Bessie Smith
Steve Harnar
went to the "White" hospital first and was refused service. So she went to
the "Black" hospital on Sunflower Ave (now a boarding house/hotel). Where she
died of loss of blood. It is a very sad story.
Chefo
Bonnie Kalmbach
Till proven otherwise, BS died in a Tenn. hospital where,
following a car accident, she was denied a blood transfusion
strictly on the basis of her race. You lose credibility by
challenging what someone says without furnishing your side of
the story. I smell a racist ...
Bessie Smith died in Clarksdale in the African-American hospital,
later the Riverside Hotel. I can't remember where I read it, but
her car had broken down, probably on Hwy 61, when it was run into
from behind. Bessie had an arm nearly torn off and had lost a massive
amount of blood, and probably wouldn't have survived anyway.
They wouldn't have taken her to Tennessee because that's nearly
85 miles away.
When Mrs. Z.L. Hill showed us the room where Bessie died, I felt an
impact on walking into it - maybe I was just all caught up emotionally,
or maybe Bessie was still hovering around.
Bonnie
"aint superstitious, black cat just crossed my trail" (going after
a tweety bird, no doubt)
Ron Weinstock
<<OM wrote:
I believe it might be in Chris Albertson's biography, BESSIE.
maxdog
>
> In a message dated 12/14/98 7:46:03 PM, KALM...@macc.wisc.edu writes:
>
> <<OM wrote:
>
> Till proven otherwise, BS died in a Tenn. hospital where,
> following a car accident, she was denied a blood transfusion
> strictly on the basis of her race. You lose credibility by
> challenging what someone says without furnishing your side of
> the story. I smell a racist ...
>
> Bessie Smith died in Clarksdale in the African-American hospital,
> later the Riverside Hotel. I can't remember where I read it, but
> her car had broken down, probably on Hwy 61, when it was run into
> from behind. Bessie had an arm nearly torn off and had lost a massive
> amount of blood, and probably wouldn't have survived anyway.
> They wouldn't have taken her to Tennessee because that's nearly
> 85 miles away.
Here's some of the info I found trying to find more info on Bessie
Smith's death.
**********************************************************
From: http://www.redhotjazz.com/Bessie.html
Bessie had started to style herself as a Swing musician and was on
the verge of a come
back when her life was tragically cut short by an automobile
accident in 1937. While driving with her
lover Richard Morgan (Lionel Hampton's uncle) in Mississippi their
car rear-ended a slow moving
truck and rolled over crushing Smith's left arm and ribs. Smith bled
to death by the time she
reached the hospital. John Hammond caused quite a stir by writing an
article in Downbeat
magazine suggesting that Smith had bleed to death because she had
been taken to a White hospital
and had been turned away. This proved not to be true, but the rumour
persists to this day.
**********************************************************
Essence Magazine January, 1993
HEADLINE: IS RACISM KILLING US
BYLINE: BY DEBRA SPENCER; Debra Spencer is a freelance writer who
had conducted research in the
areas of health and political science.
BODY:
Accounts differ on exactly how the legendary blues singer Bessie
Smith died. What is clear is
that she was in a car accident in the middle of the night and lay
bleeding to death at the scene
of the 1937 collision. A 1938 issue of the Baltimore Afro-American
ran this description of the
aftermath of the accident as told by Smith's son, Jack Gee, Jr.:
"We have never found out accurately yet how my mother was taken
back to town, but we do
know that she was first taken to a white hospital, which refused to
administer first aid or take
her in. She was then taken to the Afro-American Hospital, a colored
institution. This hospital
didn't have the proper equipment with which to operate. Physicians
had to run all over town to
get the proper equipment.
"It was about 11:30 A.M. before they administered ether to her. She
died at 11:45 A.M. No reason
was given as to why she died, but we know clearly that she died from
loss of blood and neglect
. . ."
Though some historians have shot down this account of Smith's death,
the retelling of the story
strikes fear in the hearts of all of us. Racism in the health-care
system should be a thing of
the past, but it's not. Several studies confirm that
African-Americans are not treated fairly by
the medical establishment -- and this fact is stirring intense
debate in health-care circles.
