Showing posts with label segregation. Show all posts
Showing posts with label segregation. Show all posts
Friday, July 5, 2019
Wednesday, July 8, 2015
Growing Up In the Race Divide (part 8)
One thing I've come to know is that you can't say you're from the South without automatically being linked to racism. It's a thing I hate, and it's, unfortunately, a thing that is almost completely legitimate. And it's not just racism, it's like all the "-ism"s. Or "-ist"s. And I don't want to switch this topic to sexual orientation, but I just want to point out that virtually all of the places that are acting like petulant children in regards to marriage equality are in the South.
Before I get to the issue of the Confederate flag, let's talk about why we're even talking about the Confederate flag: Dylann Roof.
Generally, I would not be one to talk about someone who has not been convicted of a crime as if he is guilty of the crime, but I think it's pretty safe to say that Roof is guilty of the nine murders at the church in Charleston, South Carolina. Actually, it's not even Roof I want to talk about. Roof stated quite plainly that he wanted to kill some black people, that he felt like it was up to him to do something about "it," whatever "it" was, and he went and did that. Even if they were so nice and welcoming to him that he almost changed his mind.
That Roof is a white supremacist and racist isn't in question.
What is in question is the racist tendencies of many people (Republican Presidential candidates) who responded to the attack by trying to call it something than what it actually was (a racially motivated mass shooting). So let's look at that:
Rick Perry, former governor of Texas and a Republican, called the shootings an "accident" and blamed the incident on drugs.
Mike Huckabee, former governor of Arkansas and a Republican, basically blamed the victims and said the incident could have been prevented if only they had been armed. Because, yes, the answer is always more guns.
Rick Santorum, another Republican presidential hopeful, called the attack an attack against freedom of religion and Christianity and not motivated by anything to do with race. He's not the only conservative to espouse this view and to call for more pastors to arm themselves for the coming war against religious freedom.
Rand Paul, another Republican hoping to become President, also blames religion, but he blames it on a lack of religion. If only we, as a nation, weren't so heathen and doing things like having children out of wedlock, then poor Roof wouldn't have done what he did. He fails to mention racial issues at all and conveniently overlooks that it's in religion and church that we retain the greatest segregation in America. In other words, churches are the greatest breeding places of racial hatred in the US.
Lindsey Graham, another Republican presidential hopeful (does this sound familiar yet?), seemed to echo Santorum's theory by saying that Roof was just out to kill Christians. It was just coincidence that he happened to kill black ones. [BULLSHIT]
I could go on but, really, what's the point? It's all more of the same and all Republicans trying to divert the issue.
Why?
That's actually a good question that boils down to only one real answer: They are okay with the status quo.
Now, there could be any number of reasons they're okay with the status quo. For instance, maybe they think racism is too big of an issue, too hard to deal with, and, so, they would rather pretend that everything is okay than to look at the issue. Looking at the issue means you have to do something about it. Or, maybe, they're okay with it for no better reason than that they are okay with it. As in, nothing needs to be better because there shouldn't be racial equality to begin with.
I don't know these guys personally, so I'm not going to try to guess. However, when someone is running a white supremacist website, professes a dislike for black people, and states his intent to kill some, then, when he does that, it's almost certainly (you know, like 99.99%) a racially motivated crime. Occam's Razor and all of that. To try and change the dialogue afterward is, at best, irresponsible.
All of which brings us to the issue of the Confederate flag.
Look, I am all for the 1st Amendment. Seriously. I will defend your right to be a racist asshole and spew racist assholery as quickly as I will defend my right to call you a racist asshole for saying racist assholery, that includes your right to have your own Confederate flag on your own property. However, I cannot be behind a state government being allowed to fly a symbol of racist assholery over a state capitol building. There is no "heritage" that excuses the government for making any kind of statement that supports racial hatred, and, I'm sorry, but the Confederate flag is a symbol of racial hatred. Just ask the neo-Nazi movement in Germany, who use the Confederate flag as their symbol because Nazi symbology is illegal.
