BS: Celebrating Racism

Subject: RE: BS: Celebrating Racism
From: LadyJean
Date: 18 Feb 11 - 12:12 AM

I once did see Lester Maddox on a TV show. I wanted to wring his neck until he started talking about prison reform, which was a subject, obviously, dear to his heart.

When it came to the treatment of inmates he was a screaming progressive. I found myself, to my amazement, agreeing with every word Lester Maddox said!

There are few villains, and few heroes in this world.

Subject: RE: BS: Celebrating Racism
From: Ron Davies
Date: 17 Feb 11 - 11:05 PM

I assume , Mr. RO, by "mass-murdering" you are referring to Ft. Pillow.   Which is also not as simple as you prefer your history. Too bad.

And "death-bed" conversion is as usual your classic simplistic approach. Maybe you would like to see if Fox News can use your skills. Sounds like you'd fit right in.

I wonder if you'll ever be able to tell the difference between history and a comic book.

We can but hope.

Subject: RE: BS: Celebrating Racism
From: Ron Davies
Date: 17 Feb 11 - 10:55 PM

Gee I feel like the Doublemint Twins:    stop, you're both wrong.    Isn't that what they said?. Something like that.

I can't accept the opening poster's view that Forrest was evil incarnate.

Nor can I accept Q's view that Southern whites after the Civil War were just trying to get back their rights.   Look, there is no doubt there was a continuing--and successful --campaign to disenfranchise and intimidate Southern blacks.

My only question is what part Forrest played in this campaign.   And by the way to point out to the opening poster, Mr. RO, (or perhaps I should just call him Red) and others of his attitude that General Forrest, like so many other historical figures, was not the cardboard cutout which seems to be the only kind of figure the illustrious poster is comfortable with.

I find the complexity of history to be fascinating. He seems to be ill at ease with anything not a stereotype--perhaps that goes with an addiction to RO.

As well as being allergic to research, and sharing the fruits of that work. Which, believe it or not, is not the same as listing books.

Subject: RE: BS: Celebrating Racism
From: Desert Dancer
Date: 17 Feb 11 - 03:06 PM

Another original document worth reading at this time: South Carolina's declaration of secession, and make sure that you get to the bottom half.

Subject: RE: BS: Celebrating Racism
From: Greg F.
Date: 17 Feb 11 - 01:32 PM

-fought against the evils of reconstruction and carpetbagging administation-

Oh, please Q-zer. Which "evils" were these? You've apparently swallowed the Neo-Confederate "Lost Cause" bullshit hook, line & sinker. Do read up on the REALITIES of the Reconstruction era some time. Any of Eric Foner's books will suffice, then the works in his bibliographies.

The KKK was a terrorist group formed to make sure that Blacks didn't exercise any of the rights they achieved after emancipation. Period.

Do read the 1868 testimony in Congress gathered regarding the activities of the Klan, too. Its readily available on line, and, shall we say, tends to contradict what you maintain.

Subject: RE: BS: Celebrating Racism
From: maple_leaf_boy
Date: 17 Feb 11 - 01:28 PM

I just saw a plate with the Confederate flag and a skull below it. Just
today. As gnu said, it's probably for the Dukes of Hazard. Then again,
the person who owned that car fits the "Mississippi of the North"
stereotype, because N.S. is sometimes nicknamed the "Mississippi of the
North".

Subject: RE: BS: Celebrating Racism
From: GUEST,999
Date: 17 Feb 11 - 01:22 PM

Have to disagree with you regarding Greg F. He's feisty as hell, but he makes sense most the time. Good friend, too.

Subject: RE: BS: Celebrating Racism
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 17 Feb 11 - 12:54 PM

Ron, the opener of this thread, a notorious inciter of ignorant outrage, also would have to know something of the origin of the KKK. The first Klans, organized by veterans of the War, fought against the evils of reconstruction and carpetbagging administation; it existed for about ten years, at which time the Forces Act caused it to disband and its activities were taken over by small groups with diverse objectives. It was this first klan to which the noted general, Bedford Forrest, was a leader.
However, the Klan objectives were met in the late 1870s when democratic southerners again took control of their governments.

