Wiley, hackneyed ugly stereotype
Mike Marshall
The KKK could barely get 7 guys together at a recent
convention (in New York City, which is not in the South
by the way) and one of them got beat up by a by-stander.
All I can figure is you, and whoever wrote "Oh Brother Where Art
Thou", and the rest of the lame Southern bashers have a
pathological need to spit in someone's face. If there's some
other point, please correct me.
-Mike http://hubcap.clemson.edu/~hubcap (good natured North/South humor)
Carl Fink
In article <9ihpk1$dkr$1...@hubcap.clemson.edu>, Mike Marshall wrote:
> Wiley, you post here sometimes, so maybe you'll read this...
>
> The KKK could barely get 7 guys together at a recent
> convention (in New York City, which is not in the South
> by the way) and one of them got beat up by a by-stander.
>
> All I can figure is you, and whoever wrote "Oh Brother Where Art
> Thou", and the rest of the lame Southern bashers have a
> pathological need to spit in someone's face. If there's some
> other point, please correct me.
Mike, did you really want to declare Klansmen an emblem of the South,
or seem to regret that the Klan is small and weak now?
--
Carl Fink ca...@dm.net
I-Con's Science and Technology Programming
<http://www.iconsf.org>
ronniecat
news:slrn9kp0i2...@panix2.panix.com...
> Mike, did you really want to declare Klansmen an emblem of the South,
> or seem to regret that the Klan is small and weak now?
Well, in Mike's defense, it seems to be Wiley who is specifically declaring
the Klansman an emblem of the south. The comic's caption refers to "Bubba's"
Klan robes as "Southern Pride Formal Wear". That's a pretty broad brush he's
painting with.
If anyone hasn't seen it it's at http://www.non-sequitur.net/ (choose July
11 2001 in the date selection boxes if you're reading following the link
after that date).
I'm not just saying this, but I thought the strip was really hilarious -
*until* I realized the right-hand portion was a continuation of the comic
and read the caption. The left-hand bit stood on its own as a very funny
panel, I thought. The caption was too heavy-handed - changed Wiley's weapon
for skewering racists from a stiletto to a board with a nail in it.
ronnie
--
"The only reason for being a professional writer is that you just can't help
it." -- Leo Rosten
*Return address munged to foil spambots. Remove my collar to reply.*
Michael Alan Chary
Carl Fink <ca...@panix.com> wrote:
>I'm going to have to quote a lot for context, sorry.
>
>In article <9ihpk1$dkr$1...@hubcap.clemson.edu>, Mike Marshall wrote:
>
>> Wiley, you post here sometimes, so maybe you'll read this...
>>
>> The KKK could barely get 7 guys together at a recent
>> convention (in New York City, which is not in the South
>> by the way) and one of them got beat up by a by-stander.
>>
>> All I can figure is you, and whoever wrote "Oh Brother Where Art
>> Thou", and the rest of the lame Southern bashers have a
>> pathological need to spit in someone's face. If there's some
>> other point, please correct me.
>
>Mike, did you really want to declare Klansmen an emblem of the South,
>or seem to regret that the Klan is small and weak now?
Hey, the Klan is healthy here in Indiana. (I help them get the right to
march places when I'm not helping to get rid of the ten commandents on
public grounds. Long Live the ACLU!)
--
"There are only two kinds of food: good and bad. Also, all of life's big
problems include the words "indictment" or "inoperable." Everything else is
small stuff." - Alton C. Brown
In Memoriam Douglas Adams, 1952-2001 "Belgium, man, Belgium!"
Mike Marshall
>Mike, did you really want to declare Klansmen an emblem of the South,
>or seem to regret that the Klan is small and weak now?
http://snow.utoronto.ca/Learn2/mod6/readcomp.html
-Mike
the Selectric gentle mystery boy
> The KKK could barely get 7 guys together at a recent
> convention (in New York City, which is not in the South
> by the way) and one of them got beat up by a by-stander.
Since Wiley was saying the Klan was particularly strong in the South,
you aren't really proving your point by talking about how the Klan is
weak in the North.
a
"ok. i shall cloak myself and cause problems at the donut shop."
- Anton Barbeau
Carl Fink
> Hey, the Klan is healthy here in Indiana. (I help them get the right to
> march places when I'm not helping to get rid of the ten commandents on
> public grounds. Long Live the ACLU!)
Hey, I've been a member of the ACLU for over 20 years. Here in New
York we're defending a guy who was arrested and imprisoned *for
writing a mean letter to a Borough President*.
--
Carl Fink ca...@dm.net
Jason Furness
>convention (in New York City, which is >not in the South
>by the way) and one of them got beat up >by a by-stander.
Whoopee!! ^__^
_________________________
-http://pixelated.purrsia.com
Robert D
controversy over the use of the Confederate flag as a symbol of "southern
pride". The fact is that there are large numbers of southerners who refuse to
acknowledge the evil that lies behind that symbol or the effect it has on
Americans of color.
Robert D.
"Your two dollar shoes hurt my feet"--Woody Guthrie
D Olz
recent
controversy over the use of the Confederate flag as a symbol of "southern
pride". The fact is that there are large numbers of southerners who refuse to
acknowledge the evil that lies behind that symbol or the effect it has on
Americans of color.
>>
Here in Virginia we recently had a special election for a congressional seat
that came open when the congressman passed on. It was reported that at a
county fair where both candidates were canvassing for votes that people wearing
a badge supporting the Confederate Battle flag wouldn't even make eye contact
with Democrat candidate, who was a black woman.
Olz
"As a people we are great, as a nation we are great, its just as individuals
that we stink."
Pat Paulsen 1968 Presidential campaign
Mike Marshall
>The strip, which I thought was hilarious, was no doubt inspired by the recent
>controversy over the use of the Confederate flag as a symbol of "southern
>pride". The fact is that there are large numbers of southerners who refuse to
>acknowledge the evil that lies behind that symbol or the effect it has on
>Americans of color.
There is no evil associated with the Confederate Flag, a symbol
of Liberty and Independence. "Americans of color" don't all
look alike, and they don't all have the same opinions about
the Confederate Flag.
William H. Hathaway
>
> Carl Fink <ca...@panix.com> wrote in message
> news:slrn9kp0i2...@panix2.panix.com...
>
> > Mike, did you really want to declare Klansmen an emblem of the South,
> > or seem to regret that the Klan is small and weak now?
>
> Well, in Mike's defense, it seems to be Wiley who is specifically declaring
> the Klansman an emblem of the south. The comic's caption refers to "Bubba's"
> Klan robes as "Southern Pride Formal Wear". That's a pretty broad brush he's
> painting with.
>
> If anyone hasn't seen it it's at http://www.non-sequitur.net/ (choose July
> 11 2001 in the date selection boxes if you're reading following the link
> after that date).
>
> I'm not just saying this, but I thought the strip was really hilarious -
> *until* I realized the right-hand portion was a continuation of the comic
> and read the caption. The left-hand bit stood on its own as a very funny
> panel, I thought. The caption was too heavy-handed - changed Wiley's weapon
> for skewering racists from a stiletto to a board with a nail in it.
>
Thanks for supplying the URL to see it. I get the print version of
the Wash Post and would have missed it.
FWIW, I don't recall ever seeing a picture of a Klan costume that included
the mulletted St. Andrew's cross (the central part of the Confederate
battle flag.) The silly pointed cap is the symbol to suggest the Klan.
So this looked to me like a combo of two distinct (though sometimes
overlapping) symbols, which sort of muddles the message, IMO. For those
who don't know, the Klan originally claimed to be the ghosts of Confederate
soldiers killed in battle, come back to haunt, frighten and harrass the
newly freed. There are things that southern Americans can be proud of
(progress since the 1950's say), but that ugly chapter of history ain't
one of them.
Wonder if there would have been a discussion about this day's strip if the
caption had been more subtle. I'm guessing the editor's of the W.Post
didn't want to find out.
Czaerana
>All I can figure is you, and whoever wrote "Oh Brother Where Art
>Thou", and the rest of the lame Southern bashers
I'm a Southerner and loved "O Brother, Where Art Thou"...
Cynthia
Chris Clarke
hub...@hubcap.clemson.edu (Mike Marshall) wrote:
> There is no evil associated with the Confederate Flag, a symbol
> of Liberty
(for certain obsolete definitions of "Liberty" which included the right
to own other people as chattel property)
> and Independence. "Americans of color" don't all
> look alike, and they don't all have the same opinions about
> the Confederate Flag.
So who says we're supposed to base our opinions on what people of color
think? Seems awfully Politically Correct of you to suggest we should,
Mike. I don't change my opinions about race just because I occasionally
force myself to read Thomas Sowell, for instance.
The "Civil War was about defending States' Rights against Federal
Tyranny" story is a post-bellum invention of people like Nathan Bedford
Forrest. No one in the Confederacy had any illusions that they were
defending freedom. Here's a useful cite, even though it's part of the
obviously Socialist New York Review of (Each Other's) Books:
http://www.nybooks.com/nyrev/WWWarchdisplay.cgi?20010412028R
None of this should be construed as disagreeing with your original
point, Mike: the South is the birthplace of ther Klan, but also of SNCC
and the Great Speckled Bird. And the North definitely has more than its
its share of reactionary loons.
But if you think the South is unchivalrously burdened with stereotypes,
try being a Californian for just one lifetime. I'm just like, totally,
all y'know? I mean GAG me.
