Racist Billboards Are Popping Up Around the South

It's a sad fact that crazy people can rarely keep their thoughts to themselves. The most level-headed among us are never the ones spewing their opinions loudly and publicly; instead, it's always someone word-vomiting about how women's rights will be the demise of civilization, how global warming is a government conspiracy, and how the white race is facing a genocide. So it is on a highway heading toward Birmingham, where a new billboard reads: "Diversity Means Chasing Down the Last White Person #white genocide." No one has ever claimed that Alabama was the epicenter of racial tolerance, but this is pretty pathetic—I mean, hashtags don't have spaces, guys.

HAHA, another billboard in racist, white supremacist Birmingham, Alabama:

— Ben Norton (@BenjaminNorton)January 12, 2015

In 2013, a similar billboard popped up in a suburb of Birmingham, which read: " Anti-Racist Is a Codeword for Anti-White." Residents tried unsuccessfully to get the sign removed, and as far as I know, it's still there. There was a billboard with the same slogan in Knoxville, Tennessee, but police dismantled it pretty quickly. And earlier this month, the KKK erected a billboard in Arkansas advertising its radio show with the tagline, "It's not racist to <3 your people" next to an image of a sad-looking girl holding a puppy.

The group behind that most recent billboard, as well as the other offending board in Alabama, is called the White Genocide Project. Their mission, as explained on their website, is "to bring awareness to the planet about the ongoing program of genocide against White people, which is the effort to change the majority White countries of the world into countries that have at the least a tiny White minority, and at most no Whites at all." Their grievances mostly have to do with non-white immigration into the United States and Europe, but they also take issue with things like affirmative action, interracial marriage, and (of course) Barack Obama.

Africa 4 Africans. Asia 4 Asians. White countries 4 everybody? Thats — LadyD (@1776LD)January 10, 2015

"White children deserve a future"

The explicitly racist, xenophobic chunk of the American far right hasn't gained the traction that their European counterparts have, so it's pretty safe to laugh at these bigots. VICE interviewed one of these nut jobs last year, and after waxing on about why non-whites should be kicked out of Europe and America, said, "I very well may be president of the United States in 2020." Ain't happening.

It's worth nothing that Springville, Alabama—the suburb where the most recent billboard appeared—is 93.6 percent white, and has become whiter than ever in the past ten years (it was a mere 90 percent white in 2000, according to Census data). So it's not like this is some sort of reaction against immigrants moving in. Nor are these racist billboards indicative of Southerners as a whole being horribly prejudiced. After the KKK's radio show billboards went up in Harrison, Arkansas (which is in a county that is 96.5 percent white), the town responded by putting up several other billboards that said things like "Love Thy Neighbor" and "Hate Cannot Drive Out Hate." But seriously, what's up with the billboard? They only prove that these racists' advertising methods are as antiquated as their worldviews.

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