It would serve us best to ignore threads started by this person and leave them to those who exist in a state of permanent outrage.

Subject: RE: BS: Celebrating Racism
From: Greg F.
Date: 17 Feb 11 - 11:17 AM

So the opening poster has seen fit to re-open this instant-classic thread. He must be looking for someone to disagree with him.

Oh Simple Seeker, by what torturous means do you arrive at those conclusions from the posting of a news update gleaned from the Associated Press, et. al.??

Hey, I'm really getting your famous serial posting technique down pretty good, eh??

Subject: RE: BS: Celebrating Racism
From: Greg F.
Date: 17 Feb 11 - 10:21 AM

.. the illustrious opening poster, and the others who say there is "no doubt" Forrest was an unreconstructed racist his whole life...

Where?

Subject: RE: BS: Celebrating Racism
From: Greg F.
Date: 17 Feb 11 - 10:12 AM

Forrest died in 1877, after being gravely ill with diabetes for a long time.

RE: his 1875 statements: With one foot in the grave, many people who believe in God- as Forrest professed to do- are frightened enough to try to make peace with their maker.


See also
http://www.nytimes.com/learning/general/onthisday/bday/0713.html

Subject: RE: BS: Celebrating Racism
From: Greg F.
Date: 17 Feb 11 - 09:59 AM

Same old dance, oh Simple Seeker After Truth- you demand "evidence" from others, and provide absolutely none yourself.

Mr. Hurst's opinions, and yours, are not evidence.

The mass-murdering Grand Wizard's "death-bed conversion" is, to say the least, very convenient for the "Lost Cause", Neo-Confederate crowd.
If- and I stress the conditional- of course it couldn't have been a self-serving ploy to make himself more amenable to changed conditions & help in recouping his lost fortune, could it?

And even if true- so what? Does it erase everything that went before?

To be continued....

Subject: RE: BS: Celebrating Racism
From: J-boy
Date: 17 Feb 11 - 01:18 AM

Sounds like a really lousy picnic. Why didn't anyone bring quiche? But it's nice to hear that the man in question was upset with the actions of his mythical "race".

Subject: RE: BS: Celebrating Racism
From: Ron Davies
Date: 16 Feb 11 - 10:39 PM

As I said, those who say confidently things like Forrest was an "unrepentant racist for sure" are showing signs of the antipathy to research often found around here.

From Nathan Bedford Forrest: A Biography, by Jack Hurst

p 385      "The reality is that over the length of his lifetime Nathan Bedford Forrest's racial attitudes probably developed more, and in the direction of liberal enlightenment, than those of most Americans in the nation's history."

This may well be overstating the point, and I do not necessarily agree with the statement.

But it is at least an open question--much to the discomfort of the knee-jerk commentators , starting with the opening poster, that we are honored to have on Mudcat.

Evidence?

I don't have much time--this computer is in demand by others. However, we can start with his public assertion in 1875 that "blacks should be allowed entry into the profession of law and anywhere else they were capable of going." Hurst p 385.

Similarly after 16 blacks were lynched after a brawl starting at an interracial picnic, Forrest was quoted as saying that if he "were entrusted with proper authority he would capture and exterminate the white marauders who disgrace their race by the cowardly murder of negroes."   Hurst p 361.



More later

Subject: RE: BS: Celebrating Racism
From: Ron Davies
Date: 16 Feb 11 - 10:18 PM

So the opening poster has seen fit to re-open this instant-classic thread.    He must be looking for someone to disagree with him.    Far be it from me to disappoint.

Forrest was a slave-trader.   That is abominable.

He also fought hard and skillfully to defend slavery. That too is totally wrong.


However, the illustrious opening poster, and the others who say there is "no doubt" Forrest was an unreconstructed racist his whole life are showing the magnificently sloppy attitude towards research often seen around here.

I think it was Jeri who came up with a perfect description of what seems to be one of the opening poster's favorite pastimes:   "recreational outrage".