[There is quite a bit more to this article but none of it has
anything to do with Bessie Smith]
************************************************
Chasin' That Devil Music--Gayle Dean Wardlow
One of the more peculiar aspects of blues reasearch is the
frequency of encounters with
conflicting and even preposterous death stories concerning a
well-known blues singer. For reasons
to be explained later, such an aura of mystery tends to surround the
deaths or disappearances of
certain singers that the features of their actual lives become
eclipsed in the minds of both the
public at large and singers' own contemporaries.
In some cases, particularly that of Bessie Smith--who died,
according to her last manager,
not dramatically on the doorstep of a segregated hospital, but in a
car collision (Oliver 1961,
70-71, but see also Albertson 1972, 215-226)--the myth is bound up
in cultural lore.
**************************************************
Blues Who's Who--Sheldon Harris
...while touring...suffered major injuries and shock in auto
accident at Coahoma, MS;
entered Afro-American Hospital where her arm was amputated but died
of her injuries; buried Mount
Lawn Cemetary, Sharon Hill, PA...
Note: Other reports on the circumstances of this singer's death have
proven incorrect.
****************************************************
--
maxdog (Tallahassee, FL)
****************************sig*****************************
* Bluesfest: Dave's CC Club's Star Spangled Blues Gathering
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************************************************************
Shaun Cronin
The Blues" by Bruce Cook there is an account of Bessie Smith's death.
It includes the following "She was horribly mangled, an arm almost severed
from her body. That was how a white doctor from Memphis found her, lying in
the road. He saw her into the hospital in Clarksdale, but it would be
difficult, he later said, to determine whether she died there or in the
ambulance. There is no basis in fact, it seems, for the popular story that
she was refused admission to a hospital because of her color."
Paul Oliver's "the Story of The Blues" has on page 136:
"Terribly mutilated and her arm nearly severed, Bessie lay in the wreckage.
A passing Memphis surgeon stopped his car and tried to lift her two hundred
pound body from the tangled metal when his own vehicle was struck. An
ambulance took her eventually to the GT Thomas Hospital Clarksdale but,
though her arm was amputated she died just after mid-day from the internal
wounds she had suffered."
Francis Davis', "The History of The Blues" (you can debate the veracity of
this source yourselves;-)) recounts Smith's death on pages 78 to 79. Davis
gives a slightly more detail account of the accident. I will skip that but
include the this paragraph.
"She might of lived if the truck driver had stopped and taken her straight
to hospital, if Dr Smith hadn't wasted time waiting for an ambulance, if
the white couple had slowed down. But all of this amounts to poor
judgement, not racism. So how did the legend start that her real cause of
death was segregation, and why do people still believe it? Because it was
believable. Hammond didn't originate the story; he was merely the first to
tell it in print, after hearing it from several musicians. It's become a
story perversely cherished y older black Americans, who take its moral to
be confirmation of a bitter truth: that even one of their own as celebrated
as Bessie Smith was just another nigger to whites."
To insinuate that someone is a racist because, on the accounts that we
have, they challenge the view that Bessie Smith's death was due to racism
is a gross example of intellectual cowardice. To believe in a fabrication
because it suits your view better than the facts is not much better.The
historical accounts suggest that it was a terrible tragedy. To say so does
not invalidate any other stories of racism that may have happned before and
since her death. However I would rather the facts.
Fred Dabney is not the one suffering a loss of credibilty on this list at
the moment.
Shaun
"How come that most things that seem plausible at the time are often
idiotic in retrospect?"
Stomping On Weird Beliefs For The Fun Of It:
http://www.dot.net.au/~sonnyboy/Skeptical_Skoundrels
bob vanarsdall
popular by Edward Albee's play the Death of Bessie Smith. Albee's political
leanings and the time the play came out made the racial story gain currency
in the popular mind. His version has pretty much been discounted by
historians, including Feinstein's book on Bessie from 1985. There is an
interview in one of the biographies (not sure whether it is Feinstein's, I
don't have it handy) with the white doctor who initially came on the scene
of the car accident.