Somewhere in my schooling, I picked up that the Confederate flag is a bad thing. Being schooled in the South, I'm not quite sure where I picked that up. It certainly wasn't a thing they tried to teach us. If it was, the Confederate flag wouldn't be so prevalent. And, yes, I did grow up watching The Dukes of Hazard, but that's as close as I got to any ties to that flag (and I'm sorry John Schneider -- I know it cuts into your income stream -- but I agree with the pulling of your show from TV).
One of my cousins (on my dad's side) and I, during high school, had frequent arguments about the Civil War. He hated Lincoln and the "war of Northern aggression." That's what he always called it and tried to make it about "states' rights," but the only "right" that was in question was the "right" to have slaves. Point being? We went to school in the same city and we both came through it with radically divergent views.
It's time to move past the Confederate flag. Or, to put it another way, it's time to lay the Confederate flag to rest. It's time for the government, including each individual state government, to get behind "all men are created equal." We can never expect the citizens to start believing in that while the leaders are still claiming racial hatred, through flying the Confederate flag, as a "heritage."
Before I get to the issue of the Confederate flag, let's talk about why we're even talking about the Confederate flag: Dylann Roof.
Generally, I would not be one to talk about someone who has not been convicted of a crime as if he is guilty of the crime, but I think it's pretty safe to say that Roof is guilty of the nine murders at the church in Charleston, South Carolina. Actually, it's not even Roof I want to talk about. Roof stated quite plainly that he wanted to kill some black people, that he felt like it was up to him to do something about "it," whatever "it" was, and he went and did that. Even if they were so nice and welcoming to him that he almost changed his mind.
That Roof is a white supremacist and racist isn't in question.
What is in question is the racist tendencies of many people (Republican Presidential candidates) who responded to the attack by trying to call it something than what it actually was (a racially motivated mass shooting). So let's look at that:
Rick Perry, former governor of Texas and a Republican, called the shootings an "accident" and blamed the incident on drugs.
Mike Huckabee, former governor of Arkansas and a Republican, basically blamed the victims and said the incident could have been prevented if only they had been armed. Because, yes, the answer is always more guns.
Rick Santorum, another Republican presidential hopeful, called the attack an attack against freedom of religion and Christianity and not motivated by anything to do with race. He's not the only conservative to espouse this view and to call for more pastors to arm themselves for the coming war against religious freedom.
Rand Paul, another Republican hoping to become President, also blames religion, but he blames it on a lack of religion. If only we, as a nation, weren't so heathen and doing things like having children out of wedlock, then poor Roof wouldn't have done what he did. He fails to mention racial issues at all and conveniently overlooks that it's in religion and church that we retain the greatest segregation in America. In other words, churches are the greatest breeding places of racial hatred in the US.
Lindsey Graham, another Republican presidential hopeful (does this sound familiar yet?), seemed to echo Santorum's theory by saying that Roof was just out to kill Christians. It was just coincidence that he happened to kill black ones. [BULLSHIT]
I could go on but, really, what's the point? It's all more of the same and all Republicans trying to divert the issue.
Why?
That's actually a good question that boils down to only one real answer: They are okay with the status quo.
Now, there could be any number of reasons they're okay with the status quo. For instance, maybe they think racism is too big of an issue, too hard to deal with, and, so, they would rather pretend that everything is okay than to look at the issue. Looking at the issue means you have to do something about it. Or, maybe, they're okay with it for no better reason than that they are okay with it. As in, nothing needs to be better because there shouldn't be racial equality to begin with.
I don't know these guys personally, so I'm not going to try to guess. However, when someone is running a white supremacist website, professes a dislike for black people, and states his intent to kill some, then, when he does that, it's almost certainly (you know, like 99.99%) a racially motivated crime. Occam's Razor and all of that. To try and change the dialogue afterward is, at best, irresponsible.
