I don't share Ms. Davis' communist ideology but I respect her for challenging institutional racism that has denigrated, brutalized and dehumanized African Americans at every turn. African Americans set up some very economically successful and self sufficient communities after the Civil War only to have them burned down by the Dixiecrats and KKK.

I believe Communist economic beliefs were also shared by MLK and Malcolm X. When segregationist America is the face of capitalism, the oppressed start looking in the opposite direction.

I don't give communism a pass. I have read most of the Black Book of Communism and am aware of the atrocities.