Halloween display with ‘black man’ hanging from noose causes outrage

By David Edwards
Thursday, October 21, 2010 11:52 EST
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A Missouri man removed his Halloween decorations Wednesday at the request of the Scott County sheriff because they were suspected of being a public disturbance.

A Klu Klux Klan figure and the depiction of a black man being lynched were featured in the display.



Rick Hoskins told KFVS that he puts the decorations up every year as a sign of “white pride.”

“There’s been a bunch of people that’s stopped by since I put them up,” explained Hoskins. “Said they want to shake my hand. They said they’re glad to see a little white pride is still left in this country.”

Sheriff Rick Walter asked Rick Hoskins to remove the decorations after receiving several complaints. Hoskins agreed but promised to contact his attorney.

“It’s freedom of expression,” said Hoskins. “They’re my Halloween decorations.”

“I understand it’s freedom of speech,” one woman told KFVS. “But he needs to get over it.”

This video is from KFVS, broadcast Oct. 20, 2010.


Watch this video on iPhone/iPad

David Edwards
David Edwards
David Edwards has served as an editor at Raw Story since 2006. His work can also be found at Crooks & Liars, and he's also been published at The BRAD BLOG. He came to Raw Story after working as a network manager for the state of North Carolina and as as engineer developing enterprise resource planning software. Follow him on Twitter at @DavidEdwards.
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  • Anonymous

    I’m glad teagaggers and other cancervatives are christian patriots. Imagine what assholes they’d be otherwise.

  • Anonymous

    Imagine what these evil bastards will do if they get into power. Let’s see Fox comment on this.

  • Anonymous

    “white pride”? in the words of frank zappa “I’m not black but there’s a whole lotsa times I wish I could say I’m not white”

  • Jodi

    How is it “white pride” to show a murder of another man?!?! Sick and disgusting! What is wrong with people?!?!?!

  • Anonymous

    I have no problem with people having pride in their race or heritage but if you can only manage to define your race by an ideology of hate then maybe you don’t really have anything to be proud of.

    If your only point of pride is hate and breeding then you’re pretty much useless to the rest of humanity.

  • http://topsy.com/www.rawstory.com/rs/2010/10/kkkthemed-halloween-display-outrage/?utm_source=pingback&utm_campaign=L2 Tweets that mention Halloween display with ‘black man’ hanging from noose causes outrage | Raw Story — Topsy.com

    [...] This post was mentioned on Twitter by 93.7 WBLK: T-Boogie, LoveU, Leslie SayimaDreamer, sitfu.com, Pascal Uccelli and others. Pascal Uccelli said: KKK-themed Halloween display causes outrage http://bit.ly/bwphye │Raw Story [...]

  • Anonymous

    About the only thing that is not stereotyped about this bigot is that is Chevy is not up on blocks with the transmission pulled.

  • Anonymous

    There aren’t adequate words for this. It certainly doesn’t contribute to the “white pride” of anyone I know. I’ll be he calls himself a Christian. This guy’s IQ is about 50 points below that of the 2 guys on the porch in “Deliverance”.

  • Anonymous

    the only consolation is knowing this fine specimen of humanity has elected to suffer the pains of a dry heart… an exceedingly painful existence clouded by confusion, depression and the worm that gnaws at his soul without respite.

  • http://twitter.com/savagelight ThatBostonMan

    Lame article, pathetic attempt at pointless race baiting.

  • Anonymous

    **If** they get in power??

  • Anonymous

    just incredible!..he’s proud of of that!?!…what a sick puppy…i’m for free speech, but this is just pure hate and racism…i hope this idiot doesn’t have any kids…

  • Anonymous

    What race has anything to be proud of?

  • http://pulse.yahoo.com/_J2BKVG44GLNRGIAYKD7UO4O27E Arthur Young

    You are right on the money with that one !! Everybody still talks as if our country is sliding in the mud, while we are all caked with it. On one hand we have this story with a guy broadcasting loud and clear where he is coming from and on the other are a slew of people who don’t even realize how similar their own trajectory is.

  • http://pulse.yahoo.com/_OGIQH2E3GAHEC2CQXLWGQDQVOY Jay S

    Just when I have others convinced that eugenics is evil, a guy like Rick Hoskins comes along… Do you believe that some folks just don’t have a soul?