- Chris
Mike Marshall
>Here in Virginia we recently had a special election for a congressional seat
>that came open when the congressman passed on. It was reported that at a
>county fair where both candidates were canvassing for votes that people wearing
>a badge supporting the Confederate Battle flag wouldn't even make eye contact
>with Democrat candidate, who was a black woman.
That's an interesting story. I wonder if it has any basis? If it does,
I wonder if the voter's distaste for the democrat was based on
her blackness, or her politics? Perhaps she emits lots of anti-Confederate
rhetoric? If you had even her last name (she does really exist, right?)
I could check on some of that for you.
I wouldn't walk on the same side of the street as our black Senator Jackson,
who has gone out of his way to make himself my political enemy. What
does that prove?
-Mike
D Olz
-Mike>>
It was reported in The Washington Post. As to what it proves, perhaps
nothing. However; it sure reinforces the idea that supports of the Confederate
Battle flag are bigoted.
Robert D
well, several weeks anyway.
hubcap(snip):
<< There is no evil associated with the Confederate Flag, a symbol
of Liberty and Independence. >>
Robert D.
Steven Rowe
>hub...@hubcap.clemson.edu (Mike Marshall) wrote:
>
>> There is no evil associated with the Confederate Flag, a symbol
>> of Liberty
We could argue about the so-called Confederate Flag (isn't it really the flag
of the Army of Tennesee?), but to say there is no evil associated with the
so-called c flag is ridiculous. I don't know how old Mike is, but to those of
us who recall the 50s and early 60s, it was certainly carried by every Klan
group I ever saw in South Carolina (where I was born and still live). And
those guys were not advocating liberty and independence for anyone but
themselves.
Historically speaking, the Klan ended in the 1880s, was reborn in the 1910s
and had it's heyday in the mid-west 1920s. It was resurrectedas a mainly
southern group in the 1950s, and is mostly gone now, (except as symbols in
cartoons). Now, the south shares the same neo-Nazi groups as the rest of
the country.
steven rowe
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
---------------------------------
Don't forget to Delete "Unspam" if you wish to e- mail me.
join the FelixTheCat list at www.egroups.com
.
Carl Fink
> There is no evil associated with the Confederate Flag, a symbol
> of Liberty and Independence.
Speaking as a Jew: it's equivalent to the swastika.
--
Carl Fink ca...@dm.net
Dan Kimmel
news:9iidhd$ap4$1...@hubcap.clemson.edu...
> do...@aol.commsn.com (D Olz) writes:
> >Here in Virginia we recently had a special election for a congressional
seat
> >that came open when the congressman passed on. It was reported that at a
> >county fair where both candidates were canvassing for votes that people
wearing
> >a badge supporting the Confederate Battle flag wouldn't even make eye
contact
> >with Democrat candidate, who was a black woman.
>
> That's an interesting story. I wonder if it has any basis? If it does,
> I wonder if the voter's distaste for the democrat was based on
> her blackness, or her politics? Perhaps she emits lots of anti-Confederate
> rhetoric? If you had even her last name (she does really exist, right?)
> I could check on some of that for you.
And that's a negative thing? Looks like the South STILL isn't ready for
self-government.
The Civil War is over. The South *lost*. Get over it.
Dan Kimmel
The Confederate Flag is a symbol of hate and treason. The folks favoring
Liberty and Independence *defeated* the rebels.
Here it is, the 21st century, and there are still people who think the Civil
War is still going on. Amazing.
Peter B. Steiger
> Here's a useful cite, even though it's part of the
>obviously Socialist New York Review of (Each Other's) Books:
>
>http://www.nybooks.com/nyrev/WWWarchdisplay.cgi?20010412028R
That is EXCELLENT! My wife, raised a southern belle in Florida,
sticks with the "states' rights" story; I wonder if there's any chance
this article will open her eyes.
Peter B. Steiger
Cheyenne, WY
----
If you reply by email, send it to pbs at com dot
canada (or vice-versa). All advertisements will be
returned to your postmaster, eh!
Thomas Galloway
Carl Fink <ca...@panix.com> wrote:
>In article <9iicbh$95f$1...@hubcap.clemson.edu>, Mike Marshall wrote:
>> There is no evil associated with the Confederate Flag, a symbol
>> of Liberty and Independence.
>Speaking as a Jew: it's equivalent to the swastika.
While I'm not a supporter of the Confederate flag, especially as officially
used as part of a state flag, having grown up in the south I wouldn't go
so far as to say it's a swastika equivalent.
Keep in mind that as an aftereffect of the Civil War, and until air
conditioning was in widespread use, the south was considered backwards
and a lesser, unsophisticated, region of the country. As an example,
look at when major league baseball franchises entered the region (back
when baseball was *the* american sport, such was a good indicator of how
major a city was). Even with the travel difficulties, California got
franchises before anywhere in the south. And for quite a while, Atlanta
and Houston were the only southern franchises.
I think because of this, there was a tendency to have a stronger than usual
sense of region, still something of a sense of "us against the world". And
a useful symbol of that attitude was the confederate flag.
As noted, this has changed considerably in the last 35-40 years with the
rise of the sun belt and southern states showing a net immigration as
opposed to a net emmigration. But, for some people, the remains of this
attitude is what attracts them to the confederate flag for the most part,
not necessarily racism. On the other hand, there are quite a few racist
rednecks for whom that is the attraction of the confederate flag. So it's
a bit more of a mix than the use of the swastika as a comparison would
indicate.
I can't think of anyone who considers it a symbol of "liberty and independence"
though.
tyg t...@panix.com
Dan Kimmel
"Thomas Galloway" <t...@panix.com> wrote in message
news:9ijd7u$dp7$1...@panix6.panix.com...
> In article <slrn9kq39e...@panix2.panix.com>,
> Carl Fink <ca...@panix.com> wrote:
> >In article <9iicbh$95f$1...@hubcap.clemson.edu>, Mike Marshall wrote:
> >> There is no evil associated with the Confederate Flag, a symbol
> >> of Liberty and Independence.
> >Speaking as a Jew: it's equivalent to the swastika.
>
> While I'm not a supporter of the Confederate flag, especially as
officially
> used as part of a state flag, having grown up in the south I wouldn't go
> so far as to say it's a swastika equivalent.
>
> Keep in mind that as an aftereffect of the Civil War, and until air
> conditioning was in widespread use, the south was considered backwards
> and a lesser, unsophisticated, region of the country.
Looking at who they send to Congress -- Dick Armey, Tom DeLay, Phil Gramm,
Trent Lott -- and the goofball in the White House, I'd have to say it still
is.
Steven Rowe
writes:
> think because of this, there was a tendency to have a stronger than usual
>sense of region, still something of a sense of "us against the world". And
>a useful symbol of that attitude was the confederate flag.
>
>As noted, this has changed considerably in the last 35-40 years with the
>rise of the sun belt and southern states showing a net immigration as
>opposed to a net emmigration
yeah, certainly during the 1910s-1930s, the south's population actually shrank,
as people headed to the big cities for job oportunities (thus leading to
increase in both recorded blues and mountain music). There was a fascinating
article in the Columbia SC "State" newspaper last year, tracing the modern
history of the so-called confederate flag, and when it became the symbol of the
south. They cited it's rise in popularity (and the decrease in popularity of
the countless other flags of the confederacy) with the re-issues of "Gone With
The Wind".
Mike Marshall
>I'm a Southerner and loved "O Brother, Where Art Thou"...
Ah, but you probably didn't feel personally lampooned by the
half-hitler/half-keystone kop kkk cliche. The Ridicule of people
who wouldn't consider letting the Confederate flag touch
the ground, and who speak about the Confederacy in terms of
heritage, wasn't lost on the movies producers. The movie
came out right when Mississippi was voting as to whether to
keep the Confederate flag as part of their official state flag.
2/3's of the citizens of Mississippi voted to keep the flag.
I wonder, do you know anything about what your family was
doing in 1864?
-Mike "this thing's too off topic to post..."
Mike Marshall
>I can't think of anyone who considers it a symbol of "liberty and independence"
>though.
The Confederates spoke of it that way. I think so. Thousands of
members of the Sons of Confederate Veterans think so. Apparently
2/3's of the voters in Mississippi think so.
-Mike
Mike Marshall
>For those
>who don't know, the Klan originally claimed to be the ghosts of Confederate
>soldiers killed in battle, come back to haunt, frighten and harrass the
>newly freed. There are things that southern Americans can be proud of
>(progress since the 1950's say), but that ugly chapter of history ain't
>one of them.
During the Reconstruction-era kkk activity in South Carolina,
the federal government supported an all black state militia
under carpetbag governor R.K.Scott. The federal government
pitted the races against one another. It was an ugly
chapter in American history, not just Southern American
history. Lest you accuse me of gleaning that information
from National Enquirer, check any source, including:
The Great South Carolina Ku Klux Klan Trials
Lou Falkner Williams
University of Georgia press, 1996
-Mike "This was on topic when I was complaining about wiley's cartoon"
William H. Hathaway
As at least one other poster mentioned, there were many other flags
used by the Confederacy - the one most people think of is the battle
flag (which itself had variations - square 'jack', rectangular,
varying number of stars, etc.). Some units used their own designs
which took many forms. At least three different designs were
used for the 'civil' aspects of the attempt to form a country
(mostly because the designs were flawed.)
Perhaps someone more expert on the history of that conflict can
verify or refute whether or not the followed occurred.
