Brooklyn "Lynching" Halloween Decoration: Racist To Some, Festive To Others

(NY1 CBS 2)

Every year somebody goes too far on Halloween—a woman dressed as a slutty nurse gets drunk and actually performs an invasive medical procedure, or an area man slips actual eyeballs into that bowl of peeled grapes. There's a fine line! Putting a bloodied mannequin underneath a rider lawnmower in your front yard? BRAVO. But lynching a black scarecrow from a tree outside your home? That's a Hallowon't, and yesterday the NYPD was summoned to enforce a little taste in Brooklyn.

The lynched, dark-complected scarecrow was spotted hanging from a tree in Kensington this week, and it somehow came to the attention of City Councilman Charles Barron, who described it as "grotesque" issuing a statement saying, "The scarecrow is offensive and reprehensible not only to the Black Community, but to all those who have a history of persecution and, or have been victimized by lynch mobs. The perpetrators of this horrific display are only acting out what they conceal in their hearts." Barron added, "It’s not a cool decoration."

But not everyone was offended. Area woman Nicole Clemente told NY1, "I don't think that that portrays lynching. I mean, it's Halloween, that's part of the Halloween spirit. When I see a jack-o-lantern with a scary face on, I don't get scared and think monsters are going to come get me." Granted, we slept through most of our American history classes, but we don't seem to remember anything about hillbilly jack-o-lanterns committing horrible civil rights abuses in the South.

Anyway, the NYPD removed the decoration yesterday because the tree is considered city property. NY1 reports that cops were unable to locate the resident who hung the decoration, but we're guessing he was down in the basement putting the finishing touches on his popular Haunted Auschwitz House.

Contact the author of this article or email tips@gothamist.com with further questions, comments or tips.

By John Del Signore in News on October 20, 2011 10:39 AM

Comments [rss]

chee1rs

an OWS white cracker did this

Eggcream

Racist. No question about it.

If comments for this article was left open for 100 years you would get a constant flow of idiotic racists saying it wasn't racist, or some such, no matter how many times you countered their imbecilic arguments. That's how psychotic racists are.

Charles

"Racist" is just what anti-whites call anyone they want to silence or discredit. Really they just say it because we're White. Anti-racist is a code word for anti-White.

Peter Rabbit

Nobody is flooding black nations and ONLY black nations with
non-blacks and saying, “Its OK, there is no such thing as race. So we are going
to replace black people with a blended people.” This is happening in white
nations and ONLY in white nations. They say they are antiracist. What they are
is antiwhite. Antiracist is a code word for antiwhite. And what they want is
genocide.

Guest

Can we also have all of the WHITE skeletons taken down from all over town? I'm REALLY offended by the connotation that all white people should be flesh-less corpses. And the RED devils. I mean, come on, not ALL Native Americans are evil. And ORANGE pumpkins (I'm sure they probably offend Asians for some reason). And GREEN witches. Wiccans aren't always about to throw up.

James Mortensen

And I suppose if the scarecrow were white, there would still be this big a stink? Reverse racism=STILL RACISM. It's a Halloween decoration. Be offended because you don't believe in Halloween, not because some kids thought it would be cool to put up a Halloween decoration. There's enough ACTUAL crime going on &, I'm sure, some ACTUAL cases of racism that can be taken care of before we have to deal with an innocently left scarecrow.

James Mortensen

We've been taught from an early age, at least where I came from, to look past the color of skin. I saw this & I thought, "bad, stupid prank!" because it's a poorly executed prank. I never once thought it was racist.

whiteiris

I want to go up to the closest white person and say: 'You can't
understand this, it's a black thing' and then slap him, just for my
mental health" -- Charles Barron

souper_crackers

I walked underneath that last week on the way to the library, and didn't think "lynching" so much as "creepy hanging dude." I guess I need to start seeing racism? Or maybe just be happy that I don't read into everything?

LICnative

Why do blacks claim ownership of a noose? I'm pretty sure that plenty of white folks ALSO met the wrong end of a rope.

Given the disparity of population totals,it's pretty reasonable to assume that MORE whites than blacks got a neck rope burn.

thesporkgirl

were the white people hanged just for being white?

i find it difficult to believe anyone can be this disingenuous.

Fern Cohen

Maybe not, but Jews were hanged in Europe because they were Jewish.

thingsthatneedtogo

Jews weren't considered to be under the anglo saxon definition of "white". Thats one of the contributing factors to their persecution.

SFNY

Wow. Straight from the "but men get raped, too" school of logic.

"From 1882-1968, 4,743 [recorded] lynchings occurred in the United States. Of these people that were lynched 3,446 were black. The blacks lynched accounted for 72.7% of the people lynched." http://faculty.berea.edu/brown...

Table of lynchings shows how the disparity widened starting in 1890, and got horrific after 1900:
http://faculty.berea.edu/brown...

LICnative

Nice, but how about BEFORE 1882, or does the totality of history not count?

Guest

It doesn't count because he needs to make a point that this is totally racist, whether it is or not.

sk83r

Whats wrong with a diverse selection of lynchings?

RobertMosesSupposesErroneously

"hillbilly jack-o-lanterns committing horrible civil rights abuses in the South" <-- SOMEBODY SET UP A KICKSTARTER AND PRODUCE THIS HORROR MOVIE NOW!

brooklynRick

Charles Barron is as useless as it gets. Making noise so he can be heard. What about all those jobs you promised when campaigning for Atlantic yards, and how is that Cadillac that Ratner bought you holding up?