  • http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=1803097397 Mary Anne Landers

    Thank you for your article, David Edwards. I’m saddened by this story, but not surprised.

    I live in a small town in Arkansas, and even in the age of Obama I run into expressions of racism among white people. And not just from so-called rednecks.

    I’ve seen and heard indications of bigotry among those who are supposed to be more educated and sophisticated. And most alarming is the fact that some of these racists are young people.

    To paraphrase a famous advertising line: We’ve come a long way, baby . . . but we’ve still got a long way to go.

  • Anonymous

    Nothing screams fear of blacks more than shit like this. They are never going to find America an all white male country. They need to grow a set & learn to live with everyone, or get out. I don’t much care which but for gods sake, suck it up. There are people different from you white boys. Those people are your equal. Not a damn thing you can do about it & be a real man. The only way you can be a real man is to learn to deal with them like God would. with a loving heart. Anything else & your headed for hell. Must suck to be so screwed up in the head & heart.

  • Anonymous

    Technically this is ‘people who hate racist’ baiting.

    You’re welcome.

  • Anonymous

    Amen to that. This is just another ignorant hayseed who flies his confederate flag and drives his swamp buggy.

  • Busto

    A four-wheeler & a Monte Carlo, really? Who didn’t see that coming?

  • http://profiles.yahoo.com/u/WVOOJV5BYINH5HWA2UEK5XMJDM Melba N

    …so says the guy whose avatar celebrates a mass-murdering communist.

  • Anonymous

    So this guy is proud that certain people of his own race once terroristically murdered people for the crime of being of another race? Sick puppy, indeed.

  • Anonymous

    Talk about your white pouter.

  • Carl Elderton

    White pride…
    And just what did this product of an inadequately branched family tree do to be born white? I was born white, nobody asked me, it just happened. I would be a lot less embarrassed about it, if this rube would change HIS color of birth.

  • http://twitter.com/jerseyblueboy Karim Walker

    disgusting…omg, this is just f’n disgusting…

  • Anonymous

    Well, hell. I see he’s got his white sheets out, too.

  • Anonymous

    I always loved that number. Right around the LA riots, too.

  • Anonymous

    And at least those guys could play a smokin’ banjo. This eejit has nothing going for him.

  • Anonymous

    I’m guessing he wants free eggs.

  • LeftCoastLeftie

    Star Chamber anyone?

  • fuckrawstorycantbanmebitches

    Ain’t tor a grand little device? Ah, how lovely those white people are.

  • Anonymous

    **Doesn’t he make you proud to be an American? Fucking chitlins-for-brains.

  • Anonymous

    **And the little lady checks in. Mass murdering communist? Who you been listening to, bubbette?

  • http://pulse.yahoo.com/_CY7B3QL6YHC3KELXAOXNJT6IMM Eric S

    Typical. It IS America, after all. Can we discontinue the false charade as if we’re NOT still a grotesquely racist nation? Like this is any isolated incident. It NEVER ends. Hell, all you have to do is look at Yahoo news comments and you’ll see just what the general mainstream of the public actually is like. That’s a better cross section than Raw Story, because most folks who look at Raw Story are in the minority when it comes to progressive mentality (and I don’t necessarily mean progressive in a strictly political sense)

  • dolly lanna

    So disgusting. I bet he is a Christian also.

  • Anonymous

    White pride? He makes me utterly ashemed of being white.

  • http://pulse.yahoo.com/_3WVPA4DMRNLJEZLKO4YDYJO72I .

    Everyone is too sensitive. Let him hang what he wants. Someone in Hollyweird hung Sarah Palin last year.

  • http://pulse.yahoo.com/_QMPOO3PZFN7XV2XZKCGSXXR3WM Joe Somebody

    he probably has 8, all supported by the State.. and not more than 3 teeth between them.

  • Anonymous

    What an uneducated moron. What was he trying to get across by hanging the KKK effigy as well? What a moron.

  • Anonymous

    Your enemy is someone’s hero.

  • http://pulse.yahoo.com/_QMPOO3PZFN7XV2XZKCGSXXR3WM Joe Somebody

    You’re failing to take into account the religious aspects.. just like Kings were sanctioned by god, these morons think god intentionally put their “soul” in that body, of those parents, and did so at the instant the sperm penetrated the ovum. They justify their insanity as being “god’s will”, and those “lessor humans” simply aren’t in god’s regard.. hence they can call them “savage” or “animals” and treat them as such.