Was it not the policy and practice of soldiers serving under
those battle flags, that when a soldier of the opposing force
was captured, if that soldier was white, he was treated as
a prisoner of war (held, guarded (sometimes by black guards),
paroled, exchanged, or kept in prison camps), but if that soldier
was black, he was immediately murdered on the spot?
People remember such policy and most continue to consider it evil.
Those who have favorable opinions about those flags have shown
reluctance to address this concern.
If that conflict was about liberty, it was about who was going
to have it when the war was over. Or who would finally achieve
a small measure of it after Reconstruction, decades of renewed
oppression and continued resistance to this day.
William H. Hathaway
Reconstruction was indeed a shameful episode in American history.
Most people learned about it in school or from elders. Or should have.
Perhaps it's time to resolve the problems rather than let them fester
for centuries like one of the ancient conflicts of the Old World.
William H. Hathaway
>
> czae...@aol.com (Czaerana) writes:
> >I'm a Southerner and loved "O Brother, Where Art Thou"...
>
> Ah, but you probably didn't feel personally lampooned by the
> half-hitler/half-keystone kop kkk cliche. The Ridicule of people
> who wouldn't consider letting the Confederate flag touch
> the ground, and who speak about the Confederacy in terms of
> heritage, wasn't lost on the movies producers. The movie
> came out right when Mississippi was voting as to whether to
> keep the Confederate flag as part of their official state flag.
> 2/3's of the citizens of Mississippi voted to keep the flag.
>
Perhaps 2/3's of those who voted - I doubt if the turn-out
of all citizens approached 66%. And I assume those who didn't
bother to vote (or weren't allowed) care much one way or the
other.
Mike Marshall
>(for certain obsolete definitions of "Liberty" which included the right
>to own other people as chattel property)
Liberty and Independence don't have obsolete definitions. Amendments
to our Constitution has, though, caused there to be obsolete definitions
of who can and cannot be a United States Citizen. Incremental improvements
to our society (blacks have the franchise, and protection under the
law) don't necessarily have to be accompanied by destructive
witch hunts. If y'all think we need to be witch hunted, though,
it is your choice.
Wiley has responded WRT the cartoon. To him that cartoon represents
me and the other thousands of members of the Sons of Confederate Veterans
perfectly. He says he thinks we need to change our evil ways.
>So who says we're supposed to base our opinions on what people of color
>think?
That other poster. Not me.
>The "Civil War was about defending States' Rights against Federal
>Tyranny" story is a post-bellum invention of people like Nathan Bedford
>Forrest.
You mean Jubal Early. If you're going to repeat the lost-cause-myth-myth,
get your attributions right.
>No one in the Confederacy had any illusions that they were
>defending freedom.
You have not read much that they said or wrote, I take it.
>But if you think the South is unchivalrously burdened with stereotypes,
>try being a Californian for just one lifetime. I'm just like, totally,
>all y'know? I mean GAG me.
My aunt was a Californian, and a nurse, for the last 50 years
of her life. When I visited her a few years ago, she still
displayed a Confederate flag in her kitchen. Her other (native)
Californian nephew warned her not to put the flag in her car lest
it be vandalized, or worse, she might be targeted for violence.
You're right, California, I mean GAG me...
-Mike
Carl Fink
> I think because of this, there was a tendency to have a stronger than usual
> sense of region, still something of a sense of "us against the world". And
> a useful symbol of that attitude was the confederate flag.
And this is different from how Germany felt after World War One how?
Defeated power, considered barbaric (partly because of what is now
acknowledged to be utterly false propaganda, in the case of Germany),
etc. You don't see the parallel?
--
Carl Fink webm...@darkspawn.com
DARKSPAWN, the first epic vampire fantasy
<http://www.darkspawn.com/>
Carl Fink
> During the Reconstruction-era kkk activity in South Carolina,
> the federal government supported an all black state militia
> under carpetbag governor R.K.Scott. The federal government
> pitted the races against one another. It was an ugly
> chapter in American history, not just Southern American
> history. Lest you accuse me of gleaning that information
> from National Enquirer, check any source, including:
Just out of curiosity: do you expect any book that uses phrases like
"carpetbag government" to be thought of as objective history, as
opposed to pro-Jim Crow, pro-racist propaganda?
Or is that phrase your own addition?
--
Carl Fink ca...@dm.net
Mike Marshall
>We could argue about the so-called Confederate Flag
We could, but this is a comics newsgroup. I'm to blame for this,
since I started it, though I was talking about a comic. Remember
this recent post:
* Sherwood Harrington
* It is a moderate group, though... one of the reasons I like it.
>I don't know how old Mike is, but to those of
>us who recall the 50s and early 60s, it was certainly carried by every Klan
>group I ever saw in South Carolina (where I was born and still live).
I was born in SC in 1957. I know details of South Carolina history that
cause me not only to know how things were in 1957, but I know
how they got that way.
>And those guys were not advocating liberty and independence for anyone but
>themselves.
Right. The main building on Clemson University Campus is Tillman Hall.
There's also a Tillman Hall dominating Winthrop University, in Rock Hill
South Carolina. Pitchfork Ben Tillman was our governor in South
Carolina, some 15 years or so after the Reconstruction government had
been run out. During Ben Tillman's first Inaugural address he denounced
``the carpetbagger vampires and baser native traitors'', and refered to
the blacks as their tool. ``The whites have absolute control of the
State Government, and we intend at any and all hazards, to retain it.''
The time for Tillman's admonition has passed. It passed very visibly
in the 1960's. If society wants to get rid of the Confederate flag,
though, they need to tear down the Tillman Halls, too. And we all
probably need to deed any property holdings we might have to the
residents of the nearest Indian reservation.
> Historically speaking, the Klan ended in the 1880s,
1870's.
The masked night riders of South Carolina's Ku Klux Klan believed
that they rode to protect themselves, their womenfolk, local
customs, and the right to constitutional government as they
understood it from encroaching outside authority. The unprecedented
wave of violence they sustained was for the sake of
honor and tradition.
If many South Carolinians believed the Klan's methods too extreme,
with violence inexorably breeding more violence, they nevertheless
agreed that the organization's purpose was a necessary reaffirmation
of local values in the face of imminent danger...
The Great South Carolina Ku Klux Klan Trials
Lou Falkner Williams
UGA press, 1996
>was reborn in the 1910s and had it's heyday in the mid-west 1920s.
This version was not "a Southern thing".
>It was resurrectedas a mainly southern group in the 1950s,
Everything, including the Klan and the Flag, that had ever been used,
or had been effective at all as a rallying point for Southern
Unity was used in the 50's and 60's as a response to federal
political and military meddling into Southern affairs. I admit
that whatever else these pesky outside agitators were responsible
for, they were partly responsible black people being able to
vote and having protection under the law. The importance of
black people being able to vote and having protection under the law
far outshadows the importance of wiley's indiscretion. Nevertheless,
wiley's mean-spirited cartoon is the topic I bring to the table in
this cartoon newsgroup.
-Mike
Mike Marshall
>And that's a negative thing? Looks like the South STILL isn't ready for
>self-government.
I, a law abiding, tax paying, property owning voter, disagree.
You're all talk, I can tell.
>The Civil War is over. The South *lost*. Get over it.
I didn't draw the cartoon.
-Mike "way over it"
Mike Marshall
>bother to vote (or weren't allowed) care much one way or the
Either this is a very serious allegation, or you're making a point
about my previous witch-hunt statement. I suspect the latter.
-Mike
Mike Marshall
>those battle flags, that when a soldier of the opposing force
>was captured, if that soldier was white, he was treated as
>a prisoner of war (held, guarded (sometimes by black guards),
>paroled, exchanged, or kept in prison camps), but if that soldier
>was black, he was immediately murdered on the spot?
No, that was not an offical policy. It was an official policy of
the Confederate government that there was a death penalty for
insurrectional slaves. To avoid trivializing even one man's
death, let me just point out that the policy was not actively
pursued. Confederate Soldiers sometimes fought under a black
flag (no quarter), when faced with USCT. Some claim there
was a "massacre" at a place called Fort Pillow, where black troops
were killed after they surrendered. Whatever the truth is,
it was not the policy of the Confederate government to kill
black soldiers on sight. USCT were treated differently
from white Yankee soldiers, in that USCT were not eligible for
prisoner exchange.
>Those who have favorable opinions about those flags have shown
>reluctance to address this concern.
Blacks deserve, and now have, the vote and protection under the law.
The concern is addressed. Lip service is worthless.
>If that conflict was about liberty, it was about who was going
>to have it when the war was over.
The conflict was over the western territories, the supreme court,
Abraham Lincoln and Northern control of Southern interests.
In other words, Southern Independence from Yankee rule. Slaves were
freed as a measure of war, and then as a condition for peace.
>Or who would finally achieve a small measure of it after Reconstruction,
>decades of renewed oppression and continued resistance to this day.
Did you know that South Carolina was first garrisoned by USCT after
the war? Or that blacks largely controlled law enforcement during
the first part of Reconstruction in South Carolina? Or that
carpetbag governor R.K.Scott formed an all black militia in South
Carolina in 1871? The federal government gave no-one a small
measure of "independence" during Reconstruction, they used Southern
blacks as their tools and then left Southern blacks high-and-dry
after the federal attention span lapsed.
-Mike
Mike Marshall
>Speaking as a Jew: it's equivalent to the swastika.
Speaking as someone who's daddy witnessed Germany's ovens at
the end of the 2nd world war, your daddy needs to give you a
spanking.
