Conspiracy theories that emerged from a civil rights shooting 60 years ago resonate today

The modern rhetorical and political resistance to racial equality finds its roots in the conspiratorial segregationists of the civil rights era.

By: Aram Goudsouzian, University of Memphis, The Conversation

Outlets: The Conversation

Published: June 11, 2026

Words: 1,048

Last Updated: 8 hours, 59 minutes ago

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By Aram Goudsouzian, University of Memphis

On June 6, 1966, on a stretch of Highway 51 just south of Hernando, Mississippi, a portly, middle-aged white man named Aubrey Norvell stepped out of a gully, lifted his shotgun and fired three shots at James Meredith, a Black civil rights activist and Air Force veteran.

Famous for integrating the University of Mississippi four years earlier, Meredith was on the second day of a walk from Memphis, …

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