wws's picture

    Southern. Let the blame games begin, if they must, but hey....

    By wws on Wed, 05/27/2009 - 8:47pm |

    We can all agree that thorough, thoughtful interpretations of historical fact matter. We know this process requires more than a knowledge of facts on a timeline, especially when the perception of those facts is combined with the perspectives and prejudices common to one's own time, or one's own place in any particular demographic. We therefore understand that it also requires awareness of the contemporaneous political and sociological lens of the time being studied through which to evaluate those facts undergoing scrutiny. And all this exhaustive effort is worth it because it takes a comprehensive understanding of our history to learn the lessons that will allow us to more correctly interpret today and tomorrow -- the only lessons, imho, that really matter, in practical terms.

     I think it is not only possible, but also important to see merit in differing points of  view, not in an either/or set of dualistic choices, but across a spectrum of opinions that get at an approximation of what was, or is true.  

    So, what I personally have to offer a discussion about the South does not include footnotes, except in the context of an unsubstantiated lifetime of experience in which I have lived in the south and in Florida (not the same thing), in the north, in the Midwest, in both northern and southern California, and, too briefly, in Canada and in Europe. 

    So. Believe me or not. But what I know about my country, because I've seen it and heard it and absorbed it, personally, inside and out, is that: a) whether you are a Yankee or a Southerner; b) whether you are from the midwest or the west coast; c) whether you are an urbanite, a suburbanite or live in the sticks; d) whether you are white or you are black or (god help you) a foreigner; e) whether you are old school or part of the new school....  we, as Americans, have a long way to go to erase the self-satisfied (and self-satisfying) myths that continue to rationalize and condone ethnic, religious, gender and sexual preference prejudices.

    But I also know, as a certainty,  that we've come a long way and that, contrary to what many people seem to be suggesting, progress, in its way, is most notable in the still flawed South, where its history of blatant, rather than shadowy, surreptitious prejudice drew a spotlight of negative focus that forced it, however unwillingly and however reluctantly for far too long, to change, fundamentally.

     Full disclosure: I make this assertion as a product of the South  -- even though I was partially, and maybe even pivotally raised, and educated, in the north, and west. Nonetheless, despite the years I have spent elsewhere, make no mistake -- I am southern to the core because wherever I am, geographically, I carry the voices, as well as the collective sensibilities and lessons taught me, by a liberal southern mother (not an oxymoron), a somewhat deranged (but funny as hell) southern grandmother, and a great-grandmother straight from central casting, etc.. Nor was mine just a matrilineal southern training; my father's family, his "people," also derive from south of the Mason-Dixon line, if only just south of it.... and, just so you know, it was solely in that mid-Atlantic Maryland faction -- not in the deep South enclaves -- that stereotypical racism reared its ugly head again as recently as two generations ago.

    So, in an effort to move this discussion forward, and to demonstrate the slow and steady, if alarmingly schizophrenic quality of southern change, I offer anyone at TPM  -- anyone who is, in my perception, south-phobic -- a glimpse of one southern family, my family, that may at times make you shudder, may at times make you angry but which should, in the aggregate, not only give you hope for the future cohesion of our American society, but also transform white southerners, in your perception, into real, living, breathing people, instead of cookie cutter stereotypes.

    Here are the facts - colored (no distasteful pun intended) by my love and affection for some, but certainly not all of the respective players noted. 

    Many generations ago:

    1) it is a fact that one of my South Carolina progenitors -- William Cloud by name -- bought, sold and owned slaves;

    2) it is a fact that his son - Augustine Cloud by name -- after going to school in Massachusetts and marrying  a girl from Boston -- then, shortly after the death of his father, voluntarily freed those slaves and their children more than twenty years before the civil war. It is recorded that Augustine gave each family land -- not so much, I suspect, as reparation per se, but rather, to give each family a good start in their independence... even if the motivation behind that gesture was to relieve Augustine of further responsibility. (Was land enough? No, but better than not giving anything.)

    Skipping several generations, because they neither distinguished nor embarrassed themselves:

    1) one of Augustine's  descendants, one of my maternal great aunts, became the first white woman on the board at Tuskegee. When she died, she left her modest estate to that school, endowing a scholarship ad infinitum (reparation of sorts, but this time based not in guilt but in belief).

    2) on the other hand, it is a fact that her generational peer, the paternal grandfather I admired and adored in all other things, was an unrepentant bigot, one who ostentatiously walked out of his church when it was announced that it would integrate, and one who asked me, at the beginning of each elementary school year, how many "pickininnies" I had in my classroom.(As a side note in parallel construction, he, too, endowed college scholarships, albeit at a college that was, then, all male and all white.) 

    My parents' generation:

    1) my mother's brother went to West Point - he who was (according to photographs, and letters) though movie star handsome, witty and athletic, was certainly not the brightest academic bulb in the bunch -- which is neither here nor there, except that, early on in his experience at West Point, he became an admirer of one of the few African American USMA graduates of the time, Benjamin Owens Davis, Jr..

    Here, I think, is a specific example that the values and cultural assumptions of any given time are relevant. Because -- in this instance, in this time and place -- a privileged, blonde, blue-eyed white southern "boyeh" of eighteen, nonetheless instantly recognized the inherent substance of one who, in my uncle's world of reference at the time, would have been referred to dismissively as "colored" at best and a "Nigra" in common parlance. This recognition of inherent value says something truly fine about my uncle, his southern white male background notwithstanding. A cynic might say that perhaps his attention was first grabbed by the family name they shared - Davis was my uncle's middle name -  but name sharing, between white and black is, btw, completely taken for granted in a south in which slaves were forced to take the names of their owners. The point -- imo -- is that it is more remarkable than not that my uncle, in 1938, selected an African American as his mentor and role model. And I know that he did so -- because I have read the letters he wrote to my mother, and I can attest that he was struck, as if by lightning, by this African American man who, as he points out with respect, endured more in his tenure at West Point than any white boy ever feared, in his worst nightmares.  

    So, after his own West Point graduation in 1942, my uncle followed in his role model's footsteps, signing up for the Army Air Corps, and requesting -- after he completed his own flight training  --that he be assigned to serve under said Capt. Davis as a pilot instructor in the Tuskegee program - where there was already a family interest and connection. 

    Sadly, my uncle's request was denied. Instead, allegedly because he had fast reflexes, he was assigned to a test pilot program in Texas .... where he died in flames six weeks later, his fiancée a witness to the unexpected crash. After which a clueless company commander sent his melted wings to my grandmother ... molten wings that now reside, uneasily, in my closet, in an archival tissue-papered box, where they keep company with my bigoted grandfather's pocket watch and my father's Phi Beta Kappa key.)

    But I digress.

    2) despite their differing upbringings on matters of race, neither my mother nor my transcendent father tolerated even a whisper of prejudice in our household; rather, they were radically inclusionary and outreaching -- which, btw, cost them dearly, in some circles, after the war and through the 50's and 60's, and they did not care.

    3) during the same time frame, an aunt - my mother's sister -- employed an African American housekeeper for twenty-five years and, when she (the housekeeper) became too frail to work, my aunt "retired" her, which is one of those "witty" southern euphemisms that evades acknowledging that my aunt laid her off without benefits or pension. 

    My generation:

    1) my sister and I didn't escape confirmation or cotillion, but we did follow my parents' excellent example in passing up ritual opportunities to join exclusionary societies: we therefore eschewed college sororities as well as both the DAR and the DoC (Daughters of the Confederacy) and, later, the Junior League; instead, we signed up for, or donated to, acronym societies and legislation that promoted inclusion and equality: SDS,  NAACP,  ACLU, etc.. And, at the first opportunity, we registered with the Democratic Party -- the real one, of course, not the Dixiecrat one that had already morphed into the Republican party of today. Since then, neither one of us has ever voted for a Republican, and throughout our adult lives, both of us have donated to and worked for Democratic candidates, as well as for specific causes we believe in, not least of which was the ERA. We  can aver, without a clichéd blush, that we have friends of every ethnic, religious and gender persuasion, with whom we feel free to celebrate common ground and discuss differences of opinion.