Judiah P. Benjamin held three different positions in the Confederate
Cabinet, and wielded power second only to Jefferson Davis.
http://www.jewish-history.com/adl_csa.html
-Mike
Antonio E. Gonzalez
>Date: 07/12/2001 7:44 AM Pacific Daylight Time
>Message-id: <9ikd3v$opa$1...@hubcap.clemson.edu>
Well, the comparison of Jews-to-swastikas, was more Jews-to-Germany, not
Jews-to-South/Confederacy, so your whole argument's made irrelevant.
- Vaughner
"Socks don't disappear in the drier. It happens in the washer, and the drier
takes the blame . . ."
- Recent NG Post.
Carl Fink
> ca...@panix.com (Carl Fink) writes:
>>Speaking as a Jew: it's equivalent to the swastika.
>
> Speaking as someone who's daddy witnessed Germany's ovens at
> the end of the 2nd world war, your daddy needs to give you a
> spanking.
Same here. Medic in the Fifth Armored Division.
> Judiah P. Benjamin held three different positions in the Confederate
> Cabinet, and wielded power second only to Jefferson Davis.
Actually, my father taught me that. (Well, except for the spelling
of his first name. Dad could spell.) I never said or meant to imply
that no Jews ever did anything horrible.
--
Carl Fink ca...@dm.net
Dan Kimmel
And there are still Russians who long for the return of Communism.
Doesn't mean they're right.
Dan Kimmel
What a bogus comeback. No one was claiming the traitorous South was
antisemitic, just that -- like the Nazis
-- they treated human beings as expendable slaves and considered some human
beings to be "sub-human."
There is no honor in the Confederate flag. It's time Southerners grew up.
Ted Kerin
to all (or to most) of the people who display it. In fact, I doubt that it
carries such a meaning to anybody but the hysterically ignorant
thought-police who want to banish it.
If you check pictures of KKK pinheads, you will most often find that the
flag they display is, in fact, the American stars and stripes. Is that a
perversion of the American flag's meaning? Yes. Does that mean we should ban
the US flag, or paint everyone who displays the US flag as a bigot? No.
Nor, I believe, is the confederate flag always displayed as a lofty
statement of regional pride and family heritage.
A dose of reality here: It means different things to different people. (Gee,
what a concept - freedom of thought.)
I venture to say that for most of the people who display it (on
bumper-stickers, T-shirts, ashtrays, etc), the confederate flag is not
really much different than a "Calvin Pissing" decal. It does not mean "Bring
back slavery." It is merely a somewhat unfocused effort to say "I see myself
as a rebel..I don't like authority in general, or the govermint in
particular.I am different.I have no special reverence for convention or
conformity."
And guess what? People are allowed to say such things, in this country. Even
people who aren't especially sophisticated or articulate.
Those who would banish the confederate flag, and consign it to the memory
hole, are in my opinion, no better than Nazi book-burners themselves.
Here's what the flag-banning debate comes down to, in terms of First
Amendment freedoms: My right to say something is not limited by what you
think I mean. If you are offended because, in your ignorance, you insist
that I mean something different than what I actually say, then that is your
problem.
(PS: I was born and raised in New Jersey, and have no use for a rebel flag.
But I damn well revere the First Amendment, and I have no use for
book-burning fascists.)
Mike Marshall
>Just out of curiosity: do you expect any book that uses phrases like
>"carpetbag government" to be thought of as objective history, as
>opposed to pro-Jim Crow, pro-racist propaganda?
Modern University Press books are not generally considered to
be propaganda. What we call history is a collection of objective facts,
and subjective opinions. If I didn't make clear what parts of the
book I was quoting, and what parts of my post were my own efforts,
I was in error. Your opinion is that those who refer to the
carpetbag government of Congressional Reconstruction as "the
carpetbag government" are racists. You are certainly in error.
-Mike
Ted Kerin
Wiley's exercise of his right to satirize. Satire is not supposed to be
fair. My irritation is directed against those who say, "No one is allowed to
display that flag, because of what I think it means -- it doesn't matter
what anybody else thinks it means."
Czaerana
>doing in 1864?
Probably drinking a lot. <g> I do know I had an ancestor who fought on the
winning side in the American Revolution. I'm proud of that...
Cynthia
Carl Fink
> The confederate flag certainly does not mean "the same thing as a swastika"
> to all (or to most) of the people who display it. In fact, I doubt that it
> carries such a meaning to anybody but the hysterically ignorant
> thought-police who want to banish it.
.
.
> people who aren't especially sophisticated or articulate.
>
> Those who would banish the confederate flag, and consign it to the memory
> hole, are in my opinion, no better than Nazi book-burners themselves.
I am an ACLU member, Ted. I'm stongly in favor of letting actual
Nazis display swastikas and march. I *joined* the ACLU, in the end,
because of the infamous Skokie march, as a matter of fact. I wish to
ban nothing.
Condemn, yes. I can criticize something without wanting it made
illegal. I'm against body piercings, too, in the sense that I think
they're either ugly or grotesque depending on details. Doesn't mean
I want them made illegal.
--
Carl Fink ca...@dm.net
Ted Kerin
it clear that I wasn't criticizing your comments or views.
Your personal reaction to the rebel battle flag is as legitimate as anyone
else's, which is part of the point I tried to make.
I don't think anyone in this group advocated the banning of any symbol by
force of law. I was reacting to events going on elsewhere, the sort of
intolerance which the ACLU bravely fights against.
Thomas Galloway
Carl Fink <ca...@panix.com> wrote:
>In article <9ijd7u$dp7$1...@panix6.panix.com>, Thomas Galloway wrote:
>> I think because of this, there was a tendency to have a stronger than usual
>> sense of region, still something of a sense of "us against the world". And
>> a useful symbol of that attitude was the confederate flag.
>
>And this is different from how Germany felt after World War One how?
>
>Defeated power, considered barbaric (partly because of what is now
>acknowledged to be utterly false propaganda, in the case of Germany),
>etc. You don't see the parallel?
Oh, I see the parallel (except that the current South is closer to the
modern Germany in the sense of "winning the peace" after losing the
war, skipping over WWII), except that as far as I know, there hasn't
been a Civil War II. Also, the swastika refers to a very specific time
in Germany's history, so Germans have other flags and symbols to show
their unity that don't relate to the Nazi period. Southerners don't;
the Civil War period was the only period where there were flags for
"the south" as a unit.
What I'm saying here is that, yes, some southerners are the equivalent of
neo-Nazis vis a vis Confederate flag = swastika. But there's also a
sense of region, minus the racism, which used the Confederate flag as
a symbol of that regional sense...and that made a lot more sense 30+ years
ago than today. Note that the use of the Confederate flag by racists is
pretty much limited to the south; I don't recall, say, residents of
South Boston using it as a symbol against desegregation of their schools.
tyg t...@panix.com
Jym Dyer
> Klansman an emblem of the south. The comic's caption
> refers to "Bubba's" Klan robes as "Southern Pride Formal
> Wear". That's a pretty broad brush he's painting with.
=v= Wiley does tend to paint with a broad brush. It's clear
that most Southerners identify with this notion of "pride,"
though Klansmen themselves most definitely do, judging from
their statements.
<_Jym_>
Jym Dyer
> Federal Tyranny" story is a post-bellum invention of people
> like Nathan Bedford Forrest.
=v= Indeed, the Southern secession, and thus the Confederacy,
was founded on precisely the *opposite* of state's rights. It
was in objection to states in the north deciding to regard black
people within their borders as human beings instead of property.
South Carolina, the first state to secede, listed that exercise
of state's rights in its Declaration of Immediate Causes.
> No one in the Confederacy had any illusions that they were
> defending freedom. Here's a useful cite, even though it's
> part of the obviously Socialist New York Review of (Each
> Other's) Books:
>
> http://www.nybooks.com/nyrev/WWWarchdisplay.cgi?20010412028R
=v= Wow, good pointer.
<_Jym_>
Kevin J. Maroney
>>The "Civil War was about defending States' Rights against Federal
>>Tyranny" story is a post-bellum invention of people like Nathan Bedford
>>Forrest.
>
>You mean Jubal Early. If you're going to repeat the lost-cause-myth-myth,
>get your attributions right.
If this were even remotely on-topic for this newsgroup, I would ask
how you would reconcile Jefferson Davis's post-war statement that the
Civil War was solely about
the inalienable right of a people to change their government…to
withdraw from a Union into which they had, as sovereign
communities, voluntarily entered... [and that the ] existence of
African servitude was in no wise the cause of the conflict, but
only an incident....
with his 1861 statement that the cause of the war was protecting the
South against Lincoln's policy on slavery would lead to
property in slaves [becoing\ so insecure as to be comparatively
worthless, ... thereby annihilating in effect property worth
thousands of millions of dollars
or Confederate vice-president Alexander Stephens's 1861 public speech
declaring that the Confederacy was founded
upon the great truth that the negro is not equal to the white man;
that slavery, subordination to the superior race, is his natural
and moral condition. This, our new Government, is the first, in
the history of the world, based on this great physical,
philosophical, and moral truth.
But it's completely off-topic to this newsgroup, so I won't. Which is
just as well.
--
Kevin J. Maroney | Unplugged Games | kmar...@ungames.com
Games are my entire waking life
Jym Dyer
> used the Confederate flag as a symbol of that regional
> sense...and that made a lot more sense 30+ years ago than
> today.
=v= Actually the flag in question was the battle flag of the
Army of Northern Virginia, and did not signify the Confederacy
or a "sense of region." It was adopted and promoted as such
a symbol by the KKK and other white supremicists, who waved it
(and incorporated it into the Georgian flag) specifically to
signify opposition to the civil rights movement of 30+ years ago.