    It’s all about the religion.

  • Anonymous

    Typical white nazi Xtian!

  • QuadSlacker

    Could’ve just stopped at the ghost decorations. Nooo, had to top that with the dead guy hanging from the tree. How’s he going to top this, a burning cross on the lawn?

    People get all obsessed with one-upping their neighbors every holiday with the decorations. It’s a sick state of the country we are in.

  • Anonymous

    We sure do have a long way to go in this society, we sure do. This is one reason of a few that I feel sorry for America. People like him and even educated bigots make it hard for the rest of us to get along with each other.

  • Anonymous

    You left out the “In my opinion” part. One man’s terrorist is another man’s freedom fighter.

  • Anonymous

    I can’t help but believe this asshole – - my opinion – - was a class valedictorian.

  • http://www.facebook.com/jee8th Joseph Edwards VIII

    Someone should burn a flag on his lawn. Heheh.

  • Anonymous

    Oh Ricky bobby! Did you not hear the south lost the civil war? I understand you have a bad self image and must prop yourself up by belittling a whole race of people, but Ricky, the truth is you are truly a sad, sad, pathetic little man.

  • Anonymous

    I wonder if he has FIRE insurance? Looks like a lovely place for a cocktail party.

  • http://voxmagi-necessarywords.blogspot.com/ VoxMagi

    White pride? Looks like this guy doesn’t have any pride of any kind…or any self respect, dignity or brains. This kind of sh*t makes me remember that the Northern Army could have done us all a favor by burning everything down the sea and salting the earth instead of taking the bootheel off the throats of these retarded pieces of crap.

  • Misty Jean Moore

    How disgusting. I’m not white, but he is disgracing his race. Can’t we just all get along?

  • Carl Elderton

    You mean by masturbating as a teenager, I saved the world from being overrun by these crotch stains? Cool!

  • http://pulse.yahoo.com/_JK5ANRUXYPQIYFECEEXEK2ETQM Dana

    Tea Baggery at it’s best.

    Let’s see if FuxNooz goes bat shit crazy over this blatant show of racism like their trumped up ‘New Black Panther’ party fest or the whole phoney Shirley Sherrod edited speech thingy…
    oh, wait he’s a ‘white racist’…free pass, nothing to see here folks move along.

  • Anonymous

    I am white, and I fail to see how this display does anything to show respect and love to any neighbor. I am stunned that this person would have the gall to do something so hurtful and with no apparent clear message besides “murder is ok”? $10 says this is a Tea Party supporter.

  • Anonymous

    How could anyone hate a smoking black woman such as yourself?!? Great avatar.

  • http://www.windstonemusic.com hourglass1

    grrrrrrrrrrrrr!

  • http://www.windstonemusic.com hourglass1

    gawd it’s great sharing oxygen with these guys, isn’t it?

  • http://www.windstonemusic.com hourglass1

    tell me that’s not a portrait so i can move along …

  • Anonymous

    “Evolution didn’t stop when we grew thumbs” Bill Hicks

  • http://www.rawstory.com RawStory

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  • Anonymous

    The guy is from Missouri… they were part of the Union during the Civil War.

  • Anonymous

    As a 7 year old traveling to the South on the train I saw two black men hanging from a tree as families had a picnic and enjoying themselves. It’s something you never forget and don’t think it’s funny. What kind of people hang two men and have their children enjoy a picnic while looking at these men suffer and die? I have seen some of the worse things in my country but lived to see the change. It’s not nor never been about black or white it’s about people and we’re lucky in the US their are more good people then bad. I’ve been able to trave to almost every State of the USA and so far it’s great and the peoplel are nice.

  • shinyorbs

    I have seen the pictures of the joyous white people of all ages smiling and laughing at the macabre scene….and thought to myself “How fucking sick is that?” and to think there are still backwards hillbilly hayseed bigots out there….if I lived there I’d tear the fucking thing down…

  • shinyorbs

    D’oh!

  • http://www.facebook.com/raymond.strand Raymond Strand

    Let him leave them up. Then when his house spontaneously is targeted for the worst kinds of Halloween pranks. Who has a problem with this guy, we need more like him. If only all racist would openly display their racism so you could avoid them at all costs. This man said he had people come up and shake his hand. That person shaking his hand could be your boss, the police officer down the street, a relative etc….