    The difference, though, between our generation and that of our children is that we still think all this multi-culturalism is miraculous, whereas our children take it as a given, as what is.

    Our childrens' generation:

    1) We lived in Manhattan when my son was young. After I divorced his father and refused alimony (OK -- some early feminist principles were just plain stupid) private elementary school was off the table. And so I sent him to public school, wrangling a place for him at the highly regarded PS 41 in the West Village by - yes, Machiavellian principles, by which I mean a lack of principle -- renting an address (as compared to an apartment) from a friend in the district, when in fact we lived on the upper west side. (It may mean nothing to anyone who was not southern or who did not live in Manhattan at the time, but even living on the upper west side was a unusual thing for a southerner to do, then, before the neighborhood was deLucca'd.) 

    Anyway, thus began a bizarre reversal of the appalling bussing African American children were subjected to in the south for years. Each morning, my son and I left our neighborhood to take the subway downtown to deliver him to school on my way to work; and, each afternoon --well, at least most days, but that is another story --  a counselor in his afterschool program, accompanied him home. But the good news is that my son adapted to his new milieu like a duck to water, even though his class had the dubious distinction of being featured in the NYT as the first Manhattan class on record in which: a) every child's parent was divorced; and, b) every student (but my son) was either African-American, Hispanic, Asian or European. I confess it -- this ethnic/country of origin imbalance concerned his southern mother who feared that he, as a minority in this context, might be targeted by whomever for bullying. But I needn't have worried. In that year, my son learned to be at ease in the world, wherever and with whomever he may find himself. It was a lifetime gift, to me as well as to him that, though born of economic necessity, keeps on giving.

    For example, that year was excellent preparation for our later move to San Francisco where, in his school, the same ethnicity distribution pertained. And, in the end, all those experiences helped my son gain admission to an excellent southern college because, in his interview, he pointed out that yes, he had the grades and SAT scores, and yes, he had the requisite athletic credentials... but, also, given his upbringing, he was a prime candidate as a useful catalyst between old south legatees and the then mandated, but under-appreciated, minority admissions.

    Shocking manipulation of circumstance? Not in my opinion, although I may rationalize it to this day. But -- has there ever been a student applying to a competitive school who has not thrown every asset he or she can think of into the consideration mix? 

    Never mind. In my son's case, these were more than persuasive words; A. meant them. And so, although shortly after his arrival, he joined a fraternity known for its southern white maleness, I was really proud that he and one his "brothers"- the grandson, btw, of a  canon-icononized, southern author - promptly challenged the national fraternity to admit minorities, and won. (Is gaining a welcome to an all white male preserve a triumph for minorities? Hmm, probably not. But it is a triumph for the white males who saw the need for correction and did something about it? I say, yes.)

    In summary, how have all these decisions and actions, through all these generations, synthesized?   

    In the immediacy of any particular moment, it's hard to tell.  But:

    1) I love the implied promise, for the south in general and for women in particular (of whatever ethnicity) that I was offered the opportunity to be the interim Editor-in-Chief of a city magazine, a job that is still almost invariably offered to a a man.

    2) I am discouraged by the fact that, during my magazine tenure, the current owner of a local plantation informed me, proudly, that part of the plantation's tourist spiel is his phrase: "It took 100 slaves 10 years to carve out these 1000 acres of rice fields" -- an accomplishment that, apparently, he still sees metrically, rather than morally.

    3) I love walking down a tabby road on Wadmalaw Island where both white and African American natives to the island tend their own, owned farms that produce tomatoes and sunflowers;  as I

    4) hate driving down a road on adjacent John's Island following a redneck truck with over-sized tires, a gun rack, a Confederate flag decal and a bumper sticker that, still says, in 2009: "Forget, hell."

    5)I love the fact that conservative women I know, really well (including a cousin) found their way to the Obama campaign headquarters; and,

    6) I hate the fact that a few of them pleaded with me to "keep it between us." 

    The conundrum of being southern, and white -- whether male or female -- continues. Obviously our discomfort does not compare to the pain and suffering over generations of those who are southern and African American; nor does it compare to the disparity that still exists in opportunities between the two. 

    The bottom line, though, is this: yes, bad things, horrific things were ignored too long in the south, accepted as the status quo. But. Things are changing -- too quickly for diehards and too slowly for everyone else. As they change there is an ebb and flow of progress and predictable backlash, just as there is in any quantum shift.

    But the South is coming along. Why, then, not offer its people the carrot of encouragement rather than the sticks of stereotype and scorn?

     

    Comments

    Beautiful--thanks for posting this.


    by worthlesscitizen (not verified) on Wed, 05/27/2009 - 9:22pm

    Even though I worry about praising those who have written professionally (which is less of a worry since more and more writers with some professional background appear here more and more every day) as well as just praising those who excel at language, cohesive thought and argument than I ever will....

    I hereby render unto you the Dayly Blog Award of THE MONTH for this here TPMCafe Site, given to all of you from all of me....

    We all have biases. I mean I have been biased toward your ability to put together a sentence for some time...

    BUT THIS, THIS IS REALLY GOOD!!!!


    by dickday (not verified) on Wed, 05/27/2009 - 9:32pm

    OUTSTANDING! Pardon the caps, but it really is an absolutely outstanding, stupendous, supercalifragilistic (sp?) blog!

    Kudos, ww! :-)

    I may return later with thoughts - to add to the stellar emotions!


    by TheraP (not verified) on Wed, 05/27/2009 - 9:54pm

    Well told and well lived all around W. Your parents sound like delightful people.


    by miguelitoh2o (not verified) on Wed, 05/27/2009 - 10:08pm

    Some--some is the key word-- in the North are slowly coming along too. Just last June, PBS presented a film--which I think played at Sundance as well-- called Traces of the Trade. When I placed information in this forum about this film, it was met with some backlash. I watched it without recriminations. I just watched and learned from that persons point of view.

    Some of us had a heads-up before this film and before we were told recently in this forum that the North was just as complicit as the South in this particular matter.

    Rec'd!


    by 1849 (not verified) on Wed, 05/27/2009 - 10:14pm

    I have lived life fiercely proud of my southern heritage - perhaps, through your words, I've a better understanding as to why. Whether a painful sandspur or a seagull's feather, they both adorn the road that leads me home.


    by barefooted (not verified) on Wed, 05/27/2009 - 10:27pm

    Staebler,(I like calling you Staebler...it's kinda like Bueller? Bueller?) Staebler, what an outstanding essay. Bookend examples of real people. I hope this blows labeling people right out of the water. Labels undermine and damage in a truly insidious way.

    Maintaining prejudices is the easy way out. No thinking required.

    Chi migwetch, Wendy.


    by ~flowerchild~ (not verified) on Wed, 05/27/2009 - 10:30pm

    Thank you for that, flower. I too hate labels!


    by TheraP (not verified) on Wed, 05/27/2009 - 11:29pm

    Thank you.


    by Frizzletoad (not verified) on Thu, 05/28/2009 - 12:07am

    DD -- Please, Sir: never confuse me with a person who can formulate a coherent argument, although I humbly accept any award --daily, monthly or otherwise -- that you feel inclined to bestow, whenever and to whomever.
    I have to admit that writing this took every bit of energy that I had for the day, which makes it all the more remarkable to me that you are writing from you head and your heart every day, day after day....which, after careful consideration, should maybe be the title of your blog series: "Day (after Day)."
    My life, DD, which has not been fabulous this year, has been transformed and transfigured by your daily posts that constitute excellence, as well as erudition and tireless energy, every day.


    by wwstaebler (not verified) on Thu, 05/28/2009 - 12:07am

    I have read the letters he wrote to my mother, and I can attest that he was struck, as if by lightning, by this African American man who, as he points out with respect, endured more in his tenure at West Point than any white boy ever feared, in his worst nightmares.