RO:   "a poster expresses righteous indignation and gets highly worked up over some issue, typically some news occurrence that is completely irrelevant to the person's own life and has no effect on that poster personally.. The poster derives (recreational) satisfaction from expressing outrage and moral indignation, frequently including a sense of moral superiority, thus differentiating Recreational Outrage from other forms of outrage."


Could hardly be a more snug fit.


At least we know what his middle initial is:   R:   Either for Recreational Outrage---or possibly for Red Queen:   "sentence first, verdict afterwards".



To be continued

Subject: RE: BS: Celebrating Racism
From: Greg F.
Date: 16 Feb 11 - 01:05 PM

Spaw, ya shoulda mentioned that "Rednecks" dates from 1973.

Sure gives ya a warm feeling to realize the progress that Mississippi and the nation have made in racial relations in the intervening 37 years, don't it?

Its not the need for a "history" as such, but the need for a fake, invented "heritage", and damn the facts of the matter. Barbour is a good exemplar - the civil-rights era as "not that bad" in Mississippi, " I had a great childhood"---- HEY, ASSHOLE - YOU WERE WHITE!!


Yup- the "New South"- the Klan in business suits instead of hoods.

Subject: RE: BS: Celebrating Racism
From: catspaw49
Date: 16 Feb 11 - 12:46 PM

Pride and the need we seem to need for a heritage affects some people to extreme degrees. My first thought on reading this thread was Randy Newman's Rednecks, I was going to quote just one line but I'll post the entire song and bold/italic the line that popped into my head. Its a strange phenomenon that drives us to feel the need for a history of some sort and to let that history define the present.....................

Rednecks

....Randy Newman

Last night I saw Lester Maddox on a TV show
With some smart ass New York Jew
And the Jew laughed at Lester Maddox
And the audience laughed at Lester Maddox too
Well he may be a fool but he's our fool
If they think they're better than him they're wrong
So I went to the park and I took some paper along
And that's where I made this song

We talk real funny down here
We drink too much and we laugh too loud
We're too dumb to make it in no Northern town
And we're keepin' the niggers down

We got no-necked oilmen from Texas
And good ol' boys from Tennessee
And colleges men from LSU
Went in dumb. Come out dumb too
Hustlin' 'round Atlanta in their alligator shoes
Gettin' drunk every weekend at the barbecues
And they're keepin' the niggers down

CHORUS
We're rednecks, rednecks
And we don't know our ass from a hole in the ground
We're rednecks, we're rednecks
And we're keeping the niggers down

Now your northern nigger's a Negro
You see he's got his dignity
Down here we're too ignorant to realize
That the North has set the nigger free

Yes he's free to be put in a cage
In Harlem in New York City
And he's free to be put in a cage on the South-Side of Chicago
And the West-Side
And he's free to be put in a cage in Hough in Cleveland
And he's free to be put in a cage in East St. Louis
And he's free to be put in a cage in Fillmore in San Francisco
And he's free to be put in a cage in Roxbury in Boston
They're gatherin' 'em up from miles around
Keepin' the niggers down

CHORUS


Spaw

Subject: RE: BS: Celebrating Racism
From: LilyFestre
Date: 16 Feb 11 - 11:46 AM

Racism is alive and well in the northern states too. There are people within a mile of our nothern Pennsylvania home who fly the Confederate flag....pretty sure it's not about southern pride in this neck of the woods. A few years back, a major KKK group (maybe a leader...I forget) was active in a nearby town as well.

I don't understand it, never will. Interesting reading on this thread.

Michelle

Subject: RE: BS: Celebrating Racism
From: Greg F.
Date: 16 Feb 11 - 11:27 AM

Haley Barbour faces questions on KKK license plate
(AP) Feb 15, 2011

Even before Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour announces whether he intends to run for president, he's facing a run of press scandals just like most confirmed candidates endure on the campaign trail. First there was the flap over the Mississippi-approved vanity license plate heralding a leader of the Ku Klux Klan---and now comes a report that Barbour, in his earlier career as a D.C. power lobbyist, represented the Mexican government in a push to render U.S. immigration law more accommodating to Mexican residents who had entered the country illegally.

