So this image was the most difficult image
to get for the book.
When I called The Getty to buy the rights to replicate
the image in the book, they said, you can't have it.
And at first I did the thing that you do, you say, thank
you, and you hang up.
And you wait a day and you call back.
And so I called back the next day,
and someone else was on the phone.
And I said I'd like to buy the rights to this image.
And she said, no, you can't have it.
And I said, why not.
And she said, well, because we are an intermediary Fulton
archives.
And they said we can't sell the rights to this image
because they are afraid that the people who
want to buy the rights to replicate the image
want to in order to support what is in the image.
And, you know, it's that kind of thing you're on the phone,
you want what you want, you know that.
I want what I want.
But each word is dropping into my consciousness one
word at a time, so I'm thinking, so they
want to buy the image in order to support
what is in the image.
And then it dawned on me.
I am not a white supremacist.
So I say to her, what if we sent you the book
and you sent it on to them and let them decide?
And so she said, OK, she will do that.
And so that's what happened.
We sent it to her.
And this is the lynching of Thomas Shipp and Abram
Smith in Marion, Indiana August 7, 1930.
And then after a few weeks I heard back
and they said, OK, send us a check.
And so I did send them a check and they let
me reproduce it in the book.
So once I paid them, I called them back.
And I said, um, there was one other thing.
And she's like, what?
No, she didn't actually.
She didn't say that.
She said yes.
I said to her, you know, actually, I
want to take out the men from the photo.
Is that OK?
And she was like, oh, now, you motherfucker,
you can do whatever you want.
And I was like, oh, OK.
So that's what I did.
So what's in the book is on the far right.
Because I'm not interested in replicating sentimentality
around the murder of Black people.
I am interested in the ways in which the culture has
suppressed the culpability and support of white citizens
of these kinds of murder.
So I was just interested in those people
in that photo who are really you people in this room,
in one way or another.
Every time you're in a room and you hear that racist statement
and you let it stand.
You know, and a funny thing happened to my husband
the other--
this was about a year, two years now.
We lived in Claremont.
I was teaching at Pomona College.
And the woman I play tennis with is a biologist.
That's irrelevant information.
And she is a biologist.
And, anyway, her husband had one of those football parties.
What are those big weekends where people--
you know the big-- the big--
Super Bowl.
Super Bowl, Super Bowl Sunday, yeah.
And so, it was Super Bowl Sunday and her husband
invited my husband over for Super Bowl Sunday.
And John went.
And I didn't go.
I wasn't invited.
And-- also, I wouldn't have gone because I had
things to do other than that.
And so I'm at home working.
And it's only been, like, an hour, and he's back.
And I said to him, why are you back?
What happened?
And he said, well, the game started,
and some guy in the room was like, look at that nigger.
But it was actually kind of interesting
what happened afterwards because then I got
an apology from my friend Nina.
And I said, why are you apologizing to me?
You didn't anything to me.
She said, yeah, I know John was upset.
And then her husband sent an apology.
And all the apologies went back and forth and everything.
You know, now we're great friends again.
Everything's cool.
But what has always been interesting to
me is if my husband had not been in that room,
and if her husband had not known that my husband is married
to me, would that comment have stood?
Probably.
And so, in that way, we all know.
I don't know what happens when I'm not in the room.
But my husband is white, and he knows
what happens when I'm not in the room.
So, through him, I know what's happening
when I'm not in the room.
And so I know that you all are in rooms
where this stuff is happening that shouldn't be happening.
And in that way, you are those people in that photo.