Blackface Governor Cheers Robert E. Lee Statue’s Replacement by Monument to Wokeness

New time capsule to include kente cloth, ‘Black Lives Matter’ stickers, ‘Stop Asian Hate’ fliers, and LGBTQQIP2SAA+ pride pin

Andrew Stiles • September 13, 2021 4:00 pm

Gov. Ralph Northam (D., Va.) applauded the removal last week of a statue of Confederate general Robert E. Lee in Richmond, as well as the copper time capsule placed inside the statue’s pedestal more than 130 years ago.

“This monument and its time capsule reflected Virginia in 1890—and it’s time to remove both so that our public spaces better reflect who we are as a people in 2021,” the governor said. The old time capsule will be replaced by a new one curated by a committee of historians, educators, artists, and government officials. It will include several dozen items intended to reflect the prevailing wokeness of the time, such as:

• A “Black Lives Matter” sticker

• A kente cloth worn by government officials during the 400th commemoration of the landing that inspired the controversial “1619 Project”

• A hip hop album

• A poem written in braille; another titled “Post-Colonial Love Poem”

• An LGBTQQIP2SAA+ pride pin and sticker

• A face mask worn by Virginia first lady Pamela Northam

• An expired vial of the Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine

• Photos and fliers from a “Stop Asian Hate” protest

• A hand-painted Native American gourd rattle

• Minutes from a First Presbyterian Church meeting to approve the formation of a “dismantling racism” advisory group.

Northam’s remarks came more than two years after nearly every prominent Democratic politician and organization, including the Washington Post, demanded his resignation when a photo from his medical school yearbook appeared to show the governor, whose nickname was reportedly “Coonman,” wearing either blackface or a Ku Klux Klan robe.

It is not known if the yearbook photo (or the NFT version thereof) was submitted for inclusion in the new time capsule, but it does not appear on the final list of selected items.

After initially admitting to being one of the individuals in the photo, Northam backtracked. He did, however, admit to darkening his face with shoe polish to appear as Michael Jackson during a dance competition. “I look back now and regret that I did not understand the harmful legacy of an action like that,” Northam said at a press conference in February 2019. When a reporter asked whether he could perform the singer’s signature “moonwalk,” the governor appeared willing to do so until his wife warned that it would be “inappropriate.”

As a Virginia-based enterprise, the Washington Free Beacon regrets not being asked to provide submissions for the blackface governor’s updated time capsule. We humbly suggest the following items in an effort to accurately and holistically reflect the generalized derangement of these times:

• A transcript of then-vice president Joe Biden’s speech in Danville, Va., on Aug. 14, 2012, during which he told the predominantly black audience that Republicans were “gonna put y’all back in chains”

• A Rolling Stone article titled, “A Rape on Campus,” originally published in November 2014 and ultimately retracted after the allegations of gang rape against members of a University of Virginia fraternity were revealed to have been fabricated

• A November 2016 Washington Post article titled, “Without Tim Kaine, Hillary Clinton might have lost Virginia as well”

• A February 2019 Washington Post editorial titled, “Ralph Northam must resign”

• A March 2020 article authored by history professor Leslie M. Harris, and published by the Virginia-based news blog POLITICO, detailing the factual inaccuracies contained in the controversial “1619 Project”

• A Virginia Department of Education report that showed a decline of more than 20 points in math and science scores across Northern Virginia, where most students were forced to attend classes remotely during the 2020-21 school year

• An Anthony Fauci prayer candle

• An “RBG Workout” bobblehead of former Supreme Court justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, aka “Notorious RBG”

• A newsreel of disgraced (and currently incarcerated) porn lawyer Michael Avenatti’s appearances on CNN and MSNBC

• A $285 cashmere sweater with “Cuomosexual” embroidering

• A pint of chocolate chocolate chip ice cream