=v= This "sense of region" excludes antiracist Southern blacks
and whites who are aware of this fact, and is thus not regional
at all.
<_Jym_>
D Olz
Lord knows that Mike and I don't agree on this subject, but "carpetbag
government" is an apt description of the installed governments of the South
after the war.
Olz
"As a people we are great, as a nation we are great, its just as individuals
that we stink."
Pat Paulsen 1968 Presidential campaign
Kevin J. Maroney
> Was it not the policy and practice of soldiers serving under
>those battle flags, that when a soldier of the opposing force
>was captured, if that soldier was white, he was treated as
>a prisoner of war (held, guarded (sometimes by black guards),
>paroled, exchanged, or kept in prison camps), but if that soldier
>was black, he was immediately murdered on the spot?
<http://www.americanpresident.org/KoTrain/Courses/AL/AL_Domestic_Affairs.htm>
Conducting the War
... For example, Lincoln never recognized the legitimacy of the
Confederacy and refused to officially negotiate with any of its
representatives, yet he agreed to treat all captured prisoners as
members of a sovereign nation rather than as traitors to be executed
or imprisoned. Until 1863 when African American soldiers began
enlisting in Union ranks, Lincoln and Davis supported a prisoner
exchange policy that kept few prisoners in long-term prison camps.
With the enlistment of blacks in the U.S. Army, the Confederates
announced that they would either execute captured black soldiers or
return them to slavery. Lincoln stopped the execution threat by
threatening in turn to execute one Confederate prisoner for every
black soldier killed. The Confederacy unofficially abandoned the
execution policy but refused to back down on returning the black
soldiers to slavery. As a result very few prisoners were exchanged
after the summer of 1863.
Thomas Galloway
>> But there's also a sense of region, minus the racism, which
>> used the Confederate flag as a symbol of that regional
>> sense...and that made a lot more sense 30+ years ago than today.
>=v= Actually the flag in question was the battle flag of the
>Army of Northern Virginia, and did not signify the Confederacy
>or a "sense of region."
All I can say is that in my youth in North Carolina, it did so signify. We're
talking about what the stars and bars turned into, not what it was in 1861-5.
>=v= This "sense of region" excludes antiracist Southern blacks
>and whites who are aware of this fact, and is thus not regional
>at all.
Um, yes it is. I don't deny there are people for whom it doesn't, or
that there are people racist, non-racist, and black for whom it doesn't.
What I am saying is that there are people who saw it as a sense of region
thing rather than as a racist thing. And that there was some reason to
do so in the period pre around 1970, but no longer.
Or, to put it another way, there are people who promoted the use of the
flag as a racist thing. There were also people who used the flag to indicate
a sense of region, for reasons which pretty much went away 30 or so years
ago. Meaning that the current use is much more racist oriented, although
there are still pockets of the region pride usage.
Again, if the stars and bars aren't a regional thing, why weren't they
used more by clearly racist damnyankees? (:-) on the damnyankees)
tyg t...@panix.com
Steven Rowe
<hath...@stsci.edu> writes:
> Reconstruction was indeed a shameful episode in American history
actually what people were taught as the history of reconstruction is shameful.
steven rowe
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
---------------------------------
Don't forget to Delete "Unspam" if you wish to e- mail me.
join the FelixTheCat list at www.egroups.com
.
Steven Rowe
>> >I can't think of anyone who considers it a symbol of "liberty and
>independence"
>> >though.
>> The Confederates spoke of it that way.
most of the confederate army (after the first year) consisted of draftees,
who did not want to go. Feel free to check for yourself.
Steven Rowe
>f you check pictures of KKK pinheads, you will most often find that the
>flag they display is, in fact, the American stars and stripes
Ted, how many Klan parades and rallies have you seen?
I've seen plenty of them, over the last 40 years, they have move so-called
confederate flags than US Flags. Why trust the media?
Steven Rowe
> During the Reconstruction-era kkk activity in South Carolina,
>> the federal government supported an all black state militia
>> under carpetbag governor R.K.Scott. The federal government
>> pitted the races against one another. It was an ugly
>> chapter in American history, not just Southern American
>> history. Lest you accuse me of gleaning that information
>> from National Enquirer, check any source, including:
>>
According to Walter Edgar in his "South Carolina: A history" the Klan begain
it's reign of terror in SC in 1868, resulting in the Klan assinating 1 state
senator and 2 state represenatives, and many other non-politicians. At this
time, there was no state militia and only 881 federal troops in SC. the state
militia was therefore founded (or re-founded) in 1869.
the klan then in 1870 in Laurensville murdered a state representive, the
probate judge, the constable, and 6 other Republicans. In one county in 10
months, the Klan had murdered 11 people, and had burned many churches and
schools, and whipped more than 600 people. Not until March 1871, did the
federal goverment become involved. It didn't work, and in october 1871,
President Grant, declared 9 SC counties to be in rebellion. While the three
main leaders of the Klan left the area, the federal goverment was powerless
(as usual), and the Klan continued it's rule by terrorism . If there was
indeed a race war, it was started by the Klan
Carl Fink
D, just for your information: because you quoted my whole .sig, then
your own, my newsreader cut off your message and forced me to
manually quote you here. You should edit your quotes. Also, stop
top-posting.
>Lord knows that Mike and I don't agree on this subject, but
>"carpetbag government" is an apt description of the installed
>governments of the South after the war.
No, it isn't. Have you by any chance read _Lies My Teacher Told Me_
by James Loewen? The Reconstruction governments suffered from one
great flaw in the eyes of the Southern whites: they weren't composed
entirely of Southern whites. So they were driven from office as part
of the disgraceful Compromise of 1877 -- but the so-called
"carpetbagger governments" were simply not the Northern opportunists
or apish Africans lampooned by the racist Southern press and somewhat
later apologist Southern historians.
--
Carl Fink ca...@dm.net
Dan Kimmel
news:RTk37.465$Um5.1...@dfiatx1-snr1.gtei.net...
<snip>
> Here's what the flag-banning debate comes down to, in terms of First
> Amendment freedoms: My right to say something is not limited by what you
> think I mean. If you are offended because, in your ignorance, you insist
> that I mean something different than what I actually say, then that is
your
> problem.
>
> (PS: I was born and raised in New Jersey, and have no use for a rebel
flag.
> But I damn well revere the First Amendment, and I have no use for
> book-burning fascists.)
I'm glad you revere the First Amendment. I only wish that you understood
it.
No one is trying to "ban" the Confederate flag. But trying to get state's
to remove it as part of their official emblems, or criticizing those who fly
the banner of hatred and treason -- out of some mistaken notion of "Southern
pride" -- is absolutely well within what the First Amendment protects: free
and robust debate.
If the government wanted to ban the flag, I'd defend those flying it. But
when private citizens correctly note its association with slavery and
bigotry, they are exercising THEIR First Amendment rights.
Steven Rowe
(D Olz) writes:
>Lord knows that Mike and I don't agree on this subject, but "carpetbag
>government" is an apt description of the installed governments of the South
>after the war.
ah, they were not "installed", but elected by the franchised population of the
south.
steven rowe,
Steven Rowe
writes:
>Again, if the stars and bars aren't a regional thing, why weren't they
>used more by clearly racist damnyankees?
hmm, they are!
steven rowe
Mike Marshall
>But it's completely off-topic to this newsgroup, so I won't. Which is
>just as well.
But not to alt.war.civil.usa. The answers to all your questions
are there.
-Mike or soc.history.war.us-civil-war (moderated)
Ted Kerin
Steven Rowe <srowe...@aol.comUNSPAM> wrote in message
news:20010712194456...@nso-fy.aol.com...
> In article <RTk37.465$Um5.1...@dfiatx1-snr1.gtei.net>, "Ted Kerin"
> <tf.k...@gte.net> writes:
>
> >f you check pictures of KKK pinheads, you will most often find that the
> >flag they display is, in fact, the American stars and stripes
>
> Ted, how many Klan parades and rallies have you seen?
> I've seen plenty of them, over the last 40 years, they have move
so-called
> confederate flags than US Flags. Why trust the media?
>
Good point, steve: In the absence of formal polling data, I should have said
"very often" instead of "most often".
But I've seen plenty of pictures of Klansidiots bearing large US flags, and
I stand by my point: We should condemn stupidity and evil behavior, not
condemn dumb symbols that mean entirely different things to different people
of good will.
Ted Kerin
Dan Kimmel <dan.k...@worldnet.att.net> wrote in message
news:P5s37.2544$gj1.140648@bgtnsc05->
>
> No one is trying to "ban" the Confederate flag.
>
Dan, try telling that to the families of students who have been thrown out
of their government-run schools, for wearing shirts with even
postage-stamp-size replicas of confederate flags.
I hate to burden the group with lengthy articles from the mainstream press
(although I do have access to them), but...Surely you are aware of these
incidents? In at least one case, the families of the suspended students were
represented by the ACLU.
Mike Marshall
> According to Walter Edgar in his "South Carolina: A history" the Klan begain
>it's reign of terror in SC in 1868, resulting in the Klan assinating 1 state
>senator and 2 state represenatives, and many other non-politicians. At this
>time, there was no state militia and only 881 federal troops in SC. the state
>militia was therefore founded (or re-founded) in 1869.
What color did you say all the troops that the federal government
garrisoned the state of South Carolina with after the war were? You didn't?
It must not be convenient to your argument. Who controlled the
police forces in most of the towns? Whites or blacks?
