First, I want to acknowledge the pain and worry many of you are experiencing this week—about your rights, your livelihoods, your safety, your children and your nation. It is a difficult and uncertain time, and each of us owes ourselves, loved ones and colleagues kindness and grace.
The Mississippi Free Press newsroom has the 1939 British motivational phrase “Keep Calm and Carry On” on a purple poster in our newsroom, and I carry it on my keychain in red. Until now, the phrase for me has been a reminder, mostly, to breathe deeply when needed and then keep going on to the necessary work.
It’s a reminder that we can finish what we start, and we can work as dedicated teams in mutually supportive environments—a world we’ve built at the Free Press.
Today that phrase means more. The United Kingdom created the (imperfect) phrase when it was under grave threat from the Nazis, which would in fact come from beyond its shores and white cliffs in 1940. With my research and writing often centering on racism, bigotry and misogyny, such as in this ongoing series and a future book, God willing, I’ve often tried to imagine living under that kind of threat. It can be hard to comprehend trying to also carry on your daily lives and work despite dire fear and uncertainty, perhaps while you’re trying to see and find solutions to get beyond it.
A Headwind Change Headed Our Way
Nov. 6, 2024, is our day that will live in infamy in many ways. It’s the first day that we woke up realizing that a headwind change is headed our way with so many of our loved ones cast overnight into fear. I don’t have all the answers, and wouldn’t pretend to, but I do think it requires staying as calm as possible and carrying on with purpose and resolve.
It also requires showing a lot of love and care for each other, as I woke up Wednesday immediately thinking about our MFP team bravely on the front lines of democracy. And it probably involves as little recrimination as possible for ourselves and others who tried bravely in their ways to save us from this reality.
Many factors got us here, not one, after anti-democracy forces gathered and mobilized steadily in the U.S. over decades, often using immigrants as the hammer to bludgeon it with—and it’s hard to know what could’ve been done differently to stop its jarring apotheosis this week. But democracy is always messy and always a struggle—but always worth it.
But we can choose to move forward with the resolve of not allowing fear to break our spirit. Each of us will have our own ways, big and small. For us at the MFP, it is to continue to tell the truth that affects the people of Mississippi, and America, with the most profound effects on the rights and freedoms of people who have never fully enjoyed them. And it is to carry on with our plans to connect Mississippians beyond divides and partisanship, even now.
It will not always be an easy road with so many bent on causing pain for others including people who don’t think it can happen to them and to those who have long been harassed and threatened for reporting real history and the truth.
This morning, a team member—a Black mother celebrating a new engagement—opened an email from a man vowing to destroy the MFP and, by extension, all of our livelihoods and a major news source for Mississippi. She still shared a lovely personal video on GroupMe, with all of us congratulating her. Enough love trumps hate. Know this.
The email vowing MFP’s destruction read: “First thing I want to do is see if Mr. Trump can’t close y’all down because y’all are a racist organization and y’all must be stopped you’re promoting racism in Mississippi when everybody is trying to just get along but you keep stirring it up with your racist articles so my purpose is to close down this publication and I will do it.”
That is, it is “racist” to report honestly about racism that hurts so many in our state and beyond.
We will Do This Work On Your Behalf
Let’s be honest: We expect such threats from up here reporting on the front lines. But it hits differently when the founders’ embedded rights of a free press and religious freedom without government interference have been continuously threatened in the last year. We are a scrappy bunch, and we will do this work on your behalf. In the upcoming years, we will seek to work alongside many of you in solutions circles in your communities. We are here for the long haul.
We do need your continued support, though. So many of you have stepped up over nearly five years now and even more in recent weeks. We see you and appreciate you. Now, I urge you to give what you can now or set up a recurring monthly membership—which means entry to a post-election Zoom talk between Stuart Stevens, Ashton Pittman and me tomorrow (Nov. 7) at 6 p.m. central. Not to mention all these gifts are doubled now during NewsMatch.
If you are able to offer a match for our end-of-year NewsMatch campaign to help bring in other donors, please write publisher@mississippifreepress.org. Or suggest any other way you can invest in MFP journalism’s longevity. We’re listening.
We’re here, Mississippi and America, to stand alongside you and report in the breach. And we will continue to work alongside all of you on this freedom road—and to resist the inevitable roadblocks and potholes along the way. The journey to maintain and grow democracy is worth it, and the alternative is unthinkable.
Read Donna Ladd’s ongoing Democracy essay series here. You can now follow her on Threads at @donnerkay and also subscribe to her new Substack newsletter at donnerkay.substack.com.
This MFP Voices essay does not necessarily represent the views of the Mississippi Free Press, its staff or board members. To submit an opinion for the MFP Voices section, send up to 1,200 words and sources fact-checking the included information to voices@mississippifreepress.org. We welcome a wide variety of viewpoints.
Read coverage of this year’s elections cycle at our Election Zone 2024 page.