    Yeah. I had the privilege of handling archived photos from West Point--some that hadn't been seen since they were filed away-- of Brave Ben. Who knows, maybe even handled one of yer uncle.

    =D

    (Such a pleasant thought.)

    North and South had quite the experience at West Point before, during, and after the Civil War. It's probably worth an evening or two to check it out. There are several excellent books and histories that have been recently published, and there's always their own web site, as well as the LoC.

    Seriously, Ma'am, as a first generation immigrant, I have none of your history. Mine is quite non-American, though I am proud of it. Thus, I have always had a fascination and respect for American history. I envy that you got yours around Christmas trees, and during supper.

    I am, in awe of you. You are like, beyond rawk!


    by Bwakfat (not verified) on Thu, 05/28/2009 - 12:12am

    Bwak: What project were you working on that involved West Point? I know you are an artist; are you a conservator as well?
    I really love the idea that you, whom I respect, may have handled photographs I never saw of my uncle, whom I never knew.
    It's an increasingly small world, and I cherish the connections within it. You are a connection I particularly cherish, for the same reason my uncle honored Ben Davis -- we call it INTEGRITY.
    Take care.
    PS -- the night I joined Mibbit, I was talking away and suddenly (much to my embarrassment, no one was there, for a considerable time. On Lingr, the screen just scrolled down, into infinity. Does Mibbit require, or is there a cue, to turn the page or change screens? Just wondering. Thanks.


    by wwstaebler (not verified) on Thu, 05/28/2009 - 12:50am

    No offense, but I don't think I've ever met a southerner who doesn't have some familial story that demonstrates their lack of bigotry and their refined spirit of brotherhood.

    I wonder why this is...


    by BevD (not verified) on Thu, 05/28/2009 - 1:00am

    An anniversary book. I think it was for PBS. I was called in as an emergency measure, as there was so very much to scan and it required knowledgebal handling. My role was more as the scanner, color corrector, retoucher, general go-to-in-a-panic person. The pity was, we were supposed to go back for more, They kept these glass negatives in filing cabinets, well wrapped, but Oy! Then 9/11 happened, and they went into "lock down" and we had to scramble for stock to flesh out the book, as well as do a certain amount of redesigning to make the deadline. It still came out nice. My friend Casey designed it, and I felt very special because he insisted they pay me to help him, as there weren't many whose integrity he trusred around his work.

    =D

    There are no archives at mibbet. We are there now.


    by Bwakfat (not verified) on Thu, 05/28/2009 - 1:02am

    Because bigotry sells newspapers?


    by Bwakfat (not verified) on Thu, 05/28/2009 - 1:04am

    No, I don't think that's it.


    by BevD (not verified) on Thu, 05/28/2009 - 1:08am

    Because, it profits the powers that be to encourage us to think that think we're more divided then we (maybe) are?


    by Bwakfat (not verified) on Thu, 05/28/2009 - 1:15am

    Because they're all just making it up?

    or

    Because we're so used to being put in the awkward position of defending ourselves for being southern (and all that this "means") that we already know which of our anecdotes will reassure you the most?


    by worthlesscitizen (not verified) on Thu, 05/28/2009 - 1:18am

    Not in my opinion. I can tell you that I could paper a room with these stories. They're all told the same way, with the same characters playing the same parts...I think it might be some sort or rite of passage for some southerners.


    by BevD (not verified) on Thu, 05/28/2009 - 1:28am

    I have lived in California, Chicago, Ohio, Alabama, and Indiana. My personal observation: The most predudiced, by far, is Chicago. The least, believe it or not, (my opinion) is Alabama. Black people in the south more often have good jobs and they don't always live in separated enclaves. They often live in the better suburbs, even out in the country. Selma was two generations ago. There is still predudice in the south, absolutely. It is pervasive and insidius. Yet, in Chicago, there is predudice that often borders on hate. Go to the white bars in Chicago and just listen. Go to any bar in Alabama and you will see blacks and whites drinking and playing cards together. The churches, north or south, are still the most segregated places in the country.


    by Faroff (not verified) on Thu, 05/28/2009 - 1:40am

    A bit of both I suppose...I wouldn't be so sure that they're all making it up, I do think that they are all so dismally familiar that whether they are true or not, they all wish fervently that they were true.

    It would almost be refreshing to read one of these confessionals where the supplicant tells us that he/she descended from a long line of bigots and only escaped after one night burning a cross on the jew manager of PigglyWiggly lawn and catching his hair on fire. He then rescued by the loving attention of the darkie aide that emptied his bedpan every night and told him stories just like Uncle Remus. Now of course, he knows better.


    by BevD (not verified) on Thu, 05/28/2009 - 1:43am

    I am the first member of my immediate family to reside below the Mason-Dixon line, although my paternal grandmother, who was raised in Seaford, Delaware, lived practically astride it. My link to the South comes by way of my great-great-granduncle, Ambrose E. Burnside, whose father was from South Carolina.

    Burnside, who followed George McClellan as commander of the Army of the Potomac, had a less than stellar military career. He is better known for his signature mutton chops, which became known as "burnsides" and, later, sideburns. Now there's something to hang your hat on. So much for my illustrious genealogy.

    My father, who to this day is a member of the English department faculty at a midwestern university, has a passion for classic Southern writers that somehow transferred to me (sadly, not much else did). Through the work of those authors -- principally Faulkner and Flannery O'Conner and Eudora Welty -- I gained an appreciation if not an understanding of the remarkable complexity and textured moral ambiguity of Southern culture.

    It has been said that you cannot understand America until you understand the Civil War. I believe that is true. As what's left of the Republican party finds its center of gravity here and succession once again becomes part of the parlance of sour-grapes politicians, it is easy to overlook the fact that the South and all it represents is fundamental to the American experience.

    Your beautifully told family history, peopled with its own Thomas Sutpens and Quentin Compsons, drove that point home forcefully for me. Thanks for sharing it.


    by bluemeanie (not verified) on Thu, 05/28/2009 - 1:52am

    The city where I encountered the most racism was Cincinnati. After that was Indianapolis. Granted, it was a long time ago for both, and my experiences were very limited, as I was only there for band gigs in a bar. Chicago was pretty bad, although not in most blues venues I visited. I think a major part of it stems from the community's inability to get over the Northside/Southside dichotomy.

    In LA , bias is rampant, yet most of it is color-blind. Get up into Bel Air and its pricey digs ilk in West LA, and it's all about bank accounts and public fame. Yet just below it in Hollywood and Westwood, the bias is about 'scenes'. On the beaches, it's about surfer turf, and locals. Blatant racism in LA is found in the poorest communities, sadly.


    by PseudoCyAnts (not verified) on Thu, 05/28/2009 - 2:32am

    wwstaebler, I second every one of these well deserved praises and can find no words better than those written above to express my appreciation. I note the same progress in the generations of my family as yours,the same division of hearts and attitudes also.It is as if members of the same family, and different generations as well, are from opposite ends of the galaxy altogether. As for labels, I find them most often to be intentionally misleading,so its wiser to look past them into the jar itself for the true content. With hat in hand I bow to you in admiration and gratitude.Your grace is astonishing and rare these days.


    by DonDi (not verified) on Thu, 05/28/2009 - 2:37am

    Having lived in the greater Cincinnati area all my life, I agree with you. In our defense I will say that we are polite drivers, both black and white.


    by BevD (not verified) on Thu, 05/28/2009 - 2:42am

    See Belle, this just gets more and more kudos. I would rather see 200 comments and 100 recs, but...

    We should just hire you to draw up a treaty between the North and the South. I think the west really does not care. but...

    Well in my mind this is such a serious blog with great comments.

    the end


    by dickday (not verified) on Thu, 05/28/2009 - 2:46am

    I would suggest, Ms. Staebler, that before you jump to the unsupported conclusion that someone is "southern-phobic" you have the facts with which to back up your statement.