> the klan then in 1870 in Laurensville murdered a state representive, the
>probate judge, the constable, and 6 other Republicans.
Shades of poor cowering blacks bending under the oppression of the man.
Here's a couple of more accurate versions of that story:
no secret white organization was present in Laurens in 1870. Whites
organized and armed themselves in plain sight in the middle
of the day, to protect themselves from the armed blacks in
charge of the federal armory. Black "constables" fired from the
upper floor of the armory into the courtyard of Laurens town
square. The freedmen were no match for ex-Confederate soldiers.
Zuczek describes the Laurens riot like this:
In Laurensville, on the day after the election [of 1870], a
scuffle broke out between a local white and a state constable.
Pushing and shoving escalated, several shots were fired , and
blacks who had come to help the constable ran into their armory.
A crowd of whites followed and began firing into the building.
Fearing an assault, the militia men dove out the back windows
and bolted for the nearby woods. Fifteen minutes after the riot
began, three blacks lay dead; two were killed inside the armory,
and another was shot while fleeing...
>If there was indeed a race war, it was started by the Klan
What a simple world you live in.
The KKK "crackdown" in 1871 occured right before an important election,
and left the leading men of South Carolina either hiding in the
swamp, in jail (around 500) or out of the country. An international
incident occured when the federal government sent John Merril to
Canada to kidnap ex-Confederate General John Bratton and smuggle him
back to the United States. After the election, the last one that
the carpetbags won, the crackdown petered out and the charges were
dropped against all the men.
-Mike
Mike Marshall
>Have you by any chance read _Lies My Teacher Told Me_
>by James Loewen?
Gee, do you read national enquirer too?
>The Reconstruction governments suffered from one
>great flaw in the eyes of the Southern whites: they weren't composed
>entirely of Southern whites.
Instead the Reconstruction governments were composed, at the highest
levels, of (white) carpetbags and scalawags. And most of the rest were
either blacks from places like Massachusetts or ex-slaves. Maybe
carlf has an explanation as to why there were almost no
blacks outside the Southern states, and he can describe to us
the conditions under which we might find black Southern field hands
sashaying around as Chief of police in, say, New York City in 1868.
My guess is that the people of New York wouldn't have stood for
it for a second. carlf thinks the people of Columbia should have
been happy with it. Whatever.
>but the so-called "carpetbagger governments" were simply not
>the Northern opportunists or apish Africans lampooned by the
>racist Southern press and somewhat later apologist Southern historians.
I can supply the names and origins of every member of the South
Carolina legislature between 177X and 1950 or so, including
during Deconstruction. And you can supply... something other
than wild claims?
-Mike "should be supplying cartoons"
Mike Marshall
>most of the confederate army (after the first year) consisted of draftees,
>who did not want to go. Feel free to check for yourself.
Ahahahaha. Both sides resorted to the draft. Many of these unreliable
men, on both sides, were deserters. Many good Confederates deserted the
front lines, to go and protect their homes, after the Yankee
army split the South and marched at will within the interior of
the Confederate states. You'll never be worth the sweat off the back of
one of the men in Lee's army in 1865, and if the Yankees who accepted
their surrender could be here, they'd tell you so. My Great-grandfather
signed up at the beginning of the war, for the war, and stayed through
the war. It is documented. Feel free to check for yourself.
-Mike
Dan Kimmel
And in this the schools are wrong, and the ACLU would be defending them even
if they wore shirts with images of Timothy McVeigh or a swastika -- and they
would be right to stand up against such official censorship.
That said, I think it is more than appropriate for *society* to indicate its
disapproval, so long as legal rights are not infringed. Most (normal)
people would feel embarrassed to be seen in public with a Nazi insignia on
their clothes, and that is the way symbols of the Confederacy should be
treated as well, not as a source of "pride."
Mike Marshall
>But trying to get state's
>to remove it as part of their official emblems, or criticizing those who fly
>[what Dan Kimmel views as ]some mistaken notion of "Southern pride" --
>and robust debate.
>If the government wanted to ban the flag, I'd defend those flying it.
Most of the devotees of the Confederate flag would, I hope, recoil from
any support by the ACLU.
>But
>when private citizens correctly note its association with slavery and
>bigotry, they are exercising THEIR First Amendment rights.
These private citizens, who haven't deeded their property back to
the Indian resevation nearest them and who claim to love the
flag that flew over all the slave ships, are hypocrites.
-Mike "the war between the mixed-race states and the white states
had something to do with slavery"
Mike Marshall
-Mike "Hopes he'll make it public here"
Chris Clarke
hub...@hubcap.clemson.edu (Mike Marshall) wrote:
> These private citizens, who haven't deeded their property back to
> the Indian resevation nearest them and who claim to love the
> flag that flew over all the slave ships, are hypocrites.
How about those of us who don't own property and don't claim to love the
flag?
And how about those of us who use arguments rather than ridicule to make
our points?
--
Chris Clarke | Editor, Faultline Magazine
www.faultline.org | California Environmental News and Information
Steven Rowe
>garrisoned the state of South Carolina with after the war were? You didn't?
>It must not be convenient to your argument. Who controlled the
>police forces in most of the towns? Whites or blacks?
hmm, my sources seem to indicate that the majority of troops were white. I
asssume that your comments about the police force is a joke, as most cities in
south carolina did not have a police force, except for private police forces.
you are perhaphs refering to the elected sheriff's department? my sources
indicate there were indeed many white sherrifs in the upcountry Carolina.
>> the klan then in 1870 in Laurensville murdered a state representive, the
>>probate judge, the constable, and 6 other Republicans.
>
>Shades of poor cowering blacks bending under the oppression of the man.
I think the above sentance pretty much sums you up,I won't argue with your
distorted facts (which I certainly could do, easily)
I'm reminded that you have in the past promoted an admitted Klansman in this
group.
You know you could at least surport the bonny blue flag, instead of the
modern pretender...
to quote you <what a simple world you live in>
steven rowe
Steven Rowe
>levels, of (white) carpetbags and scalawags.
ie; people from out of state, and people from in-state that we disagree with.
Steven Rowe
>>who did not want to go. Feel free to check for yourself.
>
>Ahahahaha. Both sides resorted to the draft.
south carolina was first, check it out.
steven rowe
Steven Rowe
>either blacks from places like Massachusetts or ex-slaves
you're fogetting that a large amount were freemen of color. (satisitics
available on request)
not that historical accuracy matters here
steven rowe
William H. Hathaway
> >bother to vote (or weren't allowed) care much one way or the
> >other. ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
>
> Either this is a very serious allegation, or you're making a point
> about my previous witch-hunt statement. I suspect the latter.
>
Nope, it was in (subtle) reference to the current War On (Some
Americans Using Certain) Drugs. One of the biggest threats to
the Republic in the present time. Many Americans have had their
voting rights removed under the bogus excuse of 'protecting the
children.' Studies have shown that a black person is ten times
more likely to be arrested for the same drug behavior as a white
person and thirteen times more likely to be incarcerated.
This War was racist in its conception, is racist in practice
and result. In some states (FL comes to mind) as many as
one-third of black male citizens are prevented from voting because
of drug convictions. I have denounced this insane, cruel,
ineffective, stupid War on numerous occasions and will continue
to do so until the politicians grow some gonads and end it.
They are wimps frightened by the 'soft-on' word. They are
doing the bidding of the drug dealers who would be put out
of business by the end of Prohibition. This War is indeed
a witch-hunt. In olden days witches were said to be those
who were 'wise in the ways of drugs (dried herbs)', such
as cannabis which was routinely used to ease the pain of
childbirth. The abuses perpetrated in the name of this
War are nearly endless. They must end.
Jym Dyer
> of "pride," though Klansmen themselves most definitely do,
> judging from their statements.
=v= AIIGH! Insanely wrong typo. What I meant to write was,
most Southerners DO NOT identify with this notion of "pride."
<_Jym_>
William H. Hathaway
Since we're being historical here .... My Great-great-grandfather
signed up during the war, but wasn't around for the surrender. He
was sent home after having his left arm shot off (amputated after
being shattered actually) at Cold Harbor, Virginia. He died on
the train ride home from gangrene. If you visit Arlington, go
to the top of the highest hill (near the erstwhile Doubleday Walk,
now turned into more grave sites), go east one or two rows and
look for a Corporal's grave stone.
I don't know if the man of Lee's army who shot him survived till
1865, but I have little doubt he believed in what he was doing.
(I can't remember if the opposing units were from S.C. or GA, but
it's in my notes somewhere, so maybe his name is in their rolls.)
And if we want to go back to the Revolution, my great-great-great-great-
grandfather joined that rebel army to kick out the rule of King George.
I haven't learned where he served, but it may have been with the Rhode
Island guys. His brother stayed "Loyal", married the woman my gggggfather
was engaged to and sailed to England.
And, oh yes, I lost an uncle to a Nazi grenade in 1944.
But talking about flags ... perhaps Maryland can give a good lesson
in how to handle it. This state was perhaps one of the more torn-apart
by that war. The first bloodshed was a few miles from this keyboard
("the patriotic gore that flecked the streets of Baltimore"), the
battle with the largest single-day dead and wounded was in Maryland,
and many families were split with fathers, sons, brothers, going to each side.
"Federal Hill" still overlooks the (somewhat famous) "Inner Harbor",
whose cannons were trained on the downtown area to keep the folks
in line (within walking distance of Fort McHenry, known for its
role in protecting that same city from the British fifty years earlier -
"thus be it ever, when free men shall stand between loved home and
war's desolation") and its legislature was locked up to prevent them
from voting to secede. I drive past a larger than life size bronze statue
of Lee and Jackson on horseback on my commute to/from work every day.
