Morning Belz, April 16
Bessemer, Alabama.
Sitting in Bessemer, Ala., right now, ready to start interviewing people as soon as my photographer arrives in a few minutes. I’m feeling optimistic, though I don’t expect a lot of employees will be easy to get on camera talking about the union vote. The Amazon Fulfillment Center (named BHM1), is on the outskirts of Birmingham, next to a waterpark. It’s humming. Parking lot full of cars, trucks coming and going. That’s in contrast to the rest of Bessemer, which appears to have its share of vacant storefronts. More to come.
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Last interview w/Hong Kong opposition newspaper owner — BBC
“Republicans will regret their breakup with big business” — Bloomberg
Andrew Yang widens lead in NYC mayoral primary — Politico
Reminder that the opioid crisis continues apace — NYT
Drug cartels now dropping bombs with drones — The Drive
Long read on a new charter city in Honduras — Astral Codex
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The video I’m making about anti-Asian racism is getting closer to completion. It’s a tricky one, which is part of the reason it’s taking so long. A little over half of the people I spoke to in Chattanooga (a pretty average mid-sized American city) said they haven’t experienced any racism any time recently, and in the on-camera interviews I was able to conduct, all sorts of racial fault lines emerged. Disapproval for illegal immigration from two of the men who spoke to me on camera, for instance, and one man saying the only racism he’s experienced in the U.S. is from his Vietnamese family toward Black Americans, or from Black Americans toward middle-aged workers in his nail salon who don’t speak English well. One lady I interviewed said she thinks “racism” is a word that’s being “instigated” by the media, and she doesn’t see the world that way. I also have a heartbreaking interview with a Lao grocery store owner who was racially abused in the small town where he’s lived for 35 years. That interview shows just how damaging even one instance (and we know there have been many!) of clear and obvious racism can do. It happened in a flash at a gas station a couple months ago, but it changed his whole perspective and caused him to consider buying a gun, and he told me, his body shaking, that “I get sad sometimes.” So it’s all pretty complicated and frankly a minefield for me, as a white guy, to try to put together. I want to do justice to the complexity of what I’ve been able to document, without in any way dismissing the very real fear, anger and alienation spread by instances of Asian hate. It’s a needle-threading exercise and I don’t want to get it wrong.
Quote
“It is strange with how little notice, good, bad, or indifferent, a man may live and die in London. He awakens no sympathy in the breast of any single person; his existence is a matter of interest to no one save himself; he cannot be said to be forgotten when he dies, for no one remembered him when he was alive.” — Charles Dickens, “Sketches by Boz,” 1837
About: I was a newspaper reporter for 14 years, most recently at the Minneapolis Star Tribune. I explained why my family left Minneapolis here. Now we live just outside Chattanooga and I work on Scuffed News, a project that either succeeds by July or will have to be abandoned. This is my newsletter. Please share it with anyone you think might enjoy it. And please consider supporting this work with your money on Patreon.