    Desidero does not possess an "informed comparative worldview" and the numerous erroneous statements he made regarding not only US history, but world history prove it.

    Having lived all over this globe, including "the south," in cultures not my own, being a student of history, a voracious reader and a consumer of information from minds more learned than mine provide me with a very well-rounded point of view.

    Do not assume -- as far too many white southerners do (yeah, I said it)-- that when a black person pushes back on matters regarding the south and or the civil war, that there is "phobia" or fear involved. Those days are long past. (You really stepped in it, with that one, and it is only because it is late evening that I do not give that the thorough reaming that it deserves.)

    Your family owned slaves in South Carolina? Big deal. My family once were slaves in South Carolina. And Mississippi and Alabama and Georgia. You know the Underground Railroad? Yeah, I have family that were among the first to make the trip north successfully. And I have family that were freedmen in New England pre-revolutionary war. We can play "can you top this?" all night long. But it's hardly productive.

    But since you brought me into this discussion -- in a manner quite different than Desidero or I did with each other -- making an inaccurate and unfounded personal assessment, and since you assumed facts not in evidence, let me set the record straight for you:

    What I am is someone wholeheartedly and enthusiastically intolerant of racists, bigots, and fools. They are not corralled by any border or imaginary line. They are not limited to any race or gender or intellectual capacity or geographical location.

    I do not cotton to people who assume that they know all about someone based on the color of his or her skin, his or her accent, eye shape, the number of vowels or consonants in his or her name, the church or synagogue he or she does or does not attend, or the person he or she chooses as a lover. I have little patience for people who pretend to be one thing and are, in fact, another. I find people who hold their "heritage" as more sacred and deserving than someone else's, tiresome, and frankly, narrow-minded.

    Phobic? Of you? or any other southerner? Hell, no.


    by Jade7243 (not verified) on Thu, 05/28/2009 - 3:02am

    I think most people at most times do offer encouragement. It is only at certain times and when certain themes come up that people get their hackles up. The tired old refrain of the "noble lost cause" is one of them and maybe the most grating. Lots of people have just had enough of that kind of thing from southern white folks. By and large I think the white south (because that's what we're talking about) and white southerners have pretty thin skin and act a lot more long suffering than they ought to. In fact, that whole feeling like a victim thing is a pretty tired thing in general and though I understand and don't doubt people sincerely feel the entire white south is at times or even often disrespected, I don't think that's terribly accurate. Id' say that more often than not white southerners are given the benefit of the doubt and lots of deference. I say this as somone whose pedigree is not dissimilar to the one you describe in your post

    I agree with you that progress is being made and things have moved along at a nearly startling clip the past 40 years outside the realm of politics in the south and that's a good thing. But it's really undeniable that a good portion of the white south (including border states) plays a central roll in holding back not only the south socially, economically and politically, but also the rest of the nation because of the reactionary politics it clings to. I would like to see that changing a whole lot more rapidly than it has though I understand it is a very difficult task.


    by oleeb (not verified) on Thu, 05/28/2009 - 3:11am

    I keep coming back to this, all night. You have a beautiful soul. When I get like this, all I have are cliches on my keyboard. Its the best I can do. Otherwise I write nothing.

    That said, you have not 'solved' the problem. You have put a human face on both 'sides' or several sides really. There are not two sides or ten sides.

    See. Just cliches.

    You will still be challenged in your plea here. But you have, and I can tell, seen more difficult challenges than our little Cafe can muster. Ha!!

    Good show and I especially loved the discussion with Bwak tonite.

    Thank you.


    by dickday (not verified) on Thu, 05/28/2009 - 3:53am

    I like the "rite of passage" idea. It suggests to me that every family in the South, at one time or another, will have, or has had, the light bulb turn on. From that moment, their lives change as they open up to a more varied experience and are richer for it.

    It seems to me to be like a person who, as a child, hated asparagus. For years they got older believing they hated asparagus. Then, one day, for some unknown, totally random reason, they tried it again, with some hollandaise, perhaps, and found out that it was really quite good. From that day forward they would smack themselves on the forehead whenever they thought about how they had passed by so many chances to have asparagus because of some child-like notion that they hated asparagus.

    The feelings were deeply held. They began before memory, from some unknown origin. The feelings were reactive, and thoughtless. It seemed so God-awful important (blesses himself) to let the entire world know exactly how they felt about asparagus. Then one day, they just tried it, and forever after could not understand what the whole fuss was about.

    The fuss is certainly a horrible experience for people of color, but to whites, they just kind of shrug. "Oh, I made a mistake. Oops." Oh, that it should be more then that, but it just is only that. And the world gets a littel better, one family at a time. I'm willing to believe the South is changing the stereotype. I'm willing to meet Southerners one at a time to get to know how they personally feel about race, but the South still has a lot of bigots and they seem to be more then welcome in the GOP.


    by GregorZap (not verified) on Thu, 05/28/2009 - 4:44am

    The variety of history here is a reminder to us all of our heritage and should inform us of the need to remain respectful of the fact that what came before us is not something we can be held accountable for. Dwelling on the past isn't always useful and occasionally discomforting or even painful. However, we do need to know about the past if for no other reason than to provide us some perspective in charting our future.

    Right now in our history we are intimately familiar with the various and apparent errors of our national leadership. We can see a historic repetition of events and an undoing of lessons learned.

    We find ourselves at a crossroads. We have people who hold a grasp of the past and those who have little or none. Unfortunately, we've just passed through a period that is remarkably regressive where MBAs paid little heed to regulatory reforms of the past.

    The real genesis for past reforms, social or otherwise, is an understanding of human nature that happens not to be a core piece of the curriculum of our top business schools, which happen to produce the majority of persons who have the most to do with running this country.

    In the general scheme of things such as are being discussed and presented here, we have a discourse where there exists variously informed opinions which lead to different and often conflicting pathways. We must be cautious to examine the advisement of specialists. Their perspectives, while useful, are limited in scope.

    Right now the scope and direction of our national deliberations are crucial. The aggregate of the discourse is very hard to unify. Our national leadership has to rationalize the lessons of history with the present. It is my opinion we are a long way from establishing the necessary relationships between competing ideas that will best serve the greatest number of Americans. Oddly enough, we once knew this with far more clarity than we do now. One lesson we would do well to learn is that it is a mistake to let events change our fundamentals or abandon those things we objectvely already know. All of us, every one, is an equal citizen of this country and any departure from that starting point is a mistake.


    by thepeoplechoose (not verified) on Thu, 05/28/2009 - 5:34am

    Perceptions do not necessarily reflect reality. The Supreme Court case: Plessy v. Ferguson, 163 U.S. 537 (1896); rates among the worst of SCOTUS decisions. It determined "Separate but Equal" segregation did not violate either the Thirteenth or Fourteenth Amendments. It was decided 7-1. Six of the seven in the majority were Northeastern Yankees, and the one dissent was from a Kentuckian:

    Plessy v Ferguson Majority:

    • Chief Justice Melville W. Fuller - from Maine
    • Stephen J. Field - from Connecticut
    • Horace Gray - from Massachusetts
    • Henry B. Brown - from Massachusetts
    • George Shiras, Jr. - from Pennsylvania
    • Edward D. White - from Louisiana
    • Rufus Peckham - from New York
    Plessy v Ferguson Dissenter:
    • John M. Harlan - from Kentucky
    The Plessy decision legitimised odious and overt racism:
    A statute which implies merely a legal distinction between the white and colored races -- a distinction which is founded in the color of the two races and which must always exist so long as white men are distinguished from the other race by color -- has no tendency to destroy the legal equality of the two races, or reestablish a state of involuntary servitude.
    [. . .]
    The object of the amendment (14th) was undoubtedly to enforce the absolute equality of the two races before the law, but, in the nature of things, it could not have been intended to abolish distinctions based upon color, or to enforce social, as distinguished from political, equality, or a commingling of the two races upon terms unsatisfactory to either. Laws permitting, and even requiring, their separation in places where they are liable to be brought into contact do not necessarily imply the inferiority of either race to the other, and have been generally, if not universally, recognized as within the competency of the state legislatures in the exercise of their police power. The most common instance of this is connected with the establishment of separate schools for white and colored children, which has been held to be a valid exercise of the legislative power even by courts of States where the political rights of the colored race have been longest and most earnestly enforced.

