Before you begin this conversation, please review the Community Guidelines and Tools for Facilitators at the beginning of this guide.

STARTING THE CONVERSATION

Immediately after the film, we suggest giving people a moment to stop and reflect. You could play some soft instrumental music or let people enjoy the silence. You could pose a general question (examples below) and give people some time to themselves to jot down or think about their answers before opening the discussion. Alternatively, you could ask participants to share their thoughts with a partner before starting a group discussion.

• What are your initial thoughts/feelings after watching the film?
• What part of the film did you identify with most? Why?
• Which aspect of the film caused feelings of estrangement/discomfort? Why?
• Did any moment in the film inspire you? If so, which part?
• Did anything surprise you while watching the film?
• What was the most challenging part of the film to watch?
• What did you learn that you had not heard of before?
• Is there anything you’re hoping to learn more about?
• In what ways, if any, does this film inspire you towards action?
• How does the film help you see systematic oppression more clearly? How did the film add to your previous understanding of systematic oppression?
• Historian, David Blight, wrote that “Memory is not history. Memory is passed down through generations, reflects ownership, and feelings of belonging.”
  • In what ways did this film make you think differently about the relationship between history and memory? What new questions or ideas do you have with regards to the relationship between them and the power they hold?
  • In what ways can memory impact our capacity to face the truths of history?
• In the film, Thomas Taylor causes CJ to seriously ponder the grief of the Confederacy by asserting that monuments serve as headstones for the unknown and unburied Confederate soldiers. What is being spoken when the Lost Cause narrative asks people to understand the grief of the wives of Confederate soldiers while erasing the grief and terror that enslaved people had to endure?
  • In what ways is the historical grief of white Confederates not a valid justification for the erection (or continued presence) of these monuments?
  • How does the opposition to statue removal under the justification of “heritage,” connect to white grief from the past?
  • How does the opposition to statue removal under the justification of “heritage” distract from the continued violence and harm these statues enact today?
  • In what ways is it historically and contemporarily impossible to separate this “heritage” from hate?
• In the film, C.J. refers to the Lost Cause as “the story that reunited a nation.” That it was “A lie born in the South. Bronzed in the North.” How does this make you think differently about the North’s complicity in strengthening foundations of white supremacy and anti-Black racism?

STATUES, STATUTES AND SYSTEMS

• In what ways are racism, colonization, and white supremacy never neutral? Who would benefit by framing these realities as neutral?
• Take a moment to consider the statues and memorials in your hometown. What, upon critical reflection, are these artifacts asking you to remember? What histories are they connected to and from whose perspective is that history being memorialized?
• What are some things that Confederate monuments in public spaces communicate without words?
  • What are some ways the presence of these monuments continue to enact harm?
• James Baldwin wrote, “History is not the past. It is the present. We carry our history with us. We are our history.” In what ways does The Neutral Ground expose the truths of Baldwin’s statement?
  • How does the film force you to think differently about a “we” or “us” that you might imagine? How do you carry these histories differently than others?
• How does learning about the UDC’s educational propaganda campaign make you reflect, think differently about, or want to know more about, the way you were taught “history”?
• Why is establishing a more historically-accurate truth of history and oppression a crucial first step towards reconciliation and repair?
  • Why is it important to recognize and name those who were historically-responsible for violence in order to move towards a vision of equality?
  • What might reckoning with the past look like? How can we understand this reconciliation as an ethical and democratic necessity in America?
  • What would be some markers of success in a project of reconciliation:
    • in our economy?
    • in public spaces?
    • in healthcare?
    • in schools?
    • in community?
    • in policy?
• How does power inform the stories that we tell and in what ways does The Neutral Ground illuminate the way power has historically worked to shape narratives to benefit oppressors?
• Today there are bills in state legislatures to ban using Critical Race Theory as an orientation to how we teach history, and to ban specific materials like the 1619 Project in schools. How does this legal campaign mirror the UDC propaganda project, and how do you think it does or doesn't protect white supremacy?
  • What historical connections can you make between systems, structures, and power to what we see happening today?

DOCUMENTING THE PAST TO SHOW THE RECEIPTS OF INHERITANCE

• Why were the confederate reenactors so reticent to accept slavery as the cause of the Civil War if its clearly written in secession documents?
  • How does this scene make visible the power of emotion and sentimentality in regards to resisting the historical truths of slavery and the Civil War?
  • How does this scene underpin the importance of teaching critical media literacy skills (ex: Critical Race Theory) when engaging with texts?
• In which ways have states’ rights been used to excuse or hide atrocities in local communities?
  • What are common comparisons that come to mind? How does language work to cover violent ideas?
• What is the irony in the reenactors blaming Harriet Beecher Stowe and “Uncle Tom’s Cabin” as the source for misinformation about the institution of slavery and the causes of the Civil War?
  • What does this illuminate about the necessary power of education as a critical intervention towards truth and reconciliation?
• What do you admire about C.J.’s decision to engage with Butterbean and Dan at the Civil War reenactment? What lessons does C.J. teach us in this scene?
• What were the potential risks of C.J. engaging with white neo-Confederates who seemed bent on sticking to their comfortable version of history?
  • What other obstacles to dismantling white supremacy does this conversation suggest we, as a nation, have to confront and undo?
  • Imagine yourself in C.J.’s position in this scene. Would you have more, or less, to risk in this scenario? What, specifically, would make you more (or less) vulnerable in that moment? What does this teach you about the very real differences BIPOC and white people face when confronted with whites supremacists?
    • How does this realization make you think differently about your individual role in confronting white supremacy and fighting for racial justice?
• How can one have a conversation about the Civil War that does not acknowledge slavery?
  • How does refusing to acknowledge slavery as the cause of the Civil War make recognition of contemporary historic and systemic injustice impossible?
  • In what ways did people in the film who refused to acknowledge slavery as the cause of the Civil War also refuse to acknowledge the way(s) they benefited (and continue to benefit) from historic and systemic racial injustice?
• When do you remember first learning about the experiences of native communities and in what ways were these narratives and experiences framed?
  • How is America’s systematic oppression revealed through the exclusion of indigenous people in contemporary conversations about race and equity?
• How are structures of oppression revealed through attempts to minimalize the severity of slavery and efforts to diminish its direct role in establishing America’s economic systems?

