King's crime, the brutal, senseless torture of a disabled black man by a white supremacist, conjures up the worst images of backwards Texas towns. People here tend to think of Austin as an oasis, the non-Texas part of Texas. We might venture out to nearby state parks, where we are likely to meet up with travelers from California, New York or Pennsylvania, but we don't usually go to small Texas towns. Bigotry, violence and angry white men in pick-up trucks are what we imagine. And what Bill King did to James Byrd Jr. this past June represented our worst nightmare.
People are crazy down there.
One white friend who has family in East Texas said she knew most people were shocked by the Jasper murder, but she wasn't. Black people disappear down there all the time. As I got close to Jasper, population 8,400, the landscape was filled with tall stands of pine trees, innumerable churches, scary-looking white men in Bubba hats out in their yards burning what I hoped was trash, little stands selling fireworks and gun stores. In fact, I have been completely bowled over by what I have witnessed in Jasper. All rights reserved.