    If you’re racist please do us all a favor and let us know.

  • http://profiles.yahoo.com/u/5ADH43ZCS3NITAIJKNHHOXH5SY C H

    I am formerly from MO. And I can tell you that there are many like him. I am still doing my own mea culpa for Ashcroft being AG. This is an ultra conservative state. That is why I left there 25 years ago. One thing you can say for MO, when someone tells you something you can take it to the bank. The one saving grace is you always know where you stand with people. Straight talk and no mind games. And often it is good to know where you are with people.

    This man is a pig, but at least he is out in the open with it. It is the subtle kind of racism, or the racism that mask’s itself in double speak that I hate most of all. I never let racism go. The only way to kill it, is to tackle the racists head on. If you stay quiet than you aid and acquiesce by you’re silence and it stays.

    I am probably older than most on this forum, and I came from a family of polite racists. The N word would never enter their mouths. But it was still there. No one can live in this world or this country and say there is no overt and institutionalized racism. And now we are going backwards and embracing it again. Very sad. I thought we might at long last growing up. But it exists everywhere in the world, in every country. It is seems to be worse here, because we expected so much from this country. I doubt very much I will live long enough to see it vanish.

  • http://blueollie.wordpress.com/2010/10/22/21-october-2010-pm/ 21 October 2010 (PM) « blueollie

    [...] Freedom of speech: yes, someone has the freedom to have racist Halloween displays. But I have the freedom to call him a racist idiot. [...]

  • Anonymous

    The mere idea of a non-white President freaks these poor souls out.

  • Anonymous

    You can’t fight stupid with STUPID, stupid.

  • http://profiles.yahoo.com/u/ZIIRJENPZTIPRDKHQLZWPQIXZA virgo47tp

    yes, hanging a black effigy in your yard and openly declaring white pride is most definitely race baiting.

  • http://www.facebook.com/brittani.bounds Brittani Bounds

    assholes like him are the reason why everyone hates white people, and america as a whole. deserves a fate worse than death or typical halloween pranks, by far. (ok, maybe some burning dog shit on his porch)

    white pride and freedom of expression MY ASS. there’s no pride or righteous expression AT ALL in this horrible prejudice and racism. just straight up, unbelieveable ignorance.

  • http://SALON WHITE DRAGON

    OK….a joke is a joke….now do the Muslim one with the paper twin towers. Too many to count. Wait until we get to the White House!

  • http://SALON WHITE DRAGON

    I don’t think we’re going backwards…. so much as not going anywhere. Your belief in our values is touching. We need to get back to calling a Spade, a shovel for starters.

  • Anonymous

    What is also disgusting is what NPR did to Juan Williams…whatever happened to free speech? and where the hell is the NAACP? or are they just another puppet for the liberals and figure his comments were anti-liberal? hhmmm.

  • Anonymous

    If the morons like this one get all freaked out over a president who is only half black, what will they do when the president is all black?

  • Anonymous

    Aah, white pride. Is that what this is? I’m white, yet somehow this doesn’t fill me with anything resembling ‘pride’.

    And I’m not even going to guess which way he’s going to vote this November.

  • http://pulse.yahoo.com/_KAHKP5CGTLLOSLUV3LHKUOQRAU Robert Carpenter

    Actually, Missouri was split during the war – they had men and supplies directed to both sides, had organized governments supporting each side and even had a star on each flag. They had basically their own civil war going on at the same time. So Vox is at least half correct.

  • Anonymous

    This is a hate crime. Any black person who sees this feels threatened. 1000s of black people used to get lynched in this country without any help from the justice system to find their killers. Black men would get lynched for looking at a white woman wrong.

  • Anonymous

    What f c king loser… It’s obvious… this is truely a sad man and is only doing this to get some pitiful form of attention. You can even tell he’s not a threat. They should let him keep that up in his yard and let him face the consequences of his actions.

  • proofter

    Parked on the lawn, no less!

  • http://pulse.yahoo.com/_TM7M56JMTA4DI6OUP2HTZTNDVE Secundino

    i said let him express him self in CALIFORNIA or GEORGIA or TENNESSEE or ALABAMA or LOUISIANA or even in TEXAS…. let see if his WHITE pride or feelings of expresion will last!(not even a day)

  • http://www.rawstory.com RawStory

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  • Anonymous

    Wish I could send him a photo of my “Lee surrendering at Appomatox” lawn display.

