Being An Artist In Trump America.
To people telling me I will lose business over my posts regarding Nazism and white supremacy:
The only reason I live in America today is due to a ridiculous prejudice. One of my ancestors had the forethought and wherewithal to see the rise in hatred against Jewish people in Germany. His wife was Jewish. My family illegally boarded a fishing vessel and they subsequently lost two children in tow (at least according to historical documents, which show that six people left Germany and four people entered the census records once they left the boat in Virginia).
Our family name was Von Weber. My ancestors dropped the Von in an attempt to seem more American.
So what does this mean?
My ancestors had to make a concrete decision and they chose America as the option that made the most sense to them in the face of TRUE adversity. The very people today that openly brandish Nazi imagery are the same kind of people that forced my family on a boat to begin with. I try to think of that experience and it’s just beyond my level of comprehension. I can’t imagine how scared those people were, how awful it must have felt to shove a wife and several kids into a fish tank hoping to escape prejudice. And then to lose a couple before you met shore. Imagine that level of tragedy that these people had to endure. Over what? Some bullshit ideology that certain people weren’t worth as much as others? In the name of patriotism and nationalism? The more things change, the more they stay the same.
So after studying my lineage and reading about the struggle my family faced to grant me the privilege of detailing it today; why would I not be offended by overt Nazi connections? I believe that there is something in my blood that forces me to find this shit repugnant: some weird, innate connection to my ancestors that compels me to say something. I don’t believe this because I think my opinion is particularly important (I don’t), I just believe it’s how those people stay alive in my soul and in my spirit.
I have to believe in something, after all, and if there is anything that my experience has shown me then it’s that my family perseveres through adversity. And I think it’s why the whole lot of us (even today) will see a person get bullied and feel an utmost responsibility to stick up for them. I really do believe that trauma is hereditary and, at least as far as my research has shown me, we have had a whole lot of it.
So when I see some Nazi shit on a stage for, arguably, the most popular political party that exists in America?
Yeah, I’m piping up. I’ll take the loss in business. Some things are more important than money.
I am the product of those people and I am not closing my mouth.
