“Get in good trouble, necessary trouble, and redeem the soul of America.”

These are the words of the great civil rights activist John Lewis, who died in July 2020 after a lifelong and historic effort to power change in this country.

People often ask me and Tracie why we continue to protest the Neo-Confederate memorial in Orange, Texas where she grew up. It was erected in 2017 along Martin Luther King Dr., one of the city’s main arteries, where it intersects with Interstate 10 not far from the Louisiana border. (Click the link to see it.)

After all, they say, the Sons of Confederate Veterans built on private land and there’s nothing that can be done to remove it.

I don’t want to point you to the Sons’ website (every click helps them). But I would like you to take a look at the bibliography by the Kennedy brothers, the pseudo-intellectuals who run these scumbags’ “media and public relations.”

They include titles like Myths of American Slavery, Was Jefferson Davis Right?, and The South Was Right!. Don’t believe me? Check out the Amazon thread. I can only imagine who Lincoln’s Marxists were.

Some people claim that the Sons are just a bunch of loser re-enactors who get a thrill out of racist cosplay. But it only takes a little bit of digging to discover that the driving force of their organization is white supremacy.

On Monday, January 16, Martin Luther King Day, 2023, Tracie and I will be protesting their “Memorial of the Wind” in Orange from 1-3 p.m. Please join us if you can. We’ll have plenty of signs and water to share.

We’ve been protesting the site since it first was erected. We’ve chronicled our efforts on our site RepurposeMemorial.com.

And every year, we raise a MLK billboard across the road from this racist, white supremacist eyesore (see below). Thank you to everyone who donated to this year’s GoFundMe. We raised enough money to keep the billboard up throughout Black History Month. Surplus funds will be applied to next year’s campaign.

As a celebrated Italian winemaker once said, sometimes the battles you know you are going to lose are the most important ones to fight.

The Sons once sent a menacing anonymous letter to a family member of ours. One of them, their local asshole in chief, Granvel Block, even showed up at the church where my father-in-law served as pastor. People yell nasty things at us and throw cigarette butts when we protest. They burn rubber and “roll coal” to intimidate us. One asshole famously told us to “get the f*ck across the border… Jesus f*cking hates you.”

These women and men are cowards who hide behind their cosplay and Neo-Confederate pageantry.

Please join us if you can. Please share this post if you can’t. And please take the day off on Monday, January 16, the day we celebrate the life and words of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., and get into the good kind of trouble — necessary trouble.

Email me at jparzen@gmail.com for more info on the protest.