On Monday, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) called for Barbour to condemn a proposed state license plate honoring honoring Gen. Nathan Bedford Forrest, a Ku Klux Klan Grand Wizard. As of mid-morning Tuesday, Barbour had not yet issued a public statement on the proposal, which is being pushed by the Sons of Confederate Veterans.

And in revisiting his earlier appraisal of the civil-rights era as "not that bad" in Mississippi, Barbour reiterated it was truthful to his own youthful experience: "I was asked about my childhood and I had a great childhood," Barbour said.


GOP Gov. Barbour refuses to denounce license plate pitch honoring KKK leader
By Sahil Kapur
Wednesday, February 16th, 2011 -- 9:30 am

WASHINGTON – Mississippi Republican Gov. Haley Barbour, a potential 2012 presidential candidate, declined to denounce a group's proposal that the state issue a license plate honoring an early Ku Klux Klan leader.

The idea, put forth by the white heritage group Sons of Confederate Veterans, would create a state-issued license plate by 2014 in honor of Confederate General and KKK leader Nathan Bedford Forrest. It would include a car tag and a series of other Civil War license plates.

Mississippi lawmakers are considering the proposal, and Barbour said it's unlikely to be approved but refused to stake out a position against it.

"I don't go around denouncing people," Barbour told reporters Tuesday in his home state when asked about the idea, according to The Associated Press.

The NAACP's Mississippi chapter president Derrick Johnson called on the governor to denounce it.

The Southern Poverty Law Center has identified the Sons of Confederate Veterans as a "hate group" known for its racist and white supremacist activities.

Barbour is the current chairman of the Republican Governors Association and an important player within the GOP. He's a former chairman of the Republican National Committee.

This isn't the first time the Mississippi Republican has found himself in the center of a race-related controversy. During an interview in December, he praised the Citizens Council, a pro-segregation white group that fought against civil rights, for "refraining from using violence"[sic]. Barbour later walked back the comments.

Barbour this week came under fire after it was revealed that his firm lobbied on behalf of Mexico in 2001 and 2002 for a program that would have helped undocumented immigrants gain legal residency in the United States.

Subject: RE: BS: Celebrating Racism
From: Greg F.
Date: 11 Feb 11 - 10:09 AM

Perhaps Mississippi can use the image of Forrest** from THIS on the license plate.

And maybe incorporate THIS as well.


** "The middle figure is Nathan Bedford Forrest... He wears his Confederate uniform, with a lash— symbolizing slavery —in his back pocket, and stands ready to plunge a knife— symbolizing the Confederate war effort, "The Lost Cause"— into his Black victim. On Forrest's coat is a medal honoring his command at Fort Pillow— symbolizing Confederate atrocities against Black soldiers. In the background, Nast includes a burning freedmen's school, representing the violent resistance of white Southerners to the freedom and advancement of Blacks in society. Forrest was one of the organizers of the Ku Klux Klan." http://blackhistory.harpweek.com/7illustrations/reconstruction/ThisIsAWhiteMansGov.htm

Subject: RE: BS: Celebrating Racism
From: Bobert
Date: 11 Feb 11 - 08:04 AM

Shhhhhhhsssshhhhh!!!

We're not supposed to be talkin' about this stuff... Perfectly okay for Bubba to fly his flags but not okay to talk about America's sins???

B~

B

Subject: RE: BS: Celebrating Racism
From: J-boy
Date: 11 Feb 11 - 12:30 AM

You are absolutely correct, LH. America's original sin it remains and will be as long as this republic exists.

Subject: RE: BS: Celebrating Racism
From: Little Hawk
Date: 10 Feb 11 - 11:45 PM

I think it's no exaggeration to say, Bobert, that the one single thing which has damaged American society the most is the tragic history of slavery, the Civil War, and race relations before then and ever since then. It is (along with what happened to the Indians) the darkest chapter in American history, and the trouble it has caused is not over yet.