    Even more offensive was its determination that a black person excluded from riding in a railroad car designated for whites had not been deprived of property, whereas a white person, forced to ride in a railroad car designated tor blacks had been deprived of property:
    It is claimed by the plaintiff in error that, in any mixed community, the reputation of belonging to the dominant race, in this instance the white race, is property in the same sense that a right of action or of inheritance is property. Conceding this to be so for the purposes of this case, we are unable to see how this statute deprives him of, or in any way affects his right to, such property. If he be a white man and assigned to a colored coach, he may have his action for damages against the company for being deprived of his so-called property. Upon the other hand, if he be a colored man and be so assigned, he has been deprived of no property, since he is not lawfully entitled to the reputation of being a white man.

    Justice Harlan, the Kentuckian, summed it up clearly at the end of his dissent:
    I am of opinion that the statute of Louisiana is inconsistent with the personal liberty of citizens, white and black, in that State, and hostile to both the spirit and letter of the Constitution of the United States. If laws of like character should be enacted in the several States of the Union, the effect would be in the highest degree mischievous. Slavery, as an institution tolerated by law would, it is true, have disappeared from our country, but there would remain a power in the States, by sinister legislation, to interfere with the full enjoyment of the blessings of freedom to regulate civil rights, common to all citizens, upon the basis of race, and to place in a condition of legal inferiority a large body of American citizens now constituting a part of the political community called the People of the United States, for whom and by whom, through representatives, our government is administered. Such a system is inconsistent with the guarantee given by the Constitution to each State of a republican form of government, and may be stricken down by Congressional action, or by the courts in the discharge of their solemn duty to maintain the supreme law of the land, anything in the constitution or laws of any State to the contrary notwithstanding.

    Plessy remained the law of the land for 58 years, until it was overturned in Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, 347 U.S. 483 (1954). Brown was unanimous, decided by nine Justices who were from diverse geographical locations:
    • Chief Justice Earl Warren - from California
    • Hugo L. Black - from Alabama
    • Stanley Reed - from Kentucky
    • Felix Frankfurter - from Austria/grew up in New York City
    • William O. Douglas - from Minnesota
    • Robert H. Jackson - from Pennsylvania
    • Harold Burton - from Massachusetts
    • Tom C. Clark - from Texas
    • Sherman Minton - from Indiana

    by PseudoCyAnts (not verified) on Thu, 05/28/2009 - 6:18am

    I hesitate to throw my hat in the rig, but here it goes.

    I read the posting, and I arrived at basically the same reaction as many of you have; that of respect over such an honest and personal appeal, and not worthy of anything but one word: true progress.

    Then, I read some other comments, which seem to me at first full of a different emotion, and loaded with baggage. A very different reaction than I admit I had naturally.

    The question then is why? Why do we see and hear different things hear? Are we projecting our own issues here, or are we trying to extinguish them here?

    I believe there are people who have issues, and those who have had issues. Race here is only important if you make it, or someone else makes it, or you feel it like a ghost in the room every time it's ugly head bites you hard,and you can't ignore it the way everyone around you does.

    Is the issue here is that nobody wants to be told how to feel, or that there feelings are wrong?
    Is it as simple as some people wanting things to change, and some wanting things to stay the same? Intentions are important here. Not everyone says the right words, knows the right conversation, nor has all the facts. What I value above all is a noble cause. If someone is extending a hand, you don't beat it away.

    And if someone has criticism, you sit and listen if you really care, and try to understand how to heal their complaint, if it be fair.

    So I guess I too will be attacked, or ignored, or praised, or corrected. But my intent is only this: that we try to understand one another in an open, honest way, without prejudging intent, but doing so in good faith.

    Is that reasonable, or naive?


    by Joe Wood (not verified) on Thu, 05/28/2009 - 6:25am

    A year ago I came across a very good article describing the whole fight for the Supreme Court in the later 1800s, how by 1875 or 1880 the game was up and how that would sink Civil Rights for the next 70-80 years. It was one of the most concise, alarming portrayals I'd ever read.


    by Desidero (not verified) on Thu, 05/28/2009 - 9:12am

    I have the honor of being descended from both abusive factory owners, men in "finance" whatever they might have been trading, and poor white trash. Abuse of blacks is inherent in the equation, as is spiteful money-grubbing existence and deep-seated hypocrisy on all questions of ethics and morals, including aiding and abetting the enemy, whether from Europe or domestic. I'm an American, which makes me triply blessed. I don't know that I really belong to a region, but I can play them like baseball teams (one of my earlier loves that's now been replaced by betting on which firms will fail faster). I don't have any spectacularly wondrous or sinister stories of family heritage to tell, except for one minor knifing of a teacher combined with incarceration and one of the military academies that's been mangled so badly I start to suspect there might be an issue of truth there. I don't recall any stories of anyone being nice to anyone (except kind of through the knife story), and aside from some mention of horse thievery in rather vague terms, I also didn't get much in the way of particularly treacherous acts. No Civil War stories either - I think everyone was too busy trading in cotton futures or picking cotton out West to bother themselves with it, but I could be wrong, perhaps it was just the war crimes were too meager to mention, not that embossing the truth couldn't have fixed that some. Anyway, it's often deeply embarrassing to me at cocktail parties when over Manhattans or Mint Juleps someone starts divulging their fabulous past, their honorific or dastardly 2nd great-uncle to the 7th removed, and I have to make do with a trip as a kid to the newly opened Space Mountain, which doesn't exactly explain what my ancestors did from the time my ancestors arrived in their newfound home/penal colony and the time that I (briefly) did. What happened to all those glorious years? Did it really come to this? Anyway, from all that time ransacking and blood-letting out West, it appears that I do have some Indian blood in me after all (re-reading that, it's my ancestors' ransacking and blood-letting, not mine), which could be interesting, except revealing this always prompts the question, "what tribe?" to which I haven't the foggiest, and the few times I tried to fake an answer I was told that those were Eastern tribes or non-existent.

    So maybe Jade's right, maybe I have an "uninformed comparative worldview" that guides me through these bitter times, that if I only knew which battalion my 3rd cousin on my Father's Great-Aunt's side fought in, how many acres they owned/ruled over, which church they went to on Sundays (or if they were irrepentant Jew in hiding or some whiff I heard once of even infidel Chinee blood, though unverified), and a variety of other trivia about life in America, I'd be able to act as a contributing member of society and TPM, tell how that now distinctly remembered Chinese ancestor helped to pound the final spikes into the cross-country railroad, how we took money from that slave-driving venture and founded a major charitable institution and University, and now am revered in stock markets and talk shows all over the nation. Perhaps if I'd been a student of history rather than growing up on foosball and pool I'd be able to pierce the shroud of today's pressing questions, but instead I'm forced to concede the obvious, that y'all's just too smart for the likes of me.


    by Desidero (not verified) on Thu, 05/28/2009 - 9:40am

    Thanks, 1849 -- because I admire you, yours was one of the responses I feared, and so I thank you for your encouraging civility.


    by wwstaebler (not verified) on Thu, 05/28/2009 - 12:19pm

    How poetically you say concisely what I want to say. Missy -- I'm heading south the second week of June. When I'm in New Bern, care to join me on a barefoot walk somewhere near you?


    by wwstaebler (not verified) on Thu, 05/28/2009 - 12:22pm

    Thank you, Flower. You started me thinking about my uncle the other day when you wrote about your grandmother, Ralph Elder and Harry.
    Wars just have to stop, period end; no more wonderful young men, and now women, lost to satisfy some maniac's urge to dominate and control.


    by wwstaebler (not verified) on Thu, 05/28/2009 - 12:25pm

    BevD: Your point is well-taken. I agree with you that too many southerners attempt to distance themselves from their own, or their family's participation in and/or tolerance of bigotry. That is why I included mention of those in my family who were guilty.


    by wwstaebler (not verified) on Thu, 05/28/2009 - 12:31pm

    I completely cosign the END of war.


    by TheraP (not verified) on Thu, 05/28/2009 - 12:32pm

    You knew Pseudo, there were the activist judges. The asshats who voted with the majority in Plessy. ha

    Nobody is more activist than Alito, Roberts & Scalia.

