The GOP’s party line has been that diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) initiatives are “racially divisive.” Yet this war against concepts deemed “racially divisive” doesn’t seem to include honoring the Confederacy and celebrations for Confederate figures, as Alabama is one of several states that mark the first Monday of June as a state holiday in honor of Jefferson Davis’ birthday. 

According to WVTM13, Alabama has not one, not two, but three holidays celebrating Confederate figures throughout the year. In a peak example of saying the quiet part out loud, the state also celebrates Robert E. Lee’s birthday — on the Martin Luther King Jr. holiday. 

For those unaware, Jefferson Davis was the President of the short-lived Confederate States of America. For reference, Martin was on the air longer than the Confederacy existed, y’all. Why don’t we have state holidays for Sheneneh?

Unsurprisingly, several of the states so offended at the sheer concept of equality are the ones who have state holidays celebrating the Confederacy. Florida and Mississippi also mark Jefferson Davis’ birthday as a state holiday, and they both have come through with some particularly heinous attacks on DEI initiatives. 

While many states and organizations began their DEI pushback earlier this year as a result of the Trump administration’s ongoing crackdown, Alabama’s anti-DEI law dates back to 2024 during the Biden administration. The law not only bans DEI initiatives in state universities but also prevents universities from teaching what legislators deemed “divisive concepts,” which is obviously code for any idea about race, gender, and sexuality that paints America in an unfavorable light.  

You know, it makes sense that Alabama’s against systemic discrimination being taught in schools, given that they’re still celebrating the Confederacy: an army that fought, and lost, an entire war over their right to treat Black people as subhuman.

I’ll never understand memorializing the Confederacy. Beyond, you know, the abject racism, there’s also the simple fact that they betrayed their country—and lost. I’m from Phoenix, and we ain’t out here celebrating the time the Suns lost the finals. New York wasn’t out here celebrating the Knicks losing the Eastern Conference Finals on Saturday. To my knowledge, there’s no parade for the team that loses the Super Bowl. Yet the South has been cherishing its L for over a century now. 

Couldn’t be me is all I’m saying. 

What makes the holiday even more insulting this year is that it comes as Alabama’s “Black Belt” has been particularly impacted by the Trump administration’s crusade against anything related to DEI. 

The University of Alabama’s LEGACY project, aimed at getting more young, Black women into STEM-related fields, was abruptly shuttered earlier this year as a result of the National Science Foundation (NSF) pulling funding in their ongoing effort to end federal support for DEI initiatives. The LEGACY project was just one of the many educational programs designed to help Black students that have been targeted over the last several months by the federal government. 

The University of Alabama is currently one of several schools under investigation for “race-based segregation” impacting white and Asian students under the Department of Education’s (DOE) newly founded “Civil Rights Fraud Initiative.” The initiative was designed as a way to make schools literally pay for anything the DOE deems as DEI and discriminatory towards white people (the real victims, obviously). 

These anti-DEI measures have extended beyond the classroom and have directly impacted the health and safety of several low-income, majority Black communities in Alabama as well. The Trump administration pulled funding for a settlement negotiated by the Biden administration to improve water sanitation in Black communities where pipes were pumping what locals described as “raw sewage.”

So, celebrating those who waged war against their country is fine, but Black people having access to clean water is where they draw the line. For people who get so offended when you call them white nationalists, they sure do their damndest to support it. 

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