Subject: RE: BS: Celebrating Racism
From: Bobert
Date: 10 Feb 11 - 11:29 PM

Yeah, LH... With Jim Crow and now the Tea Party, there's good reason for
black people to have those "old feelings"...

I mean, 150 years ago today the "Peace Conference" convened at the Willard Hotel in Washington, D.C to try to head off what would be later known as the "Civil War"... There were big shots from the South and big shots from the North... After 3 days of procedural wrangling nothing was accomplished, everyone shook hands and then were shooting at each other a month later...

Some things just don't change...

B~

Subject: RE: BS: Celebrating Racism
From: Little Hawk
Date: 10 Feb 11 - 10:49 PM

As does the Bay of Pigs, Iran-Contra, and the Shock and Awe campaign over Iraq.

No nation is perfect, and none is above criticism.

Subject: RE: BS: Celebrating Racism
From: GUEST,marks (on the road)
Date: 10 Feb 11 - 10:41 PM

The Mariel boatlift of 1980 comes to mind.

Subject: RE: BS: Celebrating Racism
From: mousethief
Date: 10 Feb 11 - 08:21 PM

They do a lot of things in Cuba we might be well to imitate in this country.

Subject: RE: BS: Celebrating Racism
From: Little Hawk
Date: 10 Feb 11 - 08:14 PM

Indeed it does. It may continue forever, although I have been in one place where I saw real racial equality: Cuba. How can I say that? Well, because I felt it palpably when I was there, that's how. It was subtle and yet quite obvious, merely in the sense of the complete ease I could sense between the Black Cubans and the Hispanic Cubans and anyone else at all that was there. There was no perceivable color line in that country.

Subject: RE: BS: Celebrating Racism
From: mousethief
Date: 10 Feb 11 - 08:08 PM

The struggle for racial equality continues.

Subject: RE: BS: Celebrating Racism
From: Little Hawk
Date: 10 Feb 11 - 08:06 PM

That's for sure, Bobert!

Fear of the Black man has long been used (and fear of the White man too, for that matter) to manipulate both White and Black voters, and it's been used over and over again. That is more of the divide and conquer tactic being waged on the minds of the American public.

The struggle for racial equality actually lasted over 100 years! It kicked off in a big way with the Civil War in the 1860s, but after the Civil War was over the Blacks in the South continued to mostly live in a miserable way even though they weren't officially slaves any longer. Segregation remained in force, and most Blacks lived in poverty, doing the same kind of work they had done before the war, and being treated as second-class citizens. The fight to end segregation was won almost exactly 100 years later, in the 1960s. That's how long it really took to accomplish what the abolitionists had set out to do.

Subject: RE: BS: Celebrating Racism
From: Bobert
Date: 10 Feb 11 - 07:34 PM

Fine... Respect them... Put up shrines to them... Have family get togethers and parade around in ya'll's uniforms and flags...

But please don't lend a voice to intolerant racists in your respect because it is absolutely disrespectful to black America, which BTW, has been seriously disrespected going back to 1619...

Yo, LH... Thinks about it this way... The unCivil War really didn't end at Appomattox... That was just one long battle that was won and it is interesting to point out that it was won by Boss Hog (the bankers and the corporatists) and seems that Boss Hog is still winnin' that part of the war but by using emotionally charged wedge issues to keep the epsilons all pissed off and armed and voting but in the little epsilonian minds of the Southerners who vote against their own interests, yeah, they think they are winning???

Like I have said in the past, if Southern Man ever figures out Boss Hog's little pea-under-the-shell-game, he's gonna be really pissed off...

B~

Subject: RE: BS: Celebrating Racism
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 10 Feb 11 - 07:13 PM

Much of what Little Hawk says is true; moreover at the time states rights were of considerable importance to large parts of the population.
I have two great grandfathers who fought on the Union side; my wife has two who fought for the Confederacy. When we were children, families on both sides went to veterans' grave sites and attended the parades which still featured one or two veterans of the conflict.

