Notre Dame Cathedral on fire in Paris

Sharon Coolidge and Max Londberg | Cincinnati Enquirer

Cincinnati Councilwoman Tamaya Dennard on Twitter said she's sad the Notre Dame Cathedral has been damaged by fire, but the reaction has been a "prime example of privilege."

She pointed to the recent string of arsons at predominantly black churches in Louisiana as an example.

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"I'm sure they held significance as well," she wrote in the Tuesday morning Tweet. "They were barely acknowledged."

The burning of Notre Dame dominated cable news channels Monday. Social media feeds all over the world and in Cincinnati were filled with posts by people who had visited the cathedral. And the City of Cincinnati, as requested by Councilman Chris Seelbach, lit up the city's convention sign in red, blue and white, a nod to France's flag.

The Enquirer/Sharon Coolidge

The Louisiana church burnings too have garnered national attention, with front page coverage in the New York Times and other national media outlets. But they didn't get the continuous live coverage or social media attention given to the Notre Dame fire.

Later Tuesday, Dennard expanded on her tweet in a message to The Enquirer, writing that stories about the destroyed black churches lacked the proper framing.

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"The stories about the Black churches have mostly centered around the identity of the alleged arsonist and the fact that his father turned him in," she wrote. "Not the fact that churches were sacred places for Black people historically especially in the South in the years of rampant, legalized domestic terrorism and Jim Crow."

She added that discussions on race, oppression and privilege requires reflection of "the darkest moments of our shared history" rather than rejecting minorities' experiences.



"Ultimately all stories should be told and we should all be equally concerned about the cultural significance and pain of those that lost a sacred space in Paris as we are with those that lost a sacred space in Louisiana," she wrote.

Joe Mallory, Vice President of the Cincinnati chapter of the NAACP, said he too sees the disparity Dennard pointed out.

"This is not the first time this has happened with black churches, where people set fires to them," Mallory said. "There is not an outcry. It’s sad, but it’s the reality of this country what people value."

Mallory said it was as true of local icons as with international ones like Notre Dame.

"Look at Music Hall or Union Terminal, the landmarks people value," Mallory said. "They will leave no stone unturned to improve them and make it better. If something happened to Music Hall, I guarantee they would rebuild it. Clearly, there is not a lot of value placed on black life; there's no investment in trying to uplift the black community."

Dennard took office in January, one of nine Cincinnati City Council members. She has made a name for herself calling our what she sees as white privilege when it comes to financing development projects and changes coming to the city's West End, where the Major League Soccer stadium is being built.

She championed the recent passage of a ban on asking salary history as a measure to reduce pay disparities between women and men with similar jobs. Last year she proposed studying whether city policies were racist, though the idea never came to a vote.

Hamilton County Republican Party Chairman Alex Triantafilou responded to the tweets with a critical Facebook post.

"City voters made a mistake electing this person to lead our fine city," Triantafilou said of Dennard. "It is a mistake I only hope they reverse in 2021. This is an embarrassment."