All of which brings us to the issue of the Confederate flag.
Look, I am all for the 1st Amendment. Seriously. I will defend your right to be a racist asshole and spew racist assholery as quickly as I will defend my right to call you a racist asshole for saying racist assholery, that includes your right to have your own Confederate flag on your own property. However, I cannot be behind a state government being allowed to fly a symbol of racist assholery over a state capitol building. There is no "heritage" that excuses the government for making any kind of statement that supports racial hatred, and, I'm sorry, but the Confederate flag is a symbol of racial hatred. Just ask the neo-Nazi movement in Germany, who use the Confederate flag as their symbol because Nazi symbology is illegal.
Somewhere in my schooling, I picked up that the Confederate flag is a bad thing. Being schooled in the South, I'm not quite sure where I picked that up. It certainly wasn't a thing they tried to teach us. If it was, the Confederate flag wouldn't be so prevalent. And, yes, I did grow up watching The Dukes of Hazard, but that's as close as I got to any ties to that flag (and I'm sorry John Schneider -- I know it cuts into your income stream -- but I agree with the pulling of your show from TV).
One of my cousins (on my dad's side) and I, during high school, had frequent arguments about the Civil War. He hated Lincoln and the "war of Northern aggression." That's what he always called it and tried to make it about "states' rights," but the only "right" that was in question was the "right" to have slaves. Point being? We went to school in the same city and we both came through it with radically divergent views.
It's time to move past the Confederate flag. Or, to put it another way, it's time to lay the Confederate flag to rest. It's time for the government, including each individual state government, to get behind "all men are created equal." We can never expect the citizens to start believing in that while the leaders are still claiming racial hatred, through flying the Confederate flag, as a "heritage."
Monday, March 30, 2015
Growing Up In the Race Divide (part 3)
One of the worst things about growing up in the South was learning that the last place where racism should exist was often the first place you'd find it: at church. And you wouldn't just find it there; racism was subtlety built into the structure of whole denominations. It was pervasive in that same way where you don't notice a bad smell when you've been around it too long. You can only notice it if you step away and come back or if someone points it out and you put some effort into smelling the thing they're talking about. Not that a lack of racial integration is true of churches just in the South; it's true of churches in general. As Joshua DuBois recently said, "Right now, 11:00 am on Sunday morning is the most segregated hour in America." And it's better now than when I was a kid.
When I was a kid...
There were no black people who lived on my street. However, if I went around my block to the next street, it was all black. Well, there may have been what was referred to as "white trash," which I didn't understand any better than I had understood "porch monkeys." The only point of context I had for the term was that there was a kid in my grade, John Spain, who was really mean and constantly in trouble and my mom used to tell me to just ignore him because he was "just white trash," so, in my mind, "white trash" meant "bully," not someone who shared the same socioeconomic position as, say, the black people on the street behind mine. [I say behind because it was the block behind my house, not the next block over in front of my house.]
And there was a marked difference between my street and the street behind my house. All of the houses on my block had nice, green lawns, even the house that was mostly unlived in. There were no cars on any of the lawns or broken bikes or toys. And there wasn't any trash. I mean actual trash, garbage, which tended to pile up at the curbs on the street behind mine. Most importantly, I suppose, at least to the people on my street, there were no black people. Ever.
Which was a problem, because I had a friend who lived on the street behind mine, and he was not allowed to come over to my house to play. I think, actually, that was more his mom than mine. There was this one time when I wanted him to come to my house and, when his mother said no, he protested, and she started whipping his butt right there and dragging him into the house. [That was not necessarily uncommon no matter what color you were.] I don't think either of us ever brought that up again.
At some point, I wanted to invite him to church with me (I think around 3rd grade), and, because it came up when I was with him, I just asked him. Without checking with my mother first. That was probably a mistake. I ran home to ask my mom; he went inside to ask his mom. His mom actually said yes; mine did not. She told me she didn't think it would be a good idea. I, of course, didn't understand why it wouldn't be a good idea.