    Yeah and Harlan, the grandfather of the Harlan of the fifties, a real harbinger of things to come. A great man!!!


    by dickday (not verified) on Thu, 05/28/2009 - 12:39pm

    Jade: Do you think I am proud that someone in my family owned slaves? If so, you are mistaken. As you are also mistaken if you think I am proud that my grandfather was a bigot, or that my aunt cast off her employee after years of work without any safety net.

    I do wish to apologize to you for not proofreading carefully what I wrote before I submitted it. Because I had decided to delete the reference to both you and Desidero as being too personal, or seeming like an attack, as part of a post of my own. (I originally wrote a much shorter version of this to submit as a comment only on your post -- that is the only reason why I mentioned you and Desidero by name. But this was difficult for me to write, whether you understand why, or not, and in the interim, your post dropped out of sight.)
    I have been reading your posts for a year now, Jade, and it would take a person far dimmer than I am to miss your obvious intelligence, education, wordly sophistication, passionate involvement in issues you care about and absolute fearlessness in stating your views. All the talents and character attributes you have are qualities I admire --- whether in a white person or any other person.
    Just for the record, because I, too, speak my mind fairly candidly now and again, I did perceive a south-phobic quality in what you wrote. But the fact that I perceived it does not mean it is true.... just as your perception that I am proud of everyone in my family, including the slave owners and bigots and thoughtless users of others is not true, though it was what you perceived.
    Question: what could I say that would ring true to you, in terms of convincing you, and others, that much more of the white south than not is now on the same side of progress that you are?


    by wwstaebler (not verified) on Thu, 05/28/2009 - 1:00pm

    I suspect that it has to do with the difference between an intellectual reaction and one based on actual life experience. Isn't our "baggage" just another name for our accumulated life experience?

    BTW, I think that also was the point Sonia Sotomayor was making, about her expectation that her latina life experience would more completely inform her decisions on minority and women's rights issues. Intellect plus actual life experience being superior to intellect alone.


    by new10 (not verified) on Thu, 05/28/2009 - 1:12pm

    enjoyed your commentary, thanks for it and the effort that went into it. it was all good to read and helps my own understanding. I was born and raised in the deepest south, in New Orleans and Biloxi, respectively, by the way.

    just a couple quick thoughts, however: I did NOT find Jade the least bit antagonistic to the South. I think that she merely gave Desidero's bombastic conflations, animosities, and pesonal attacks (especially his vitriolic comments) the whupping they richly deserved. if that is how Desidero must communicate, through hostility, profanity, and self-righteous but unwarranted indigation, then I think he is no longer TPMCafe material.

    that's just this old deep southerner's opinion, but I'm sticking by it. continue growing up, Desidero, along with our dear old Dixie (not the beer).


    by NewsNag (not verified) on Thu, 05/28/2009 - 1:20pm

    This sounds like the makings of a book to me. Go for it!


    by tlees2 (not verified) on Thu, 05/28/2009 - 1:45pm

    I just taught my history class about Burnside's sideburns the other day after we saw his picture on our DVD of Ken Burns's THE CIVIL WAR.


    by tlees2 (not verified) on Thu, 05/28/2009 - 1:51pm

    Desidero, spot me the nine ball and I'll play you for five bucks and a shot. I bet after about ten games we can tell stories that match anything here at TPMC. Just don't expect the same details twice, I don't have a good enough memory to tell the same lie a week later. I'll admit to one prejudice up front though, I won't shoot pool in any damned place that has air hockey.


    by A Guy Called Lulu (not verified) on Thu, 05/28/2009 - 2:02pm

    Good for you, Jade. Staebler's careless-to-reckless insult was not just sloppy, it was also gratuitous and revealed more about her than she would like. Even if she truly forgot to delete it from her piece, why wasn't her callow insult important enough to her to remember to erase it? I'll tell you why. It's because she and most antebellum daydreamers still to some degree carry chips on their shoulders. By the way, I was born in New Orleans, raised in Biloxi, and have lived in Texas for the last 30 years, spending 55 of my 57 years below Mason-Dixon.

    Reading her original piece, as well as the follow-up comments from my fellow southerners and her responses to them, reminded me of how much southerners in general tend to wear the victim chip on their shoulders, especially the ones who still romanticize even in a small way that long, brutal, and anything-but-glorious era in history. Should Germans take effervescent, ethereal pleasures in that grand period of their history from 1933 to 1945?

    There's a difference between loving the land and loving the perpetration of atrocities to be sure, but it's a difference most southerners ultimately have a difficult time completely splitting. Their love of the South so very often becomes inevitably conflated with love of Dixie, and therein lies the trap which the southerner both lays and gets caught in. It's subtle, but it's an obvious flaw easily detected by southerners who love the South but are not the least bit enamored or starstruck or beholden or whatever about Dixie.

    And, Staebler, despite real southern racial progress, let me say straight out that the majority of white southerners ARE STILL NOT FULLY RECONSTRUCTED: Witness the 2008 presidential election returns. Are you kidding me? A large majority of white southerners voted against Obama. They did this because he's black and because the modern Democratic Party has been the party of Civil Rights. To think otherwise is to have one's head in the sand. Look at the totals. That's still Dixie talking. It's the history. And anyone not blinded by the mythology of a genteel Southern tradition will see and admit that.

    So, Jade, I'm sorry that Staebler insulted you and everyone else of good faith. I suspect her hoop skirt and petticoat are showing, though just barely. And Staebler, the south may have some relaxed racial tensions now, but the underlying white animus against blacks is going strong.


    by NewsNag (not verified) on Thu, 05/28/2009 - 2:02pm

    Thank you for commenting, NewsNag. I have apologized to Jade for naming her specifically in my post and for accusing her, in particular, as one I perceive as being south-phobic. I originally wrote this to be a comment reply on her blog, but it took me so long to write it that her post disappeared. Posting this, then, as a standalone of my own, thereafter, I should have deleted the references to both Jade and to Desidero altogether. So, although it's a bit late, I will go back to Manage Entries and revise it this afternoon.
    I have an abiding affection for New Orleans where my mother's father went to law school, where my mother was born, and where I still have extended family. I hope you and yours weathered Katrina and its never ending aftermath without losing everything, including your minds and hopes for the future.
    I will look forward to reading your posts from now on.


    by wwstaebler (not verified) on Thu, 05/28/2009 - 2:04pm

    Thank you, TheraP. Praise from you -- someone whose principles never waver -- is high praise indeed.


    by wwstaebler (not verified) on Thu, 05/28/2009 - 2:07pm

    Thanks, Wendy for that moving portrait of your family. For what it's worth, I certainily didn't get the impression of a contest of whose relatives did this or that; just a well-written and succinct family story. I appreciate your taking the time to share it.