They will not be forgotten for a generation or two yet. My wife's generation remains strong in the UDS and tells the stories from their parents of the War and Reconstruction carpetbaggers. The South did not rebuild until WW2 brought industry and shifts in population.

On my side, the Union side, the GAR was important still to my parents generation. The Independence Day parades prominantly featured surviving veterans of the war.
.
The men who fought on both sides deserve the same respect.

Subject: RE: BS: Celebrating Racism
From: Little Hawk
Date: 10 Feb 11 - 07:10 PM

Sure, sure. Just wait till Chongo gets elected, and you see HIS smilin' face lookin' back atcha from every license plate. THEN you will have something to complain about, buster!

I don't look at it as "the South won", Bobert, cos you know who won the Civil War? The big industrialists and bankers in the industrial Northeast won that war, and they are still winning it now, only they're pushing rightwing imperial policy all over the world. They are the guys who built the armaments that won the Civil War and that have won other major wars since, and they didn't do it to free Black people or anyone else, but they are delighted to enlist the aid of dumbass ignorant jingoistic Southerners, Westerners, and Northerners to back their imperial policy, you betcha! ;-) Boss Hawg runs the $ySStem, Bobert, as you well know, and Boss Hawg's central command structure has always been primarily in the industrial Northeast, Washington DC, and more recently, California. If they pay lip service to "liberal" causes to get local support, it is just for the sake of divide and conquer, not because they really believe in anything that could truly be called liberal.

Lincoln foresaw what was coming, and he warned against it, saying that bankers and industrialists were taking over the government and destroying America's democratic traditions. He was right. He didn't live too long after saying so.

Kennedy said something similar, and he didn't live too long either.

Eisenhower warned us about it also, but only just as he was leaving office.

Subject: RE: BS: Celebrating Racism
From: Bill D
Date: 10 Feb 11 - 06:10 PM

I suppose Georgia will want Lester Maddox on license plates... with crossed axe handles.

Subject: RE: BS: Celebrating Racism
From: Bobert
Date: 10 Feb 11 - 05:49 PM

BTW, who says the South lost???

I mean, look around you and the Southern Strategy... Look at just how far right the corportists have taken *US* using that Southern Strategy over and over and over???

They say that the "South will rise again" and it has and it has its boot heels on the necks of those Volvo drivin, latte drinkin', commie eastern elitists...

B~

Subject: RE: BS: Celebrating Racism
From: Little Hawk
Date: 10 Feb 11 - 05:32 PM

I think a permanently divided USA would have been a blessing for most of its neighbours, near and far, because the two halves of it would have devoted most of their paranoia and military aggression toward each other ever since, thus taking the heat off the rest of us, as it were...and they'd not have become the Superpower that the USA is now.

As a later side effect, Germany and Austria might also have won the First World War on the continent of Europe (they'd never have seriously threatened the UK), and that would have removed any possibility of the Nazis ever coming to power, while I doubt it would have made any appreciable difference to the general welfare of either Englishmen or Canadians in the years following. It just would have been another humiliating defeat for France, that's all, and they'd have survived it.

Subject: RE: BS: Celebrating Racism
From: mousethief
Date: 10 Feb 11 - 05:21 PM

A great pity that the South lost.

Yes. We'd have those fuckers out of our hair, and the Rethugs wouldn't have won nearly so many presidential elections since 1964. If we asked them nicely do you think they'd secede next week?

Subject: RE: BS: Celebrating Racism
From: Bobert
Date: 10 Feb 11 - 04:46 PM

So, Q, because your great grandaddy, who you didn't even know, fought in the war 150 years ago, that gives Redneck Nation the right to continue displying their hatred of black people???

Beam me up, Scotty...

B~

Subject: RE: BS: Celebrating Racism
From: Little Hawk
Date: 10 Feb 11 - 03:06 PM

I should have said if the Southern politicians had had the vision (and the nerve) to end slavery...

It wasn't a question of not having brains. Many of them were very intelligent men. It was a question of them lacking vision...the ability to see outside their accustomed cultural mindset.