The monument to Confederate women is just the other side of campus.
And I have recently visited Point Lookout - a prison for captured
Rebs. Cemetery there for many who died at the camp. With a big
stone monument. A recent court judgement allowed that battle flag
to be flown over them on Memorial Day.
This was indeed a region with strong contrary feelings.
Supporters of the rebellion wore the red and white bottony symbol
of the coats of arms of the maternal line of the Lords Baltimore family
to show their sentiments. Such as were caught went to jail for it.
However, after the war, both coats of arms (black and yellow Calvert
and red and white Crossland) were incorporated into the Maryland
state flag - to show that, even though many Marylanders wanted to
rip apart the Union (and many fought for that), the conflict was
over and even they were welcomed back into the normal affairs of
a civil society, everyone supporting the state and its role in the
nation.
Perhaps the Mississipians who wished to retain their symbol
feel more threatened by reconciliation. I've only driven through
that state once so I don't know much about the people. Maybe
they could take a look at MD and how they handled it. Heaven
knows the state has its problems but its flag is at least
a lot prettier.
Cheers,
Wm. H.
Dan Kimmel
"Jym Dyer" <j...@econet.org> wrote in message
news:Jym.wzk81...@econet.org...
> > -Mike "the war between the mixed-race states and the white states
> > had something to do with slavery"
>
> ever been such a thing as a "white state."
> <_Jym_>
Although Vermont comes close.
Ted Kerin
Steven Rowe <srowe...@aol.comUNSPAM> wrote in message
>
> not that historical accuracy matters here
> steven rowe
>
Actually, what maybe shouldn't matter so much (in the particular way it's
being mis-used by both "sides" here), is...history.
What I mean by that is: There are people who honestly regard the confederate
flag as a symbol of regional pride; that's what it means to them, whether
you like it or not. It is useless to quote history in an effort to prove
that it meant something else a hundred years ago, or to point out that it
means something different to you.
Nobody here is "wrong" in describing their personal interpretations of this
symbol. What I take exception to, is anyone proclaiming that "I say it's
bad, and therefore, anyone who says different is a bad person."
Or, "I say it's bad, so nobody should be allowed to use it."
Or, "I say it's bad, so you cannot possibly think it means anything good.
And if you claim to believe anything different than I, you must be an idiot,
or a liar."
You think that [your particular version of] "history" should determine
whether a symbol is appropriate or permissible in today's society? Really?
Consider: There are fundamentalists who will tell you (and for this
discussion, it's irrelevant whether they're strictly correct) that:
1) the so-called "peace symbol" is actually a "broken cross" which,
historically, stands for hatred of Christians, and is a symbol of death.
If this is true, does it mean that anyone displaying a peace symbol today
(or in the 1960s) must be denounced and branded an anti-Christian bigot? Or,
can we instead concede that, whatever the symbol meant before, it is being
used now for a benign purpose?
And that, conversely,
2) the "swastika" adopted by the Nazis had been used for centuries among
aboriginal people as a symbol of love, harmony and well-being.
If this is true, does it mean that Nazi swastikas must be credited with the
same connotation given to the same symbol in prior history? Or, is it more
relevant to look at the actual motives and actions of the people who are
carrying the symbol?
In truth, I would defend the right of anyone to carry a symbol of whatever
they want to say, even if it is despicable. (Yes, Dan, I do understand the
First Amendment.)
But in the case of the confederate flag, it should be obvious that there is
an actual, legitimate and sincere difference of intent and interpretation.
And I resent the implication that some people's interpretations should be
crammed down everyone else's throats, and given the force of either law or
unanimous opprobrium. Why should they? Because those people's
interpretations are "morally" motivated? Because they are politically
correct? Because those people are "better" than someone else?
No. I say, anyone has the right to be inspired with either pride or disgust
by the same symbol. And although we cannot agree on what the confederate
flag means, we should be able to acknowledge the sincerity and legitimacy of
different views, without assuming that everyone who displays it "must" be a
racist or a dolt.
Ted Kerin
message, it was in the rhetorical sense of "you, the person reading this,"
not "you, steven rowe".
Chris Clarke
<ubI37.35163$C81.2...@bgtnsc04-news.ops.worldnet.att.net>,
"Dan Kimmel" <dan.k...@worldnet.att.net> wrote:
The Abenaki would be intrigued by that statement.
Chris Clarke
"Ted Kerin" <tf.k...@gte.net> wrote:
> Steven Rowe <srowe...@aol.comUNSPAM> wrote in message
> news:20010713142034...@ng-mi1.aol.com...
>
> >
> > not that historical accuracy matters here
> > steven rowe
> >
>
> Actually, what maybe shouldn't matter so much (in the particular way it's
> being mis-used by both "sides" here), is...history.
[snip a well-intended post-modernistic, "there is no objective reality"
essay that would make Stanley Fish jealous]
You seem to overlook the fact that the right to an opinion includes the
right to work politically on behalf of that opinion.
And if you maintain that people with opinions contrary to yours aren't
ever wrong, then you need to come up with some other word to describe
whatever it is you have. Because it certainly isn't an "opinion." A
"preference", maybe, or an "idea." An "opinion" implies the courage to
stand up for it.
That's not to say that people who disagree with one's opinions are
always wrong. Because the person who's wrong might be you. It may well
be that I'm wrong, that the Confederacy was justified in promoting
slavery, that Davis and Lee and such weren't hypocrites of the first
order for blithely accepting infringements of the rights of Free States
up until Lincoln's election (at which point they changed their mind
according to the Lost Cause Myth Myth Myth), that the frequent
"accidental" racist statements of Lost Cause supporters don't mean that
pro-Confederate sympathy has racism at its very core, that Horrible
Black People terrorized the God-Fearin' And Victimized former plantation
masters and that Garfield isn't boring and repetitive.
John Ockerbloom
>>> Have you by any chance read _Lies My Teacher Told Me_
>>> by James Loewen?
>> Gee, do you read national enquirer too?
>
>what he says.
He may, but he also seems to have definite axes to grind. I dipped
into the book above, and found several pages claiming that
schoolteachers are "lying" about Helen Keller because her socialist
politics aren't usually mentioned, or remembered. And indeed he gave
many cited examples of her socialist writings.
But he didn't adequately explain *why* this particular aspect of Keller's
life story was of special interest. Keller's education as a deaf-blind
person and later work as an advocate for the disabled is remarkable, and
has few precedents. But there doesn't seem to be much particularly
remarkable about her socialist writings (compared to anyone else's
socialist writings, that is; it's not like there was any shortage of
socialist authors.) She did link her activism in this area with her
blindness to some extent, but she also did that with her third
major cause (which I'll get to below).
If the claim is that the major interests that Keller advocated
after her childhood education should be presented, it's odd that in the
several pages Loewen spends on Keller, I couldn't find any mention of her
Swedenborgian religion, an unorthodox creed considerably less common than
socialism was in her day, and for which she also published writings to
advocate. (See, for instance, her book _My Religion_.) If not mentioning
her unconventional political advocacy is "lying" by omission, then why isn't
not mentioning her unconventional religious advocacy?
I have not seen any reason to assume that the facts that Loewen brings up
are untrustworthy. However, I look more skeptically at the selection
of facts he chooses to present, and his judgments based on them.
ObComics: Still, he's more fun to read than "Mallard Fillmore" any day
of the week...
John Mark Ockerbloom
Mike Marshall
>=v= In the entire history of the United States, there has never
>ever been such a thing as a "white state."
There were 21 million people in the north in 1860. 200,000 were
black.
There were 9 million people in the South in 1860. 4,000,000 were
black.
What tortured reasons you can come up with to explain this?
-Mike
Steven Rowe
what I said is factually true, it may be read as implying something else. I
should have chose my words better.
Also, my southern hertiage is rankled by people who attempt to place hackneyed
ugly sterotypes on me, so I well understand Mike's feelings on that issue -
even if I don't feel upset by that particular stereotype that upset him.
No one may care that family came to the South prior to 1700 and that
several of my great-great grandfathers were in the war on the side of the
South (I have no idea nor care if they were enilisties or drafties), but I
feel strongly that they suffer no shame from those who nowdays would believe
that they followed the apparent southern PC line. That they followed flags
that did not exist for their state, or were in armys that did not exist -
except in the minds of folks who created them 50-100 years later.That they had
to have views because we nowdays expect them to have views. I know of the
extreme damage of Sherman's troops to my family - yet I also I know that my
family had no bitterness toward their country: the United States. While
none of my "War Between the States"era family lived to my generation, many of
the people they raised did; and the stories I heard from them, are not stories
of hatred toward blacks or northerns or foreign born. They also knew the
difference between real hertiage and fake heritage.
I grew up in Klan country, they had rallies in the field near my home, i
heard kkk songs on the first cassette player I've ever seen, I've seen the
posters and phamplets on telephone polls and literature tables, I knew members
of the Klan. I still talk to former members of the Klan.
I resent the implication by everyone and particuarly by those so-called
Southerners, that my real hertiage is that which has been faked up by those
who change for their own current (1950s-2000) political agenda.
Steven Rowe, Southern by the Grace of God - but not for your political agenda
Ted Kerin
Chris Clarke <ccl...@faultline.org> wrote in message
news:cclarke-BC0D2A...@news1.rdc1.sfba.home.com...
