#forsyth county

Cumming, Forsyth County, GA

Black Americans have had 15 million acres of land stolen through terror, lynchings and genocide down to 1 million. 

This is just one of many that deal with the ethnic cleansing of Black Americans by white mobs. You may have heard of Oprah doing an episode in 1987 about that county. (Episode: Oprah Visits a County Where No Black Person Had Lived for 75 Years.) Sundown towns, of course. No longer completely completely white, it is still largely white. Mrs. Elon Osby and every last descendant needs to gather their docs and get every single acre back. Everybody living all comfortably there and shit gotta go. It is what it is. We’ve been needed an Anti-Black Hate Crime bill. But the Democrats, who Black Americans have loyally voted for with no tangibles in return, obviously feel it’s of no concern. The likes of Buffalo, anyone?

Did I mention this town is close by Oscarville, the Black American town under that man-made lake, Lake Lanier? 1912.

Add this onto the reparations claim and charge genocide.

In this undated photo provided by Rebecca Hale, Marc Tyler Nobleman poses for a portrait. The author's clash with a Georgia school district over a mention of someone's homosexuality in a presentation highlights the reach of conservatives' push for what what they call parents' rights. Nobleman at first complied with a request not to mention that the son of Batman's co-creator was gay but then rebelled. He and LGBTQ+ advocates say the Forsyth County district in suburban Atlanta was wrong. The district says schools shouldn't engage in such discussions without parents knowing in advance. (Rebecca Hale via AP)

ATLANTA (AP) — Marc Tyler Nobleman was supposed to talk to kids about the secret co-creator of Batman, with the aim of inspiring young students in suburban Atlanta's Forsyth County to research and write.

Then the school district told him he had to cut a key point from his presentation — that the artist he helped rescue from obscurity had a gay son. Rather than acquiesce, he canceled the last of his talks.

“We’re long past the point where we should be policing people talking about who they love,” Nobleman said in a telephone interview. “And that’s what I’m hoping will happen in this community.”

State laws restricting talk of sexual orientation and gender identity in schools have proliferated in recent years, but the clash with Nobleman shows schools may be limiting such discussions even in states like Georgia that haven’t officially banned them. Some proponents of broader laws giving parents more control over schools argue they extend to discussion of sex and gender even if the statutes don’t explicitly cover them.

Eleven states ban discussion of LGBTQ+ people in at least some public schools in what are often called “Don’t say gay” laws, according to the Movement Advancement Project, an LGBTQ+ rights think tank. Five additional states require parental consent for discussion, according to the project.

Legislation restricting LGBTQ+ rights gained steam this year, but suppression is not new. A school district in New Jersey, which requires curriculums to be LGBTQ-inclusive, tried to bar a valedictorian from discussing his queer identity during a graduation speech in 2021. That year, a federal judge ordered an Indiana district to give the same privileges to a gay-straight alliance as to other extracurricular groups. Two years later, Indiana passed a law banning discussion of LGBTQ+ people in grades K-3.

Schools nationwide have been challenged on books with LGBTQ+ themes or characters, and many have removed them, including Forsyth County, which has been a battleground in the politics of schooling.

LGBTQ+ advocates say Nobleman bumped up against a moral panic fomented by conservatives seeking to roll back acceptance.

“The idea that these folks are saying that they just don’t want to talk about it at all is very disingenuous,” said Cathryn Oakley, a lawyer for the Human Rights Campaign, a leading advocacy group. “What they mean is they don’t want views other than theirs to be expressed. And they believe that that means everyone should have to hear what they believe.”

Discussion of straight people with traditional gender identities is everywhere, she said, and if all discussion of sexuality is going to be banned, Oakley said, “then you certainly better not be teaching ‘Romeo and Juliet.’"

Nobleman, a self-described “superhero geek" who lives in the suburbs of Washington, D.C., is best known as the author of “Bill the Boy Wonder: The Secret Co-creator of Batman." It lays out the story of Bill Finger, the long-uncredited author who helped create Batman and other comic book characters.

Finger died in obscurity in 1974, with artist Bob Kane credited as Batman’s only creator. Finger’s only child was a son, Fred Finger, who was gay and died in 1992 at age 43 of AIDS complications. Bill Finger was presumed to have no living heirs, meaning there was no one to press DC Comics to acknowledge Finger's work.

The children of Jeremiah and Nancy Brown, who were expelled from Forsyth in 1912. Left to right: Harrison, Rosalee, Bertie, Fred, Naomi, and Minor Brown, circa 1896.

Araluen: End of My Journey by John Dreamer

Arrida: Arabian Nights (Epic verison; Aladdin) by Alan Irwin Menken

Celtica: Spirit of the Wild by BrunuhVille

Hibernia:  Aeon by Nick Murray

Nihon-Ja:  Oogway Ascends (Kung Fu Panda) by Hans Zimmer & John Powell

Skandia: Once There Were Dragons (How To Train Your Dragon: The Hidden World) by John Powell

Sonderland: Dark Harbour (Instrumental verison) by Nick Phoenix