That's the problem people usually have. It isn't that they are stupid, necessarily...it's that they are culturally blind, unwilling to change in the face of changing conditions.

Dogs tend to be like that too. ;-) Habits are not easy to break.

Subject: RE: BS: Celebrating Racism
From: Little Hawk
Date: 10 Feb 11 - 03:02 PM

Strangely enough, my mother's family (Canadian) had a member who went to fight in the American Civil War...on the Southern side. A fair number of Canadians volunteered for both sides in that war, and they had many different reasons for doing so. Some did so because of family connections on one side or the other. Some did so to free the Blacks. Some did so because the USA was seen as an old enemy of Canada and the British Crown, going back to the War of 1812 and the American Revolution. People who saw it that way tended to sympathize with the South, not because of any racial issues, but because of other political concerns. There was similarly much sympathy for the Southern cause in the UK, again because of past conflicts with the USA, while at the same time the English population did not sympathize with the Southern practice of slavery.

It wasn't just a one-issue situation. It was quite complex.

If the Southern politicians had had the brains (and the nerve) to end slavery and free the southern Blacks, they could have put their cause on much stronger ground, gained a lot more soldiers to fight for the South, and would probably have gotten much more substantial help from England and France, both of which would have preferred a permanently divided American colossus to a single, united USA. That's just ordinary power politics. Competing empires always prefer it if their most powerful competitors are divided or weakened in some fashion.

Subject: RE: BS: Celebrating Racism
From: Greg F.
Date: 10 Feb 11 - 02:51 PM

How many folks here grand daddies or daddies fought in the unCivil War??? None, that's how many.

Not quite, Bobert - my Great(or not so great?) Grandfather served in the Pennsylvanis Light Artillery. And I remember quite well what my grandfather had to say about him & his experiances in the war.

Subject: RE: BS: Celebrating Racism
From: Little Hawk
Date: 10 Feb 11 - 02:49 PM

It depends on what pushes your particular buttons, Bobert, and that's about all there is to it. I am constantly annoyed by seeing decals on (a minority of) Canadian cars exhorting me to "Support Our Troops!", because I am utterly opposed to their presence in Afghanistan, and I know what those decals mean: they mean support for that war. But so what? I have to live with the fact that not everyone thinks the way I do, and in a democracy everyone can freely express the way he thinks, correct? If not, is it a democracy?

You cannot force other people to walk neatly inside your personal comfort zone all the time.

******

Greg, I see no particular reason why the American Civil War should not be referred to as "The War Between the States". That's what it was. The northern states fought the southern states, because the southern states wanted to separate into a different nation, and the northern states objected to them doing so. It was, literally, a war between 2 coalitions of American states. There is nothing particularly redneck, racist, or anything else like that about calling it the War Between the States. In fact, it's a totally neutral label for that war...as is "The Civil War". Nothing racist is implied by either label.

As for "The War of Northern Aggression", that is pretty much a literal description of the tactics that ensued following the outbreak of hostilities. Virtually all the fighting was done on southern soil, and resulted from Northern invasion of that soil...aside from Lee's 2 short and abortive attempts to counterattack against the North...(Antietam and Gettysburg), both of which led to his forces quickly returning south with crippling losses. The South never had enough men or materiel to conquer the North or to adequately defend themselves from it either, so they were forced to stand on the defensive and suffer a long series of Northern invasions and grueling battles of attrition which eventually crushed them. How could Southerners not have seen such a situation as a war of northern aggression? They were defending their own homes against an invading army, so what else would they see it as?

In one's efforts to oppose racism, which are laudable efforts, one should not go totally blind to what the people who lived back in that time were going through and simply characterize the southerners as racist monsters just because they were unlucky enough to be on the losing side in that war.

Nathan Beford Forrest was an unrepentant racist, for sure. And in being so, he wasn't terribly unusual at the time (there were lots of unrepentant racists living on both sides of the Mason-Dixon line). What did make him unusual, however, was that he was an absolutely brilliant military commander. It's not surprising that some Southerners still remember him for that, regardless of his views on race.