She was, in fact, taken to the black hospital in Clarksdale first; it later
became the Riverside. The doctor at the accident scene had little hope for
her even surviving the trip to the hospital. He had no idea who she was at
the time.
Bob
Bonnie Kalmbach
This evidence is based on what eye-witness Dr Hugh Smith told BJ Shelton
of The Clarksdale Register some 20 years later. Shelton discovered that
this newspaper on 27 September 1937 identified the other driver, placed
the scene of the accident 10 miles north of Clarksdale MS. The paper,
like the ambulance driver Dr Smith spoke to, reported that Bessie Smith
had died at a Negro hospital in Clarksdale.
I always imagine the place of the accident to be where Hwy 61 starts to
bend off toward the right toward Clarksdale as you come from Memphis
and on the outskirts of Lyon, which I think was Son House's birthplace.
Toward sunset, the light hits you smack in the eye; I've almost wiped out
there myself a time or two. Maybe it was at that time of day the other car
slammed into Bessie's stalled automoble. I think the old Hwy 61 is pretty
close to the newer one.
bonnie
Tom Claypool
the evening (actually early morning). There wouldn't have been any sun.
More likely, road weariness or falling asleep would have been the cause.
All of us who have driven the old road know that it always has been a
dangerous stretch of highway. Bessie was on her way from Memphis. Does
anybody know if she had performed on Beale that night, and if so, where?
Tom Claypool
Fred Dabney
some the belief is more important than dull facts.
This one we know, but how many other myths do we live with not knowing
they're suspect?
Fred D.
Ocky Milkman
account of her death, which contradicts Dabney's original
assertion. his unequivocal dismissal of the traditional story
is not only apparently not backed up by facts but
suspiciously designed to exculpate whites. do i still smell a
racist, inadvertent or otherwise?
om
===
A thought for Christmas: "... all religions are at bottom
systems of cruelty."
--F. Nietzsche
_________________________________________________________
DO YOU YAHOO!?
Get your free @yahoo.com address at http://mail.yahoo.com
Rich Gonzalez
>in other words, no one really knows; ... no definitive
>account..., which contradicts ....
>assertion. his unequivocal dismissal ...
>is not ...apparently .... but...suspiciously designed to ... .
> do i still smell a racist, inadvertent or otherwise?
I smell a guy who can't admit he's wrong. About ANYTHING.
richg
maxdog
educate us if you have the facts.
Ocky Milkman wrote:
>
> in other words, no one really knows; there is no definitive
> account of her death, which contradicts Dabney's original
> assertion. his unequivocal dismissal of the traditional story
> is not only apparently not backed up by facts but
> suspiciously designed to exculpate whites. do i still smell a
> racist, inadvertent or otherwise?
Alan Lloyd
<KALM...@macc.wisc.edu> writes
>
>I always imagine the place of the accident to be where Hwy 61 starts to
>bend off toward the right toward Clarksdale as you come from Memphis
>and on the outskirts of Lyon, which I think was Son House's birthplace.
>Toward sunset, the light hits you smack in the eye; I've almost wiped out
>there myself a time or two. Maybe it was at that time of day the other car
>slammed into Bessie's stalled automoble. I think the old Hwy 61 is pretty
>close to the newer one.
unexpected in that flat landscape!
The eyewitness report puts the accident at around 2am on a Sunday
morning, some 14 to 16 miles north of Clarksdale (as opposed to the
contemporary news report's 10 miles).
According to Dr Smith: "The colored man" (later identified as Richard
Morgan) "gave me the following story: A trailer truck a large one,
capable of hauling 16 or 18 thousand pounds of load, had apparently
pulled off the highway to check his tires and had started to pull back
on the highway and had just cleared the road when he, the colored man,
and Bessie Smith drove practically underneath the tailgate of this large
truck".