  • Anonymous

    So there are attorneys out there who accept payment in mayonnaise sandwiches and NASCAR memorabilia?

  • Anonymous

    I just saw a petition to “dont cave to Sarah Palin, support NPR” video. HOw about “DON’T CAVE TO CAIR AND GOEORGE SOROS DEFUND NPR”?

    In the scheme of things if they are a non profit, getting tax breaks and large donations from the public, and undue influence is controlling their public discourse and actions. Why should any non profit obtain tax breaks or tax money to subsidize what has become a liberal religion? Or a obviously biased religion or philosophy of any kind? Whether you listen or watch NPR and PBS etc, that fact remains that these have become ENTITLEMENTS, just like the U.N, Foreign Aid, GRANTS, Medicaid etc, with no appropriation or limit to their usefulness or original justification. When talking taxes, these have nothing to do with the basic and orginal Constitutional provisions for providing for the National Defense etc. In respect to “free” listening and radio/T.V., why cant they compete the same as ABC, NBC, CBS and other viewer and advertising generated channels?

  • Anonymous

    As to this article and picture, I personally hate the vampires and blood and guts displays of the recent years. But all said, it should be free speech and private property rights. (If we still have private property rights and its a residential zoned property. Of course it might be owned or the mortgage owned by the Government owned banks, so we all know who the Government sides with when it comes to private property and free speech. The courts have made it legal to burn the American Flag, but don’t burn a cross or hang a sheet. You can hang a foreign flag above a American flag, but don’t hang a traditional rebel State Flag. I dont come from the South, and have a long history of family “equal rights” and anti slavery anti crime abolitionism, but if you support all the blatant songs, music, media violence and language that has been marketed and Constitutionalized under Marketing and Free Speech for the last 20 years, this Hallowen Display should be a non issue. “I disagree with what you say, but defend to the death your right to say it” Is the release of all the confidential, if not secret military documents by WikiLeaks, any less offensive or threatening because it is free speech or on the internet? The Sheriff should have just told the complanants that it was legal and forgot about it, or let the neighbors file suit. Free speech is not a Hate crime!

  • Anonymous

    So whenever the LaRaza and NAACP march on Washington or demonstrate or make comments aganst Bush, Clinton, or any Government Action they don’t like, its because of the color of the Presidents Skin????? Wow! Talk about stereotyping and reading peoples minds. Bet MLK and majority black folk that marched and fought for equal rights in the 60′s, were “Freaked Out” that the President and majority of Courts and Congress were White, at time of Civil Rights Legislation and 60′s huh? Whats good for the goose is good for the gander, and Americans who disrespect and label the Tea Partyers as racist or one size fits all, should remember their own movements, organizing and intentions first, before judging and stereotyping others. Nothing to fear but fear itself should be the Tea Party and Conservative mantra.

  • LightningJoe

    So “white pride” depends on lynching blacks?

    That is the only interpretation possible, if this display is taken at face value. The idea that it stands for “white pride” would make me ashamed to be white, if I actually believed it stood for anything besides parochial ignorance.

    And the fact that people (white people, I assume) are pulling over to shake the hand of the man who erected this monstrosity is fully as offensive as the image itself is.

    BUT — if this is acceptable speech in America, then SO IS the converse, an image of a black lynching a white man. Which, I assume, would be pointed to as “racist” by the very man who put this up. Double standards, indeed! And another term for double race standards is “Jim Crow.”

    If any blacks have the stomach for it, I’d ask THEM to pull over and ask to shake the hand of this man. Any man “proud” of his identity shouldn’t refuse to shake such a hand offered in support of his right to self-expression.

  • LightningJoe

    But you see, even this guy would object to being called a racist. Racism is commonly acknowledged to be a bad thing. Only the most bitter of black-haters will take on that label openly.

    The rest of them insist they are not racist, but it’s only a protective-coloration objection, not an internal self-identity denial. They simply don’t want to be IDENTIFIED as a racist, witness this guy’s self-defined boosting of his “white pride” instead; when such a display clearly shows an act of murder motivated by race — not anyone’s point of pride.

    And they also try to turn the racist label against their detractors, saying that FINDING AND IDENTIFYING a racist is itself a form of racism. They KNOW they are racist, but they don’t want to be CALLED racist.

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