We’re #1

Our beloved Pennsylvania has much to boast about among the fifty states. The Keystone State stands second in fracking, gambling revenue and gasoline tax per gallon. Look out, Texas, Nevada, and California. We are coming after you.

In one area, we are #1. According to the Anti-Defamation League, Pennsylvania leads the nation (by a wide margin) in distribution of racist and anti-semitic propaganda. Our Commonwealth saw 471 incidents of the total 4,851nationwide. Those slackers in Virginia (Remember Charlottesville?) trailed with a mere 375 incidents. Racist stickers and pamphlets were distributed on PA college campuses. Racist rallies were held at the state Capitol in Harrisburg, and at Gettysburg National Cemetery. I don’t think that Abe Lincoln would approve.

Their general messages are the old chestnuts “Jews control the world” (which surely worked out for 6 million of them in the Holocaust) and “ White people are under constant attack from Blacks” (which explains all those Black billionaires out there).

These hate groups do have cool names though. The Patriot Front, the European Heritage Association, and the Folkish Resistance are all active in Pennsylvania. “We are common working folk of European heritage patriotically resisting Jews and Blacks.”

William Penn founded our beloved commonwealth specifically as a haven of religious tolerance. There’s a reason why all those wacky Amish and Mennonites settled here. Penn even treated the Native Americans fairly, buying the Philadelphia area and forbidding European settlement beyond that. Of course, his sons later screwed the Lenni Lenape out of everything up to Blue Mountain and the Delaware Water Gap in the infamous Walking Purchase. Pennsylvania was one of the first states to abolish slavery.

I don’t think that William Penn would be very happy with the lack of tolerance in his commonwealth today.

By Ed Dufton