    by CVille Dem (not verified) on Thu, 05/28/2009 - 3:02pm

    BevD. I lived in Cincinnati for two years in the early 80's. And, there, I had two neighbors whose differing attitudes demonstrate that deeply-rooted prejudice, as well as achieved wisdom, exists everywhere.
    I forget what foreign flare-up occurred -- perhaps you will recall it -- but suddenly there was much waving of flags and many tough warmongering editorials, etc..
    I was struck by the fact that it was the young, modern mother of two who was seen and heard, screaming in her driveway, that any man who did not immediately go down to the local recruiting office to sign up for military service was no man at all -- that it was their duty as Americans "to go kill all those foreign bastards." Whereas, my other neighbor, the elderly woman who was born and raised in the neighborhood, and whose husband had been a policeman, commented to me, quietly, that all the uproar was a case in point of how conservative Cincinnati actually is, and has always been....
    To some degree, BevD, I can understand your distaste, and even your doubt in the veracity of some of the common themes that run through southern family histories. I had something of the same response to the theme of poor German immigrant makes good through hard slog despite all odds against him, or her, that I heard repeatedly in the Midwest.....perhaps because the stories were true, though redundant.


    by wwstaebler (not verified) on Thu, 05/28/2009 - 3:05pm

    I won't play pool in anyplace without beer or whiskey, which I think eliminates air hockey as well. Snooker's even better, then I don't have to worry about sinking the 8-ball. Don't know what Quinn will say, he gets testy about the subject, even though *technically* you shouldn't be allowed to body check your opponent in air hockey, and he's the only one I've seen with his own private penalty box.


    by Desidero (not verified) on Thu, 05/28/2009 - 3:07pm

    Interesting they certainly were, Mh20, but delightful? Depends on whose opinion was sought. To most family and friends, yes. To those who in the family and community who resented what they perceived as a cavalier ingratitude for a way of life they were supposed to quietly share, not so delightful. But I am proud of them that neither their convictions, nor their manners, ever wavered. I inherited the conviction part, but too often fail in the good manners department.


    by wwstaebler (not verified) on Thu, 05/28/2009 - 3:18pm

    What is the name of the book Bwak? I'd like to read it.


    by wwstaebler (not verified) on Thu, 05/28/2009 - 3:19pm

    I come from the school of thought that insists that very little progress has been made in human civilization. I am something of a loving misanthrope, but I come by it honest.

    What seems like progress in the modern lens should be tested using a thought experiment. Test society against a utopian future. Yes, it is a biased thought experiment, but the bias is deliberate. The reason is that we as a people always have much further to progress. And I don't mean progress in the imperial sense where the world becomes better because we have infested the world with our theoretically elite culture.

    The fact is we as a nation suffer the following problems:

    Wage slavery
    Lack of health care
    Cyclical poverty
    Violence
    Incarceration
    More than 10% of GDP invested in warfare
    Racism
    Intolerance
    Elitism
    Collusion of entertainment and information
    Declining education standards
    Drugs
    Escapism
    Ignorance

    There are many more words that can be used to describe this country. And there should be ZERO tolerance for relativistic statements about how far as a nation we have progressed. We haven't. For the level of wealth we have managed to generate via the wonders of capitalism, we have squandered this wealth and instead expanded our deadly footprint until it has covered the globe.

    So south, north, east, west, urban, suburban, whoever and wherever you may be, there is no room for some kind of comparison. We are all thick as thieves in this global mess. And while we take pot shots at one another for our specific regional misdeeds, we ignore the anterior problem that permeates our lives like oxygen. That problem is expansion and consumption and how the underlying enthymene of our perpetuates these two problems.

    So I suggest that we all put down our knives and be reasonable. Getting into cultural snipe fests gets us nowhere. It is like a Lutheran and a Methodist arguing over differences in dogma. I don't care if your grandma was Harriet Tubman or Jefferson Davis, we are all in this together. Those of us who have the freedom of intellect, wealth, or other trait that increases our mobility over the physical and abstract dimensions should help the less fortunate without pointing fingers.

    The fact is that human nature and human history is ugly and horrifying, and we should all be laboring towards a more pefect union, nor arguing of which union is less perfect.


    by Zipperupus (not verified) on Thu, 05/28/2009 - 3:43pm

    I do find it ironic that those who have ancestors who owned slaves can research genealogy stemming back several hundred years, while those who descended from slaves can only research their ancestors up to the boat they arrived on. That fact kind of gives the post a certain funny flavor, probably unintentional.


    by Zipperupus (not verified) on Thu, 05/28/2009 - 4:00pm

    Maybe it's because we have two parents, four grandparents, eight great-grandparents, 16 great-great-grandparents, etc.

    It's not that surprising that at least one of them can provide us with a good story — or a bad story, if we so desire. (Of course, the way family stories are told, the good stories are more apt to be passed on.)

    How is that different from Northerners? Wouldn't most of them also have familial stories that "demonstrates their lack of bigotry and their refined spirit of brotherhood"?

    We're not really so very different. To suggest otherwise seems to me just like another form of bigotry. I hope that's not what you were suggesting.


    by Nebton (not verified) on Thu, 05/28/2009 - 4:01pm

    I need to use preview. I have a pair of contractors banging on pipes behind me and my fingers are a little shaky.


    by Zipperupus (not verified) on Thu, 05/28/2009 - 4:05pm

    Sounds reasonable to me. Some here might argue, 'way too reasonable'. i.e. Never bring a knife to a gunfight. ;)


    by miguelitoh2o (not verified) on Thu, 05/28/2009 - 4:14pm

    I've always considered 'baggage' to be a euphemism for unresolved emotions with regard to our 'real life experience'.


    by miguelitoh2o (not verified) on Thu, 05/28/2009 - 4:19pm

    Southern music and pop art offers a plethora of comfortable identifaction with all things Dixie.

    I have seen white crossover rappers, but I have yet to see a black crossover country music sensation. The absence is as glaringly obvious as it is overlooked.


    by Zipperupus (not verified) on Thu, 05/28/2009 - 4:37pm

    Jeez Jade, are you self-inflating, or do you need some kinda special equipment to become that pompous?

    I know, I know, somebody called you "South phobic," pretty darned unfair. Except it was, of course, immediately following an entire post you'd done, slagging Des off by name 15 or 20 times, and casually accusing him of being an "apologist for slavery."

    But what really caught my attention in your comment here (and in your previous post), the sections that - to me - really said, "This... Is... Jade", were the lonnnnng lists of who you hate. Sorry, that was unfair. It's who you hate, can't cotton to, are intolerant of, have little patience for, and who you hate some more. It is SO cool the way you've thought so much about the degrees and types of dislike, and then make these lists, and we all get to guess who you think should be in which category.

    I'm just really anxious about it today though, you know? Is Jade gonna "not cotton" to me? Or maybe she'll exert herself and be "enthusiastically intolerant" of me? Damn - you have to admit - that'd be exciting!

    And oh the glory, my most fervent wish, to join the many (many) who have gone before me, to be chosen for...

    JADE'S SPECIAL HATE LIST.


    by quinn esq (not verified) on Thu, 05/28/2009 - 4:49pm

    William Faulkner skewered this pretension in Absalom, Absalom. I would actually hold that his body of work more or less undermines any and all Dixie pretensions.


    by Zipperupus (not verified) on Thu, 05/28/2009 - 4:53pm

    The Iceman Cometh.


    by Zipperupus (not verified) on Thu, 05/28/2009 - 5:01pm

    He's been through Ice Weasels, better be something more vicious.


    by Desidero (not verified) on Thu, 05/28/2009 - 5:12pm

    I can name two. Charlie Pride and Ray Robinson Charles.


    by 1849 (not verified) on Thu, 05/28/2009 - 5:17pm

    For the record, I like blogging with elbows, and generally have an easy time figuring out whether someone's trying to insult me or not, not that I particularly care, I'm more interested that they take the blogging subject at hand seriously enough to be either funny and witty or interesting. We all make mistakes, big deal, I sometime write what, 40,000 words a day, do I need to check every fact or rely on someone to pounce on the obvious ones? I'm more interested in figuring out some unique vantage point to the subject at hand, which I think Ms. Staebler managed to do here, despite some gripes about her sounding like typical white apologists. Okay, at minimum she's an adept apologist, more likely she's just trying to be interesting and I think succeeding - blame it on her relatives or milieu or whatever you need to.