Now, she did actually make an attempt to explain it to me. But it didn't make sense to me. See, there were actually two black kids in my church. A boy in my grade and his younger sister. They were it, though, in a church of 1200-1500. Not that I was aware of the numbers. I pointed out to my mom that, look, there were these two other kids, but she could only tell me that they were a special circumstance, something which I never found out the why of even when I was good friends with both of them later in high school.
However, I do think that my mother was probably, actually correct in her assessment of it not being a good idea. That wasn't something I understand until I was in high school, though, and which I'll talk about next time. All I knew at the time was that I had to walk back around the corner to his house and tell him he couldn't come. I had to crush his excitement (and he was excited) by saying no. It was one of the hardest, longest walks I've ever made, It was just a trip around the block, but, to my 3rd grade self, it was like walking to an execution.
Which it was, in a way, because that was the beginning of the end of our friendship. It just wasn't the same after that. I don't know if it was just me or if it was both of us, but it felt like something broke when I had to tell him that he couldn't come after all. And he wanted to know why, and all I had was, "It's not a good idea." What a horrible phrase, that.
When I was a kid...
There were no black people who lived on my street. However, if I went around my block to the next street, it was all black. Well, there may have been what was referred to as "white trash," which I didn't understand any better than I had understood "porch monkeys." The only point of context I had for the term was that there was a kid in my grade, John Spain, who was really mean and constantly in trouble and my mom used to tell me to just ignore him because he was "just white trash," so, in my mind, "white trash" meant "bully," not someone who shared the same socioeconomic position as, say, the black people on the street behind mine. [I say behind because it was the block behind my house, not the next block over in front of my house.]
And there was a marked difference between my street and the street behind my house. All of the houses on my block had nice, green lawns, even the house that was mostly unlived in. There were no cars on any of the lawns or broken bikes or toys. And there wasn't any trash. I mean actual trash, garbage, which tended to pile up at the curbs on the street behind mine. Most importantly, I suppose, at least to the people on my street, there were no black people. Ever.
Which was a problem, because I had a friend who lived on the street behind mine, and he was not allowed to come over to my house to play. I think, actually, that was more his mom than mine. There was this one time when I wanted him to come to my house and, when his mother said no, he protested, and she started whipping his butt right there and dragging him into the house. [That was not necessarily uncommon no matter what color you were.] I don't think either of us ever brought that up again.
At some point, I wanted to invite him to church with me (I think around 3rd grade), and, because it came up when I was with him, I just asked him. Without checking with my mother first. That was probably a mistake. I ran home to ask my mom; he went inside to ask his mom. His mom actually said yes; mine did not. She told me she didn't think it would be a good idea. I, of course, didn't understand why it wouldn't be a good idea.
Now, she did actually make an attempt to explain it to me. But it didn't make sense to me. See, there were actually two black kids in my church. A boy in my grade and his younger sister. They were it, though, in a church of 1200-1500. Not that I was aware of the numbers. I pointed out to my mom that, look, there were these two other kids, but she could only tell me that they were a special circumstance, something which I never found out the why of even when I was good friends with both of them later in high school.
However, I do think that my mother was probably, actually correct in her assessment of it not being a good idea. That wasn't something I understand until I was in high school, though, and which I'll talk about next time. All I knew at the time was that I had to walk back around the corner to his house and tell him he couldn't come. I had to crush his excitement (and he was excited) by saying no. It was one of the hardest, longest walks I've ever made, It was just a trip around the block, but, to my 3rd grade self, it was like walking to an execution.
Which it was, in a way, because that was the beginning of the end of our friendship. It just wasn't the same after that. I don't know if it was just me or if it was both of us, but it felt like something broke when I had to tell him that he couldn't come after all. And he wanted to know why, and all I had was, "It's not a good idea." What a horrible phrase, that.
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