--
Alan Lloyd
London England
Ocky Milkman
remembering your own name, you would have realized that the
matter of bessie smith's death was anything but closed. duh,
uh, you yourself furnished a variety of contradictory
accounts of BS's death, to which I was refering, among which
is the following:
i.e., not ALL historians have the same story, i.e., the smug
dabney assertion that bs was not denied a transfusion is as i
have said a bit too pat, a bit too convenient for a good ol'
boy. om
---maxdog <max...@UNR.NET> wrote:
>
> And where is your evidence to support your statements? Please
> educate us if you have the facts.
>
> Ocky Milkman wrote:
> >
> > in other words, no one really knows; there is no definitive
> > account of her death, which contradicts Dabney's original
> > assertion. his unequivocal dismissal of the traditional
story
> > is not only apparently not backed up by facts but
> > suspiciously designed to exculpate whites. do i still
smell a
> > racist, inadvertent or otherwise?
>
_________________________________________________________
bob vanarsdall
So what are we to judge here as historical accuracy? A quote from BS's son,
who was not there at the accident or the hospital, or the account by the
doctor who first happened on the accident scene and treated Bessie?
I'm not aware of any evidence that she was refused at a white hospital, nor
that anyone had to "run all over town for the proper equipment" nor that
she died of "neglect". While I sympathize with a son's loss of his mother,
his statement from afar has little bearing on what actually happened.
You come down to the old question, "Was you there?" And Mr. Gee was *not*...
Bob
maxdog
>
> if you had been following the thread, if you were capable of
> remembering your own name, you would have realized that the
> matter of bessie smith's death was anything but closed. duh,
> uh, you yourself furnished a variety of contradictory
> accounts of BS's death, to which I was refering, among which
> is the following:
Your insults aside, WHERE IS YOUR EVIDENCE? Just because you say so
it is not good enough. I just reported what I found. No editing of
pertinent content, no omissions. The article in Essence was about
racism in health care. They pointed out "Though some historians have
shot down this account of Smith's death". Their support of the
theory was Jack Gee, Jr. who was not on the scene, the support of
the historians in question is the doctor who was on the scene (as
taken from other posts on this subject). Who do you want to believe.
It could have happened, racism at that time and in this time could
cause such a situation. But a crucial witness disputes the story.
Racism exists, but not under every rock. Fight it where it exists,
not the imagined windmills of racism in your mind.
A more important question in Bessie Smith's death should be "Was
there another (white) hospital closer that might have been able to
provide the aid necessary to save her life?" Did the doctor send
Bessie to a hospital that he knew would accept her when a closer or
better one might have been available? I don't know, I wasn't even
alive at the time. I can only go by the interviews of those that
were there. I have not read answers to the questions I just asked.
--
maxdog (Tallahassee, FL)
****************************sig**************************
* Get your Blues-L Bumper Stickers now! *
* Check this URL for info: *
* http://www.unr.net/~maxdog/Blues-L/Bumper-Sticker.htm *
Shaun Cronin
>in other words, no one really knows; there is no definitive
>account of her death, which contradicts Dabney's original
>assertion. his unequivocal dismissal of the traditional story
>is not only apparently not backed up by facts but
>suspiciously designed to exculpate whites. do i still smell a
>racist, inadvertent or otherwise?
The good thing that has come out of this thread is Martin Dunstan's account
of his travels. The bad thing is the intellectual dishonesty displayed
above. Fred did post information regarding Bessie's death based on research
by her biographer. Also note that none of the accounts posted by various
'zellers gave any credence to the idea that she died because of a refusal
of treatment by a white hospital.
The facts support that Bessie Smith died as a result of a tragedy. Not
malice due to racism. Are you beliefs so fragile that you need to construct
your facts around your beliefs instead of constructing your belief around
facts? I would of expected better from someone so frequently eloquent and
insightful.
Dismissing the "traditional story" has nothing to do with racism. A great
many injustices were directed by whites against blacks over the years.
