This essay contains a description of a lynching.
When 14-year-old Emmett Till was murdered by brothers Roy Bryant and J. W. Milam in 1955 Mississippi, Jim Crow was alive and well in the American South. For years, I thought the only motive for Emmett's brutal murder was anti-Blackness. But while working on the exhibit Reckoning with Remembrance: History, Injustice, and the Murder of Emmett Till with the Center of Restorative History at the Smithsonian's National Museum of American History, I learned how ideas about masculinity also drove this tragic event.
As part of my internship with the Center for Restorative History, I have developed programming for boys and men that examines how toxic masculinity—the harm that men do to themselves and others—is a major contributor to violent expression in society. When I started my internship, I didn't anticipate that the tragic murder of Emmett Till would become helpful in tackling the destructive effects of toxic masculinity. The historic photographs from the trial for Emmett Till's murder in 1955 enable me to use visual aids to combat the violence and destructive effects of toxic masculinity today. In my programming, I draw inspiration from Emmett Till's mother, Mamie Till Mobley, who dedicated her life to ensuring that Emmett's legacy be a call to action.
On August 24, 1955, at Bryant's Grocery in Money, Mississippi, Emmett Till and his cousins went into the store to buy candy. Witnesses say that Emmett whistled at Carolyn Bryant as he left the store. When Carolyn's husband heard what had happened, he called up his brother and the two went to Mose Wright's house, where Emmett was staying. They abducted Emmett at gunpoint, brutally beat him, then shot him in the head. Afterwards, they took Emmett's body to the Tallahatchie River, tied a cotton gin fan around his neck, and threw his body in the river. On August 31, 1955, a teenage boy found Emmett. Bryant and Milam were arrested and charged with first-degree murder. After five days of testimony before an all-white and all-male jury in Sumner, Mississippi, the jury deliberated for only 67 minutes before finding the men "not guilty."
In the South, white manhood was especially linked to the protection of white women, and any perceived threat could be met with violence, including lynching. If white men didn't violently retaliate against Black men accused of "disrespecting" white women, they would be seen as cowards. In 1956, Look magazine journalist William Bradford Huie wrote that Roy Bryant was worried about being seen by the white community as a coward if he did nothing to Emmett Till when faced with allegations that the boy had harassed his wife. In his 2024 book, The Barn, writer and Mississippi native Wright Thompson suggests that Milam and Bryant also feared a loss of power over Black people in Money, MS, a community that had come to "expect violence from white men like Milam, and to judge them cowards if they weren't capable of administering it."
When I first came across journalists and writers' observations about Emmett's murderers, I immediately recognized ideas that I had studied in a college course called "Sociology of Masculinity." That class—combined with my own experiences—helped me understand how toxic masculinity, along with racism, drove Milam and Bryant's actions toward Emmett.
In his 2017 book, The Blood of Emmett Till, historian and author Timothy Tyson explains that Bryant and Milam "practiced a raw style of masculine camaraderie revolving around guns, hunting, fishing, poker, and drinking." One does not have to look any further than the now bullet-ridden markers erected in honor of Emmett Till to see that gun culture is still strong in Mississippi.
For Milam, his Southern education in masculinity was enriched by his service in World War II. During training, it was drilled into soldiers that men should not express emotions and should never be seen as cowards. As international relations professor Joshua S. Goldstein writes in War and Gender, "Shame centrally punishes failure in masculine war roles, in particular, i.e., succumbing to fear in battle and thus proving oneself a coward." When I read this, I saw the connection between masculinity and the violence that goes on daily in almost every community under the guise of proving one's manhood.
The fear of being called a coward and the impact of the community's ideas of masculinity reminded me of my own experiences. In my mid-twenties, I had an ongoing, informal discussion with a group of boys and men whose ages ranged from teens to early seventies. We were different generations of men self-policing in a toxic way to prove our masculinity to the community elders, to the people we looked up to, to each other, and to ourselves. We were in search of validation. During my time as a youth counselor and an Alternative to Violence facilitator, I have seen many cases of young men doing toxic things to prove their manhood by showing that they are not cowards or scared. I also saw the negative effects of those toxic behaviors on their communities and themselves.
I find myself looking at the famous photographs from the Bryant and Milam trial in a completely new way. Now I see the community's socially enforced racism and toxic masculinity, and how they were passed down. In a picture of Bryant and Milam in the courtroom, I see them surrounded by all older white men in white shirts, with crew cuts and clean-shaven faces. There are no women present. This powerful image shows a community supporting Roy Bryant and J. W. Milam and upholding cultural beliefs around racism and a particularly violent image of masculinity. In another picture of the courtroom, Bryant's Sons are sitting on his lap. Looking at this picture, I now see how these same cultural beliefs can be passed on to children because they are taught to follow the examples of adults. Author Devery S. Anderson makes it plain in Emmett Till; the boys were there for a reason.
"[T]he entire scene served an important purpose for the defense team, which hoped to convey to potential jurors that doting fathers… would hardly be inclined to kill other people's children."
The boys would have seen their father as a role model. When talking to youth, I often remind them that they are role models to someone else and must be mindful of what they do and say. "You never know who is looking up to you," I tell them. And people who look up to you will do things they think you would do or would approve of. Someone once told me he had looked up to me when he was a child. Unfortunately, I was engaging in toxic behaviors during that time. Yet he saw me as a role model. This experience now fuels my drive to address the harmful issue of toxic masculinity with men of all ages.
Through the other pictures from the trial, I am haunted by the effects of toxic masculinity. Rev. Mose Wright, Mamie Till-Mobley, and young Simeon Wright are devastated. Their lives will never be the same. Wright's innocence has been stolen by the witnessing of his cousin being kidnapped and later found lynched. Mamie is at the casket, crying over her son's body. Their lives would never be the same. These scenes of lost innocence and mothers' mourning still exist due to toxic masculinity.
Coming into Sumner, Mississippi, in 1955, there was a sign that read "Sumner: A Good Place to raise a boy." I am presented with the question: raising a boy to be what? It has been seventy years since the murder of Emmett Till. The question still presents itself: how do we raise boys into the dead spirit of toxic masculinity, or into the spirit of life-giving masculinity?