    by Desidero (not verified) on Thu, 05/28/2009 - 5:23pm

    Don't forget Darius Rucker, who just recently crossed into the Land of Twang.


    by worthlesscitizen (not verified) on Thu, 05/28/2009 - 5:27pm

    NewsNag:
    I am surprised by the anger I perceive, or at least the degree of vehemence in your response, as none of my remarks to which you take exception were directed at you.
    Nonetheless, you've given me a few things to think about and to possibly reconsider. For example:
    I agree that the vote tallies throughout the deep south in November were depressing, though I was not particularly surprised, anymore than you were. Progress is, after all, only progress --
    I do think that we clearly saw some of that during the primary season. To me, the fact that Obama won the SC primary was cause for real celebration. It can only mean that not only African- American Democrats, but also white Democrats in large numbers (admittedly still a smaller demographic than one would wish) anted up. That, when confronted with a choice they've never faced before --up until now, after all, it's only been a choice about issues, as the presidential candidates were always either my white guy or your white guy -- this time, they had to decide whether it was the issues mattered, or the candidate's gender that mattered, or the color of the candidate's skin that mattered and, imo, they chose wisely. So, no matter what residual inner racist tendencies you may suspect them of harboring, they proved you wrong to the extent that they made the leap and voted, not only on the basis of issues, but for him, if against Hillary.
    What about the November results? You and I draw different conclusions about why the results turned out as they did.
    Even after reconsideration, I with your conclusion that the only, or at least the overwhelming explanation for those numbers was racially-based white hatred of Obama.
    That was one factor, yes, but not the only one by any measure. For example:
    Many of the conservative white people I know would not vote for any Democratic candidate, period -- of any color or gender -- so completely do they believe in one or more of the following:
    a) the economic policies promulgated by the Republicans -- in particular the "just say no to increased taxes" mantra;
    b) the abortion and gay marriage bans supported by the Republican fundamentalist base; born agains of my acquaintance -- whether white or African-American, btw -- get completely worked up over abortion and gay marriage;
    c) finally, there is the over-the-top patriot crowd, those who cannot distinguish between honoring our military and stopping an unwarranted war and bringing them home.
    Do you disagree with these points? If so, please say how and why.
    As to the anger or vehemence in your response:
    1) make all the assumptions you want to make about me, whether they are correct or incorrect. I find it curious, however, that you feel completely free to use a double standard:
    a) apparently you may hurl all the derisive" hoop skirt and petticoat" insults you please at me, but I am to refrain from saying, politely, that I think someone is southern-phobic, whether that is true, or only my perception. And,
    b) for the sake of parity in address, if you are going to address me as "Staebler" shall I address you as "Nag"?


    by wwstaebler (not verified) on Thu, 05/28/2009 - 5:55pm

    With no intent to be combative or argumentative, I think Jade has some legitimate points that people would do well to try and tune into better and make a real effort to understand. I don't think it's easy for most white people to do. Frankly, I think (and it's just a guess here since I can't speak for her)that she's probably been rather restrained and diplomatic in voicing her opinions on these matters.

    I honestly think that the self indulgent character of much of this discussion on the part of whites generally and southern whites particularly is just too much at times, is irritating and in some respects can be downright insulting or offensive.


    by oleeb (not verified) on Thu, 05/28/2009 - 6:35pm

    Thank you, BlueMeanie. I respect you and therefore, your opinion matters to me. Burnsides, eh? Hope you do not sport the look.


    by wwstaebler (not verified) on Thu, 05/28/2009 - 6:45pm

    The reasons these stories are told is because they illustrate the nature of change in a positive direction.

    What is clear to me is that both sticks and carrots are needed: carrots for the celebration of positive change and sticks of scorn for retrogressive positions. It is by expressing that scorn that we break the silence of good people and show that certain positions are simply not acceptable:= as you did with "I hate driving down a road on adjacent John's Island following a redneck truck with over-size tires, a gun rack, as well as a Confederate flag decal and a bumper sticker that, still in 2009, says: "Forget, hell." "

    There is a lovely MLK statement about the 'appalling silence of good people' being far more damaging that the clamor of bad ones. Thanks for breaking that.

    If the sticks are over done, you get people who close down and don't even try to see the other side's point of view. Kristoff has a good article on this in today's NYTs.


    by AJM (not verified) on Thu, 05/28/2009 - 6:54pm

    That was simply terrific. I really appreciate some of the thinking and writing I find here at TPM...

    Such candor and perspective... Thank you very much.


    by Ickyma (not verified) on Thu, 05/28/2009 - 8:11pm

    The details are a little off, but here ya go - confessions and amends and meeting John Lewis in DC, to apologize for beating him up 48 years earlier.

    Lewis was a class act, praising the man for his “raw courage.” He is one of my favorites in Congress.


    by seashell (not verified) on Thu, 05/28/2009 - 8:42pm

    Thank you, Dondi, although you have made me blush, not becoming in a woman of my age and stage.


    by wwstaebler (not verified) on Thu, 05/28/2009 - 10:50pm

    What are you talking about? Southern music has nothing to do with racism. That you couldn't think even of Charlie Pride makes it pretty obvious you know nothing about Country music.

    Most from the north don't even vaguely understand or appreciate Country music. You think it is simple, when it really is much more complex than say, the Beatles. I know you won't like this, but Elvis really could sing.

    If you ever listen closely to Country, you will find it has a great deal of humor. You are getting your leg pulled, and don't even know it.


    by Faroff (not verified) on Fri, 05/29/2009 - 1:00am

    Oh, yes, I forgot to explain why Country has nothing to do with racism. The only subjects covered by Country Music are: 1. Trains, dogs, and divorces. In that order. The all time hits usually cover all three.


    by Faroff (not verified) on Fri, 05/29/2009 - 1:03am

    For a Democrat to lose South Carolina by less than 10 points is significant. I think your assessment of Republican voter sentiment tracks accurately with the results.

    Race was as much a positive as it was a negative in a state that is nearly 40 percent African American. I canvassed deep-red, lily-white neighborhoods for Obama in October, and most of the folks I talked to wouldn't have voted for a Democratic candidate under any circumstances. Certainly race was an underlying factor, spoken or unspoken depending on who you were talking to. But the main drivers were taxes, "values" issues and defense.


    by bluemeanie (not verified) on Fri, 05/29/2009 - 2:17am

    If someone's grandma had been Jefferson Davis, this discussion would never have taken place.

    I suspect we have philosophical differences regarding the perfectibility of man, but no matter. Shaky fingers or no, your last sentence is a keeper. Thanks.


    by bluemeanie (not verified) on Fri, 05/29/2009 - 2:27am

    Thanks for an honest look at your family WW...I know it was not an easy one for you to write.

    If its any consolation, 1/2 my family was from Pascagoula Miss, the other 1/2 from Twin Falls, Idaho and they are ALL incredibly prejudiced. I submit that it is perhaps WORSE that the Idaho folks are, as they had no culturally ingrained reason to be...

    I rose above my upbringing, too.


    by stillidealistic (not verified) on Fri, 05/29/2009 - 3:18am

    The big question, if one is determined to make the Southern vote about race, is how did they vote the last few cycles? Did it change for Obama? Well, yes, it did, the Dems got more. I'm not buying that the southern votes were racially charged. I don't see data to support that. Quite the opposite. It trends the other way, though not by much, enough to win.


    by GregorZap (not verified) on Fri, 05/29/2009 - 6:14am

    I believe most of Idaho was "settled" by southerners fleeing the Dust Bowl, which is why many have southern drawls. Their parents were southerners. I guess having a racist heritage made it easy to displace the Natives as well.


    by GregorZap (not verified) on Fri, 05/29/2009 - 6:26am

    A fine essay - one my New Orleans-bred mother would've been proud to write. I'm late coming to this thread, but I feel lucky to have followed a recent reference on Deanie Mills' blog.

    Keep it up!


    by Tom Shepard (not verified) on Mon, 08/17/2009 - 6:55pm

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