Bessie Smith's death was not one of them. This doesn't "exculpate" whites.
If someone wants to, there are a great many crimes that can be used to
condemn whites for their racism.
When emotional arguments take precedence over reason irrationality is the
usual outcome. Time to take responsibility for your views.
Ed Vadas
<< suspiciously designed to exculpate whites. do i still smell a
racist, inadvertent or otherwise? >>
I am not sure how to ascertain which is true, but I would advise that you make
sure the breeze isn't blowing your breath back in your face.
Ed
Richard Flohil
is roundly and authoritatively corrected by a number of list members. Does
he thank those contributors? Does he say, in effect, "Gee, it's good to
know what really happened, as far as one can tell about an event that
happened half a century ago"?
Oh, no. He has the brass balls to repeat his accusation that one
of the contributors is a racist!
>in other words, no one really knows; there is no definitive
>account of her death, which contradicts Dabney's original
>assertion. his unequivocal dismissal of the traditional story
>is not only apparently not backed up by facts but
>suspiciously designed to exculpate whites. do i still smell a
>racist, inadvertent or otherwise?
The response to his original assertion about Smith's death was this list at
its very best: informed, intelligent posts, a discussion as to why the
original story surfaced, and some convincing historical data.
And OM's smug, offensive response was a perfect example of this
list at it's very worst (hey, and I'm including Bamalamadingdong calling me
"pointy headed"!) (oh, go ahead, insert one o' them smiley things)....
Richard (the Lion-Hearted)
(Not at all grouchy this morning, honest. But still watching for the door
to catch my ass)
PS: Rich Gonzalez' post on OM's response was utterly brilliant; wish I'd
thought of it!
Ocky Milkman
accounts given here, being instead impressed by the divergences among
them, making me more suspicious and less certain than ever. As for
your obvious malice, why don't you go back to bed and stay there for a
decade or too? om
==
A thought for the holidays: "... all religions are at bottom systems of cruelty."
--F. Nietzsche
Ocky Milkman
>
> So what are we to judge here as historical accuracy? A quote from
BS's son,
> who was not there at the accident or the hospital, or the account by
the
> doctor who first happened on the accident scene and treated Bessie?
>
> I'm not aware of any evidence that she was refused at a white
hospital, nor
> that anyone had to "run all over town for the proper equipment" nor
that
> she died of "neglect". While I sympathize with a son's loss of his
mother,
> his statement from afar has little bearing on what actually happened.
>
> You come down to the old question, "Was you there?" And Mr. Gee was
*not*...
Why all this reluctance to even admit the possibility of racism? Could
it be the reluctance of the guilty?
Anyone who would discount the opinion of son about the death of his
mother, especially in favor of someone who has something to gain from
a coverup, in favor of those involved in the failed attempt to
resuscitate Smith, is someone whose judgement I would not trust.
OM
maxdog
>
> Anyone who would discount the opinion of son about the death of his
> mother, especially in favor of someone who has something to gain from
> a coverup, in favor of those involved in the failed attempt to
> resuscitate Smith, is someone whose judgement I would not trust.
>
> OM
> ==
> A thought for the holidays: "... all religions are at bottom systems of cruelty."
> --F. Nietzsche
>
I have seen no credible evidence presented in this thread that
there was racism involved in Bessie Smith's death. Her son was not
there, John Hammond Sr. was not there. I have seen evidence
presented to the contrary. The doctor whose statement was first hand
evidence. He was not called to the accident but happened upon it. He
had nothing to gain or lose by the story. The hospital would have
been to blame for turning her away if the rumor was true. So go
ahead, don't trust my judgement Ocky, I sure don't trust your logic.
--
maxdog (Tallahassee, FL)
****************************sig*****************************
* Bluesfest: Dave's CC Club's Star Spangled Blues Gathering
* Check this URL for info:
* http://members.tripod.com/bluesfest
* Or email me offlist.
************************************************************
Chris
> Why all this reluctance to even admit the possibility of racism? Could
> it be the reluctance of the guilty?