Subject: RE: BS: Celebrating Racism
From: akenaton
Date: 10 Feb 11 - 02:38 PM

Interesting thread, I've just been watching a TV programme about the "Scotch/ Irish" settlers who fought on both sides in the Civil War, although most fought for the Confederacy.
According to the commentary, the slavery issue was not a great motivator for these people, who were more intersted in their freedom and pioneer spirit being diluted by Unionist government...more of a cultural issue I suppose. Most of the foot soldiers who fought and died would never have been in a position to own slaves...most were almost as poor as the slaves themselves.

Another time, another place, It is illogical to view historical issues through modern eyes and with modern perceptions.

I would be intested to hear some good discussion here from the US members..... not just the usual political propaganda.    Ake

Subject: RE: BS: Celebrating Racism
From: Wesley S
Date: 10 Feb 11 - 02:30 PM

Look at it this way - If the state does approve these plates it will be a lot easier to spot the idjets among us.

Subject: RE: BS: Celebrating Racism
From: Bobert
Date: 10 Feb 11 - 02:22 PM

How many folks here grand daddies or daddies fought in the unCivil War???

None, that's how many... This idea that folks are memorializing their loved ones is more mythology... No one alive here in Mudville knows any family member who fought in that war... None... Nada... Zipola...

I wished we had black members here in lilly white Mudville who would articulate the pain that the Confederate flag cuases black folks in the South... We don't ... Maybe that's why some folks think they can get away with thinking it's okay for Redneck Nation to continue flying their symbol of racism without having to know that it causes suffering...

(But, Boberdz... If there were than the same argument you have used would be wrong because none of them would have had daddies or grand daddies who were slaves...)

More bad thinking... Jim Crow ain't exactly dead and buried... Black folks know that there are one heck of a lot of white racists out there... They have gotten these constant reminders over the years... I mean, the 1979 Greensboro Massacre, as I have pointed out, was one...

But the real issue is why do people feel they have a right to do things that remind black folks of stuff that black folks would love to just let pass... Like I said, you want fly a Confederate flag at a battlefield then fine... That is heritage... It is history... It shows respect for people who died in the war even if they died defending slavery... Hey, black folks can understand these things...

But black folks can't understand why people feel it's perfectly okay to slap that bigass racist symbol on the back of their pickup trucks and Camaros...

I can't believe there are people here who really don't get this???

B~

Subject: RE: BS: Celebrating Racism
From: Greg F.
Date: 10 Feb 11 - 02:03 PM

They have just as much right to be remembered by their descendants as those who fought on the Union side.

You betcha- just as long as its also remembered that the secesh were fighting to maintain racism, white supremacy and slavery as a positive good.

Subject: RE: BS: Celebrating Racism
From: gnu
Date: 10 Feb 11 - 02:02 PM

BWL... hahahahaa

999... Confederate flags in Alberta... we see em here too in New Brunswick but I think they commemorate The Duke Boys (google Dukes Of Hazard iffn ya don't know them Dukes). Again, like BWL said eh?

Subject: RE: BS: Celebrating Racism
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 10 Feb 11 - 01:47 PM

Yes, oh really!- Bobble-head.

Subject: RE: BS: Celebrating Racism
From: Bee-dubya-ell
Date: 10 Feb 11 - 01:31 PM

Hey, if they let anti-abortion fuckwits sport "Choose Life" license plates, I'm not gonna begrudge letting Bubba have his N.B. Forrest plate as well. If people feel compelled to give their state governments extra money over and above what standard-issue license plates cost just for the privilege of advertising their idiocy, it's fine with me. In fact, I sorta like the idea. It's the next best thing to having a plate that says "I'm a fuckin' idiot!"

Subject: RE: BS: Celebrating Racism
From: Bobert
Date: 10 Feb 11 - 01:28 PM

Oh, really, Q??? Fine, fly it at the battlefields... I have no problems with that... That's the only exception...

BTW, anyone who thinks that flying this flag anywhere by anyone who thinks it's their right ought to have to live just one day as a black person living in the South...Just one day!!!

It's boorish!!!

B~