
About 1,500 American Indian and Alaska Native missing persons have been recorded across the United States by the National Crime Information Center, and 2,700 homicide cases have been reported to the federal government's Uniform Crime Reporting Program.
About 1,500 American Indian and Alaska Native missing persons have been recorded across the United States by the National Crime Information Center, and 2,700 homicide cases have been reported to the federal government's Uniform Crime Reporting Program.
The Justice Department has also reported that on some reservations, Native American women are murdered at a rate more than ten times the national average.
At the same time, the US denies that native populations of North America had experienced genocide, even in controversial cases like the Sand Creek Massacre and the Long Walk of the Navajo.