>
Ochy, if that is your real name,
I have no problem admitting to the possibility of racism. I believe you are one!
Your posts read like Archie Bunker bought a thesaurus. Why is it so important to you
that someone 50 years ago was racist. Does this help validate your obsession with
racism. Does it make you feel righteous in your racism? Yes there are racists in this
world. You or anyone else that spew hate with flourished pen are the worst kind. Why
don't you use your considerable writing skills to educating us on the life and times
of BS instead of just spreading BS?
Chris (that is my real name) Francis
Shaun Cronin
interesting message to the list. It illustrates how urban legends become
entrenched as "facts" because they are often quite believable.
Shaun
>Date: Wed, 16 Dec 1998 16:54:01 -0800
>From: Steve Hirsch <shi...@nal.usda.gov>
>Reply-To: shi...@nal.usda.gov
>Organization: RICHS
>MIME-Version: 1.0
>To: Shaun Cronin <sonn...@DOT.NET.AU>
>Subject: Re: Bessie Smith
>
>Shaun Cronin wrote:
snip by Shaun of a his original post
>Hello,
>
>Liked your message above. I'd never heard the Bessie Smith
>story, but a well known variant is that Dr. Charles Drew, the
>doctor who developed blood transfusions, died after being in
>an auto accident and being refused treatment and a life-
>saving transfusion at a white hospital. I've attached an
>interesting message on that below. I'm not a member of Blues-l
>and can't post there. Feel free to forward on to the list.
>
>Steve Hirsch
>
>From: sde...@crick.ssctr.bcm.tmc.edu (Stuart P. Derby)
>Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban
>Subject: Re: charles drew: black american, creator of blood plasma
>Date: 30 Jan 1994 23:04:04 GMT
>Organization: Baylor College of Medicine, Houston, Tx Lines: 72
>Message-ID: <2ihed4$a...@gazette.bcm.tmc.edu> References:
><27JAN94.14...@VM1.MCGILL.CA> <2iblcr$q...@gazette.bcm.tmc.edu>
>NNTP-Posting-Host: crick.ssctr.bcm.tmc.edu
>
>
>>Rice U.'s library's on-line card-catalogue has:
>>
>>Author: Wynes, Charles E.
>>
>
>> Title: Charles Richard Drew : the man and the myth / Charles E.
>
>> Wynes.
>
>>
>
>> Published: Urbana : University of Illinois Press, c1988.
>
>
>>
>>I'll check and see what it says this weekend.
>
>It's this weekend and I checked, the book thoroughly refutes the myth.
>Dr. Drew suffered fatal injuries in the wreck. Despite the immediate
>attentions of the three other physicians who were with him (two of whom
>were substantially uninjured), and prompt attention at a nearby
>mixed-race (segregated) hospital, where he was attended by three other
>physicians, one of whom was the co-owner of the hospital, Dr. Drew died
>from the massive injuries. Included in the treatment was the
>administration of "at least one blood transfusion" - the hospital
>stocked both whole blood and plasma.
>
>The myth has been widely circulated, including _Time_ magazine. It also
>mentions:
>
>"But the story lives on. A McGill University publication, the _McGill
>Reporter_, repeated it in its December 1981 issue. Fortunately, it
>brought a vigorous denial from Dr. Edward Bensley, professor emeritus of
>medicine at McGill, [...]. Part of the evidence that Dr. Bensley had was
>a copy of a letter written by Dr. Ford [another black physician who was
>with Dr. Drew in the accident], in which Ford tried to lay the 'bled to
>death' canard to rest."
>
>And later, quoting Dr. Ford:
>
>"Doctor Drew's cause of death was that of a broken neck and complete
>blockage of the blood flow back to the heart. Immediately following the
>accident in which he was half thrown out of the car, and actually
>crushed to death by the car as it turned over the second time, the
>doctors who were were able to, got out of the car quickly and came to
>Doctor Drew's rescue, but it was of no avail because even at that time,
>it was quite obvious that his chances of surviving were nil."