> In article <v6I37.1507$Lk1.2...@paloalto-snr1.gtei.net>,
> "Ted Kerin" <tf.k...@gte.net> wrote:
>
> >
> > Actually, what maybe shouldn't matter so much (in the particular way
it's
> > being mis-used by both "sides" here), is...history.
>
> [snip a well-intended post-modernistic, "there is no objective reality"
> essay that would make Stanley Fish jealous]
>
"The cause of the Civil War" is capable of analysis, and has objective
reality. (And I have enjoyed the discussion of that issue here, even though
I think it cannot properly justify prejudice against everybody who has the
stars-n-bars on his belt-buckle in 2001.)
"What I mean when I display the confederate flag" is purely subjective, and
is not a proper subject for moralizing or insults based on mind-reading.
Especially when it's so obvious that opinions are too disparate to infer
evil intent from use of this symbol.
>
> You seem to overlook the fact that the right to an opinion includes the
> right to work politically on behalf of that opinion.
>
There's a difference between proselytizing to advance your point of view,
and obliterating the offending symbol by force of law or by intellectual mob
rule, which is a form of book-burning. As stated in a prior post, in this
regard I am responding to events happening outside this discussion, such as
the expulsion of schoolkids with forbidden symbols on their clothing or
their bumper stickers.
>
> And if you maintain that people with opinions contrary to yours aren't
> ever wrong, ...
>
See above distinction -- between issues that have objective reality, and
anyone's subjective intent in employing symbols for non-verbal expression.
Chris Clarke
"Ted Kerin" <tf.k...@gte.net> wrote:
Fair enough.
Mark Jackson
> Jym Dyer <j...@econet.org> writes:
> >=v= In the entire history of the United States, there has never
> >ever been such a thing as a "white state."
>
> There were 21 million people in the north in 1860. 200,000 were
> black.
All of whom were free to travel (except as deterred by fear of
slavecatchers).
> There were 9 million people in the South in 1860. 4,000,000 were
> black.
All but about 250,000 of whom were enslaved.
> What tortured reasons you can come up with to explain this?
Explain what?
--
Mark Jackson - http://www.alumni.caltech.edu/~mjackson
The chief executives of large American corporations are,
as a class, the most overpaid people on the planet.
- James Surowiecki
Carl Fink
> He may, but he also seems to have definite axes to grind.
Yes, but that's kind of his point -- that *so do textbook authors*,
but their philosophy is just assumed to be the only one possible.
--
Carl Fink ca...@dm.net
Carl Fink
> "What I mean when I display the confederate flag" is purely subjective
Arguably, but "What you SAY by displaying the confederate flag" is
subjective in *other people's* minds. It says, "I'm a racist,
bigoted thug." It DOES NOT MATTER what you mean, that's the message
that you're sending. Furthermore, it's impossible not to know you're
saying that.
--
Carl Fink ca...@dm.net
Thomas Galloway
Sorry Carl, but it depends. To use your own example of the swastika, it
used to be a very innocent, even favorable symbol. It was then co-opted
by the Nazis so that now it's a symbol of horror (there was a nice story
in the text anthology Superheroes where a kindly old man wanted to give
various characters superpowers in the classic Captain Marvel vein; say
a word and be turned into a superhero including costume. The problem was,
he dated back to pre-WWII, so the costume included the swastika as a very
prominent design element. For some reason, no one was willing to go out
as "Captain Swastika").
Or take a rainbow. Back in North Carolina in the mid to late 70s, it was
very popular to put a translucent rainbow decal on one's back car window.
It symbolized either thinking it looked nice, or perhaps a bit of hippie
sentiment. Now, the rainbow symbol has been sufficiently co-opted, at
least in California, so that someone with such a decal would be considered
to be gay or bi-. Similarly, the word "queer" has gone from general adjective
meaning "odd" to being used as an insult to being claimed as self-description
by a number of homosexuals.
While the stars and bars are getting more and more associated with racists
(particularly with the whole state flag thing), it wouldn't surprise me at
all for someone, particularly someone in their late middle age or older,
to still display 'em with the attitude of "Damned if I'm going to let those
racist punks take away the symbol of my region". While it's in the late
stages of transition, I think it's still somewhat in a transitional phase
such that not everyone displaying the stars and bars is automatically a
racist jerk a la a swastika, although the odds are in its favor these days.
tyg t...@panix.com
Carl Fink
tidbit: the swastika was once prominently displayed on SYNAGOGUES.
We Jews have a very long-standing prohibition on representational art
("graven images"), so, like Muslims, we decorated our houses of
worship with abstract designs.
In article <9iobnp$khr$1...@panix3.panix.com>, Thomas Galloway wrote:
> . . . While it's in the late
> stages of transition, I think it's still somewhat in a transitional phase
> such that not everyone displaying the stars and bars is automatically a
> racist jerk a la a swastika, although the odds are in its favor these days.
I specifically said that that isn't necessarily what the displayer
MEANS, only what he's SAYING. The first refers to the displayer's
internal state, the second to the VIEWER'S internal state. Almost
anyone (outside your small group of older people who don't want to
accept the symbol's meaning) seeing it will think "Racist thug".
I mean, if a devout Hindu immigrates to the USA, it's possible they
would decorate their temple with that ancient symbol of good fortune,
the swastika. (The word itself is apparently derived from Sanskrit.)
However, even though all they mean is "good luck" or "promotion of
good", almost anyone LOOKING at the building will think "Nazis".
Do you really want to insist, like Dodgson, that a symbol means only
what you want it to mean, no more and no less?
--
Carl Fink ca...@dm.net
Thomas Galloway
Carl Fink <ca...@panix.com> wrote:
>I enjoyed the "Captain Swastika" story myself, Tom. Historical
>tidbit: the swastika was once prominently displayed on SYNAGOGUES.
>We Jews have a very long-standing prohibition on representational art
>("graven images"), so, like Muslims, we decorated our houses of
>worship with abstract designs.
OK, so let me try an analogy to make my point. You've got a synagogue that
has swastikas on it. Up comes the Nazis using it in the 1930s. Isn't it
possible that you're not out sandblasting the swastikas off that first day,
but rather proclaiming that you're not going to allow the Nazis to co-opt
the symbol you were already using to represent something else? And that
different people will have different points at which they'd be sandblasting
the swastikas, having given up on having the symbol co-opted?
>Do you really want to insist, like Dodgson, that a symbol means only
>what you want it to mean, no more and no less?
Nope. I mean that there's a period of transition on symbol co-opts. It's
not like everyone woke up the same morning and got the instructions that
swastikas are now evil, rainbows are now a gay pride symbol, and geek
is a good thing to call someone.
As a side note, there's a story in Saturday's Boston Globe about how there
are some protests in Harvard alumni circles about seeing the movie Legally
Blonde. No, not because it's supposedly set at Harvard Law School, but because
the co-writer of the novel the movie is based on was a Harvard undergrad.
Who, when she was a student a decade or so ago, insisted on hanging a
Stars and Bars flag out her dorm room window. She claimed it was to symbolize
regional pride and as an intended slam against what she perceived as
New England elitism. Those against it were angry at her for refusing to
take it down after they'd explained to her what the flag meant to them.
I'd tend to be on the side of the ones angry at her (although I think
carrying a grudge about it for a decade is a bit much absent other bad
behavior) since, as I've written, the reasons for the South having a strong
sense of regional pride pretty much went away by the time of her birth in
the 70s.
tyg t...@panix.com
Jym Dyer
> Nazis using it in the 1930s. Isn't it possible that you're not
> out sandblasting the swastikas off that first day, but rather
> proclaiming that you're not going to allow the Nazis to co-opt
> the symbol you were already using to represent something else?
=v= The problem with that analogy is that the swastika had an
original meaning before the Nazis used it. The battle flag of
the Army of Northern Virginia originated as a symbol of a war
to perpetuate slavery, and was later used by the KKK and its
ilk as a symbol of an effort to perpetuate white supremacy.
=v= I don't see the point in attempting to use this flag as a
symbol of regional pride. Can Southern blacks or anti-racist
Southern whites possibly rally around such a symbol unless they
are ignorant of its history? I realize that new generations
start with innocence, not ignorance, but I can't see the point
of having a symbol that only works for those with blinders on.
<_Jym_>
Rob Wynne
>=v= I don't see the point in attempting to use this flag as a
>symbol of regional pride. Can Southern blacks or anti-racist
>Southern whites possibly rally around such a symbol unless they
>are ignorant of its history? I realize that new generations
>start with innocence, not ignorance, but I can't see the point
>of having a symbol that only works for those with blinders on.
> <_Jym_>
What it all boils down to, at the end of the day, is respect. Do I find
it distressing that people would choose to continue obsessively worrying
over things that happened 150 years ago instead of putting their efforts
into bettering today and tomorrow? Yes, absolutely. But until such time
as the majority, especially in the south, show that they can let go of
their own cultural baggage, it's too much to expect the minority to
assume that the past is the past.
The deep and fundamental truth is that, in the end, there are no white
people and no black people. There's just people. If a piece of cloth is
capable of creating such fundamental divisions between us, then we owe
it to each other to put that aside so that we can grow as one people
towards tomorrow.
Rob
--
Rob Wynne / The Autographed Cat / d...@america.net
The best original science-fiction and fantasy on the web:
Aphelion Webzine: http://www.aphelion-webzine.com/
Gafilk 2002: Jan 11-13, 2002, Atlanta, GA -- http://www.gafilk.org/