WHITE RAGE THEN AND NOW: TERRORISM IN THE 21st CENTURY

In 2021 white supremacist groups, and racially or ethnically-motivated terrorism, was determined by the United States government to be the greatest domestic terrorism threat facing the US.

• How do the scenes from Charlottesville in 2017 illuminate the ways ideas, sentiments, and justifications of white supremacy that founded “The Lost Cause” narrative are still being used today?
  • Where, specifically, did you witness these connections? Were they embedded in language, symbols, ideas, systems, etc?
• In what ways is there no validity to the former President’s assertion that there were “fine” people on both sides in Charlottesville?
  • What does this statement expose about the lasting impacts and force of Lost Cause mythology?
  • How is the violence of colonization and white supremacy incomparable to resistance against these forms of violence?
• What would it look like for white people and communities to take responsibility for the violence still perpetrated in the name of confederate monuments?
  • What might possibilities for accountability and responsibility-taking make possible?
  • What do you think holds white people back from acknowledging this inheritance and committing to more just futures?
• Are there any similarities between The White League referenced in the film and The Proud Boys (or any other neo-confederate/white supremacist groups local to your area)?
• How does CJ’s identity as a Black/Filipino person invite us to think about intersections of identity and how they inform movements to build coalitions for racial justice? How does identity determine historical inheritance in dynamic, multiple, and more compelling ways that lend to mutli-racial solidarity?
  • How can power be gathered through connections and awareness of multiple identity positions and the differences they determine?
• Black activist and scholar, Fred Moten writes, “The coalition emerges out of your recognition that it’s [messed] up for you, in the same way that we’ve already recognized that it’s [messed] up for us. I don’t need your help. I just need you to recognize that this [white supremacist violence] is killing you, too, however much more softly…” (2013).
  • In what ways are movements and struggles for racial justice beneficial to all of us? In what ways is your experience of freedom and safety bound to another person’s experience of freedom and safety?
• How can communities, or local governments, engage in processes to repair this long history? Specifically, what must be done after Confederate Monuments have been removed?
  • What are some concrete steps that could be taken to make current conditions and structures more equitable for Black and Brown communities?
• In what ways are white supremacy, histories of colonization, and contemporary struggles for racial justice a very real concern for the entire nation, not just the Southeast?

What dangers exist in imagining yourself, your region, or community, as having progressed “beyond” these structures, systems, and histories?

CLOSING QUESTION/ACTIVITY (Optional)

“Proper remembrance, not reverence.” -Mitch Landrieu, former Mayor of New Orleans, in relation to Confederate monuments.

In the film, Mitch Landrieu talks about how he used to see Confederate monuments and not think much about them. However, when a friend of his asked him to consider how the monuments could make a person of color feel when they walked by them, he began to see the monuments differently. When Mitch was able to make a personal connection through his friend, he made the transition of being indifferent to being an advocate. The connection activity is a way to illustrate the importance of connection in our communities.

Connection Activity:

(Adapted from a nonviolence activity by New Way Revolution Nonviolence practitioners)

Step 1: Have a few volunteers that would be comfortable with physical contact come to the front of the room. Ask the volunteers to stand shoulder to shoulder and link their arms together. Talk about how the group is connected to one another through proximity.

Step 2: Gently pull one of the group members forward by the arm, while everyone still has their arms linked together. This will demonstrate the impact of being connected. Ask the people watching and participating what they observe after you pulled one person forward. Explain that when you pull one person, all the others move in the same direction as that person. Everyone is instantly affected by what that person being pulled by is affected by.

Step 3: Have the group unlink their arms. Gently pull one person forward. This will demonstrate that without connection, something could happen to someone near us, even our community, and we would not be affected. Ask the group about their observations after you pull one person forward.

Follow up questions:

How can this be a demonstration of what happens within our communities?

How do you see this demonstrated in the film? How about in your own communities?

What are ways we can “link arms” within our own communities? What might coalition-building do for our communities?

**

This activity is a visual example of the importance of being willing to connect with others, even with those of different points of views, in order to understand the impacts of what each person is affected by. In the film, CJ put himself in a situation to have conversations with people who believed in the principals of the Lost Cause when he participated in the Civil War reenactment. Although the other participants were willing to talk to CJ, they were not willing to connect with CJ by visiting a slavery museum to better understand the impacts of the narrative they held so strongly as truth.

Close the activity by reading an excerpt from the poem, “The Hill We Climb” by Amanda Gorman.

...And, yes, we are far from polished, far from pristine, but that doesn’t mean we are striving to form a union that is perfect.

We are striving to forge our union with purpose.

To compose a country committed to all cultures, colors, characters and conditions of man.

And so we lift our gaze, not to what stands between us, but what stands before us.

We close the divide because we know to put our future first, we must first put our differences aside.

We lay down our arms so we can reach out our arms to one another.

We seek harm to none and harmony for all.