Today in, News I Can Get Behind: Missy Elliot in place of a Confederate monument? YES.
Sign me TF up.
No, really. Sign me up. It's an actual Change.org petition. For real.
The petition, started by Nathan Coflin, has 28,720 signatures (and needs just 35K, so get on over there).
Portsmouth City Council: Replace the Confederate Monument in Portsmouth with statue of Missy Elliott.... https://t.co/imZbQkBAdW via @Change
— NɅTHɅN (@NathanKnope) August 19, 2017
Hats off to you, Nathan. A true American hero.
Petition language includes the following:
We believe it is time to finally replace the Confederate Monument in Olde Towne Portsmouth Virginia near the intersection of Court and High streets with a new statue of a true Portsmouth native hero. Who better to encapsulate the culture and spirit of the city enshrined in a new monument than Grammy Award winning rapper, dancer, and record producer Missy "Misdemeanor" Elliott?
Before she was "Missy Misdemeanor" she was Melissa Arnette Elliott, born on July 1, 1971 in Portsmouth, Virginia. Hailing from humble beginnings as the only child of a power company dispatcher and a welder at Portsmouth's lauded naval shipyard, she rose to become a platinum recording artist with over 30-million albums sold. All this without even once owning a slave.
Getting this statue put up will be a lot of work and you may ask yourself is it worth it? I say yes and ask you to join me in letting us work it. Together we can put white supremacy down, flip it and reverse it. Let us come together in getting City Council to erect this statue in honor of Missy Elliott and all those in the great City of Portsmouth who work it each and every day. Ycamerpus Etihw!
Missy is all of us.
Missy is everything the Confederacy was not.
IS IT WORTH IT?
Yes, it is worth it.
Let me work it. I put my thang down flip it 'n reverse it (the Confederacy, that is). Do you also want to reverse it?