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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsWhite House With Confederate Flag Flying Over It - On Bumper Sticker
Radio caller on progressive talk said he was driving in the South recently and saw a car with such a sticker on it. The caption on it was "I Have A Dream".
hobbit709
(41,694 posts)Octafish
(55,745 posts)Scuba
(53,475 posts)Cooley Hurd
(26,877 posts)TheMastersNemesis
(10,602 posts)Bucky
(54,041 posts)Bok_Tukalo
(4,323 posts)<OPE>
Hoyt
(54,770 posts)Or so I've been told, as if the governors -- elected by a majority of citizenry -- who didn't expand Medicaid (or outright restricted it), supported voter IDs, etc., aren't racists and openly hostile to the poor, disabled, mentally ill.
Fawke Em
(11,366 posts)The "majority" of which you speak are the rural areas.
See... in the South, much like everywhere else, the rural areas vote "red" and the urban areas vote "blue." The difference is that there are more rural areas in the South than, say, in the North or the West coast.
For example, if it weren't for the fact that Pittsburgh and Philadelphia are huge cities, Pennsylvania would be red.
In my own state, Tennessee, all four our our major cities - Memphis, Nashville, Knoxville and Chattanooga - boast Democrats as mayors. We are simply outvoted by our rural neighbors who are fed only a steady diet of right-wing radio, Faux News and conservative local newspapers. They simply, by virtue of their isolation, don't have as many media choices as we in the cities do - so they're brainwashed and kept in the dark.
If you want to effectively change the South (or HEY! How about changing the mid-West, which is CONSIDERABLY more "red" than the South), then you'll need to talk WITH rural voters instead of at them. It wouldn't hurt if some liberals started retiring to our back-woodsy areas, either.
kentauros
(29,414 posts)Ever since I read of the FCC's plan several years ago, I've had this notion that people might begin to spread out into the country, once Internet access is equal to what's available in the cities. Until that happens, I don't see all that many Liberals retiring to rural areas, unless they're looking to set up a farm, winery, or vodka distillery
Fawke Em
(11,366 posts)That's the Battle Flag or Northern Virgina.
I live in the South and don't seem to see these as much as DU would think I should; however, when I do, I always point that out, much to the chagrin of the bearer. LOL.
Aristus
(66,446 posts)They fly it because they know it pisses off un-bigoted, non-racist, un-stupid people.
Fawke Em
(11,366 posts)In the South, many people are conditioned to believe that it's not bigoted. They have been taught over lifetimes that it represents states rights. They honestly believe it's not racist.
This is the conundrum. Like many, many, many wars, the elite sought to enrich their finances and power by coming up with some story that would appeal to the masses so they would have a steady fodder of young men to fight their wars.
Most of the young men who fought in the Civil War on the side of the South were not rich enough to own slaves, so the PTB came up with the "state's rights" story and sold it to the poor and middle class, who, if they knew that it was solely about owning slaves wouldn't have given two hoots about it - since they weren't rich enough to do so.
Lots of wars are like this. Like the wealthy wanting their hands on Iraqi oil, so the nation was sold the "weapons of mass destruction" bill of goods. Or the Gulf of Tonkin.
The Civil War's origins in lies are really no different.
Aristus
(66,446 posts)I'm pretty sure they did, since as long as slavery existed, they themselves would never be at the bottom of the socio-economic ladder.
Poor white Southerners fought just as hard for slavery as slave owners themselves.
The poor, propertyless dirt farmers were fighting for something abstract: their sense of dignity and self-worth, however perverted it might have been by the notion that these qualities were predicated upon the enslavement of people who had done them no harm.
RVN VET
(492 posts)Nobody wants to be on the bottom of the social ladder, the lowest of the low. So the current RW poor and working stiff needs to feel that the Mexicans and, of course (and always) the Blacks are beneath them, are something to be scorned and abused because by scorning and abusing them, you let the upper rungs of the ladder know that you think just like they do and are, therefore, as good as they (the upper rungers) are. Along the same lines, the uneducated among them scorn the educated as ivy tower know-nothing "egg heads" who are really only "book-larned" and devoid of the common sense of the "common man" (who is, by definition, white and blue collar -- whether employed or not). And don't even get them started about the Jews!
Problem is, there are 10s of millions of these folks. They vote. And they vote for the stupid. "They takin' away my food stamps? Yeah, I guess I use food stamps because I'm outta work and my family needs to eat -- but, shoot, if it means keepin' all those unqualified moochers from stealin' from the gummint, then I'm for it." Seriously.
kentauros
(29,414 posts)That is, I live in Texas. I honestly don't recall seeing many of the Confederate flags, whichever ones are which. I would never be able to tell the difference between any of them. The history of the South didn't seem all that important to our schools back in the 1970s as compared to Texas History. When you have an entire high school year dedicated to your state's history, any history, other than that for the US & World, doesn't "rate"
Looking back on it now, it was almost as if we (as in, those that created our curriculum) were "ashamed" we were involved in the Civil War at all, and then didn't want to talk about it, much less teach the "proud" Southern history after the fact. I certainly didn't grow up learning about Southern Pride. Texas Pride, yes, but the rest of the South was another world entirely, and weren't truly a part of them.
Hoyt
(54,770 posts)This is a flag of hatred. Where I live, they had that symbol on the state flag until they realized they better take it off if they wanted to get the Olympics.
FSogol
(45,524 posts)My favorite The Onion Article!
"HUNTSVILLE, ALFor the 135th straight year since Gen. Robert E. Lee's surrender at Appomattox, representatives for the South announced Monday that the region has postponed plans to rise again.
Three of the estimated 45 million Southerners who have not yet gotten around to rising again.
"Make no mistake, the South shall rise again," said Knox Pritchard, president of the Huntsville-based Alliance Of Confederate States. "But we're just not quite ready to do it now. Hopefully, we'll be able to rise again real soon, maybe even in 2001.""
http://www.theonion.com/articles/south-postpones-rising-again-for-yet-another-year,377/
fitman
(482 posts)These flags are everywhere..