>
>It also notes that the myth was circulating shortly after Dr. Drew's
>death, and speculates that it may be a mutation of a myth concerning
>Bessie Smith's death in 1937. She also died in a car crash in the South,
>and the myth circulated that she had died outside a "white's only"
>hospital after being refused admittance. In fact, she was taken directly
>to a "black" hospital by the black ambulance driver - half a mile from
>the nearby "white" hospital - where she died from internal injuries.
>(They amputated one
>of her arms while trying to save her, BTW). I guess the myth is just
>more believable than the truth somehow.
>
>--
Shaun Cronin
>
>Anyone who would discount the opinion of son about the death of his
>mother, especially in favor of someone who has something to gain from
>a coverup, in favor of those involved in the failed attempt to
>resuscitate Smith, is someone whose judgement I would not trust.
Well, you have found someone. But before I explain my reasons
congratulations on the post-modernistic approach to baseless conspiracy
mongering. When are you going to openly express your support for
Anthrocentrism?
There is a good reason to discount the account of Bessie Smith's son.
Emotional involvement and that the facts (which om for some reason keeps
avoiding) discredited any idea that Smith was denied treatment because of
her race.
Note that this is not a racist attack on her son. Regard it a dispassionate
assessment of how human emotions can shape ones perceptions (something
which I encounter quite frequently on the 'net).
As pointed out earlier, the doctor that was on the scene has stated (via
research. Something om seems to avoid) that the exact point of her death
was difficult to determine. She might of died in the ambulance or on the
way to hospital. Her injuries were severe and the delay did not help. So
far, those that support the idea that her death was the result of racial
malice have yet to provide the name of the hospital or any other piece of
evidence to support that idea. Just because someone says so doesn't make it
so.
Rumours concerning the idea that she was refused treatment by a white
hospital that lead to her death sprang up quite quickly after her death. I
would suggest that her son is basing his assessment on those rumours given
the lack of evidence for any factual basis to those rumours. I would also
suspect that, growing up in the times he did, it is a story that would seem
very believable. But her son is human and, however understandable the
reasons for believing that what he was saying was correct, emotions can
cloud over the facts. Moving towards racial equality is not served by
perpetuating myths.
To regard Bessie's son as the authority for the events surrounding here
death just because he is Bessie's son could only be termed as some weird
appeal to authority.
But I suspect that no facts will allow yourself to stop trying to present
your agenda and calling me some sort of the cruel, heartless, racist
bastard (or words to the effect).
As I stated before, you seems to construct your facts around your beliefs.
Holding on to them in fear that if some little part of your belief crumbles
before the facts, the whole belief will come crashing down. What are you
afraid of? That because admitting that the facts seem to point out that her
death was a tragedy you are then a racist?
If good evidence comes to light that her death was a result of racial
malice then I will gladly accept that. Unfortunately I have this bad habit
of trying to shape what I believe in around that facts as best as I can
discern them to be.
If her death was racial malice then is another in a long series of
tragedies borne from racism. If it was a simply an accident then it was a
tragedy as well with simple bad luck the culprit. To believe that the
latter it is so does not make one a racist nor does it lessen the evils of
the past.
Some of us would rather the facts than let our beliefs guide us.
Shaun
Ocky Milkman
as "either/or" rather than "both/and." As far as I can tell from the
accounts presented here about Smith's death, there is plenty of
ambiguity to allow for all versions, none of them being definitive,
all of them a partial truth, all limited in their own way.
And, always, shining behind the arguments of those, like Cronin
("sonnyboy" indeed!) and "maxdog," are the general positions and
biases of these same people in all matters, which override the
technical details and specifics of any single argument they pose.
Their gun-slinging eagerness to prove me wrong (Hey, I'm wrong.
Satisfied?) being more important than any issue at hand could ever be,
trivializes those issues really, and makes me wonder what really is
the agenda here? wouldn't be white over black, now would it?
OM
==
A thought for the holidays: "... all religions are at bottom systems of cruelty."
--F. Nietzsche