At least 9 dead in church shooting in SC

Parent Cafe
381

“emilybee, I don’t think it’s racism; I think it’s people trying to make a fast buck.”

By buying Confederate Flags and then selling them to racists? Who else, besides a racist, is going to be buying these flags?

“Let the purge begin.”

I think the statutes of these men are a bit different. People don’t walk around with pictures of these men on their shirts, on their license plates or wave flags with their pictures on them. They aren’t the chosen symbol of racist hate groups. 99.9 percent of the people wouldn’t even be able to tell you who these men are.

382

Sorry, but that doesn’t fit the media’s preferred narrative about religious people.

383

You mean the same legislature and governor that supported having the flag there as recently as a month ago?

384

Yep - those same ones. Change has to happen somewhere. Many of them likely only supported it out of political expediency so they may not have had a true change of heart just a new reading of the direction of the prevailing winds.

385

I was wondering what Amazon would do RE battle flag merch as Bezos is a Libertarian, but he seems to have joined the bandwagon late putting his company’s image (for once) over his personal political principles. I can’t say where he stands on it morally. No, even Amazon cannot end racism or even make everyone hold hands and sing Kumbaya, but it’s one more step in the right direction so I’ll take it.

386

I hold no brief for “the Lost Cause.” IMHO, they were traitors fighting for an exploitative, racist system. The rank and file who were in the majority that didn’t own slaves were still deeply vested in the notion that they were at least inherently superior to blacks. The South benefited greatly in the Electoral College by counting black people as a fraction of a person, even though that fractional person had no rights. The fact that slavery continued after the revolution was shameful, IMHO, as was the Dredd Scott decision. The events in Bloody Kansas and the Missouri Compromise showed just how devoted to the cause of slavery they were. The existence of Jim Crow shows how deeply embedded in Southern society racism was…and in some quarters, still is.

At the same time, one must have historical imagination. One must look at someone like Thomas Jefferson and realize that Sally Hemmings was his late wife’s half sister. That a constitution that did away with slavery would never have been ratified. And so on. One must understand that for many–and quite possibly many in the North, also-- the loyalty to one’s state was greater than to the Union at that time when the nation was new. One must understand that there were deeply conflicted individuals such as Robert E. Lee, who wished to free his own slaves, but was prevented by the laws of Virginia from simply doing so, since those people would have to immediately leave the state, leaving all friends and family behind. He felt responsibility for their futures. He thought he ought to find places for them to live and work, rather than simply cutting them loose. (Or so I have read.) Perhaps he should have just done so anyway. But it is easy for us to say.

It was not a minor matter for him to forswear his oath as an officer in the US Army. I think that the magnificent book by Michael Shaara, The Killer Angels, captures the subtleties of the time very well, as does the movie Gettysburg, which is closely based on the book. (The later books by Jeff Shaara, his son and research assistant, are nowhere near that quality, and the sequel to the movie, backed by Ted Turner, is a disgusting piece of Southern Lost Cause apologism that I was tempted to walk out of.)

One must acknowledge that some free black people were slave owners, as bizarre as that seems. One must acknowledge that there were some white slave owners who fathered children with black women who were in essence their wives, and not only recognized them but saw that they were educated and left property to them. And yet there were other men who treated their own children like chattel.

Nothing is really that simple, and it is not wise to severely judge historical figures by modern standards. Don’t forget that black men had the vote long before women of any race. Many champions of human rights didn’t extend that to their own wives.

387

Consolation: You are right. History is more nuanced than those who haven’t studied it extensively know. In my own family, Missourians, one g-g-g-uncle owned two slaves. But he fought for the Union. His brother, my ancestor, owned no slaves. Indeed, he as justice of the peace, married slaves even though Missouri law made it illegal to do so. He also fought for the Union. U. S. Grant’s wife owned slaves.

George Washington was the only slave owning president to free his slaves on his death. He died in 1799. By the mid-1800’s land in Virginia was losing value fast, partly due to the opening of more land through the Louisiana Purchase, partly due to being played out through tobacco. Jefferson and Madison could not have afforded to free their slaves or Martha Jefferson, Jefferson’s surviving daughter and Dolley Madison, would have been left penniless. Yes, Jefferson was a big spender who guaranteed bad loans. But other Virginia planters were in the same situation. To do the right thing and free the slaves would have destituted their families. And their creditors wouldn’t have allowed it. By the time of Jefferson’s death, Monticello was in bad repair.

Freed slaves had to leave the state. So if they had families on other plantations, they would never see them again.

And Consolation is right. The champions of women’s right to vote were absolutely livid that uneducated black males, former slaves, were able to vote before educated women could. And they said so in language that would be viewed as very racist today.

388

There is no Soviet style purge going on. Southern townsfolk have been removing Confederate statues from town squares for years. And street names have been changed before. Twenty years ago the State of Washington renamed a state highway that had been named after a Confederate officer. Times have changed, sometimes with great contention, but always in a democratic way.

389

I wanted to add, on the subject of freeing slaves, that my first UU congregation, The UU Church in Westport, , owns a table given by the descendants of a woman who used her entire inheritance to purchase the freedom of her family’s slaves. This was after the American Civil War, in either Cuba or Peutro Rico, I can’t recall. The table is that upon which she signed the papers for each person.

What courage! While our founding fathers pledged their lives, their fortunes, and their sacred honor, it meant something that many today cannot fathom.

I believe that MLK was correct when he said that the arc of history bends toward justice.

390

I suspect that some of you who are so quick to condemn the flag are not even from the South, and that some of you who so quickly throw around the word “treason” assume that the world of 1860 was exactly like the world of 2015.

Question: If Greece announces today that they are leaving the European Union and a war erupts which they lose, and thus they are forced to remain, are they all guilty of “treason?” Does anyone not grasp the idea that in 1860 the issue of whether or not a state might secede simply was not settled. An issue that is absolutely settled today might not have been absolutely settled in 1860. So a war that erupts in such a situation does not involve “treason.”

Consolation mentions a woman who used her inheritance to free her family’s slaves. There was a Mississippi man who died around 1840 who ordered that his slaves be freed and given passage to Liberia with some money should they wish it. After some years of court challenge the will was upheld and a number of them did indeed go to Liberia, where they essentially tried to replicate the social order that they learned from their masters. Most of their descendents became part of the Liberian elite, but most were killed during the Liberian civil war. Kind of an interesting story.

391

Odd that in the call for a purge of names and statues of Confederates, I haven’t read any calling for a purge of the name of a former senator who had been a Grand Dragon of the KKK and who refused to serve in the military because he would be alongside black people. And this much more recently than the Civil War. His name is on federal courthouses, bridges, streets, highways and a prison (just to name a few). I’m talking about Robert Byrd of West Virginia.

392

Many people from all parts of the political spectrum and from all regions have held views, belonged to groups and espoused causes that they later came to honestly regret and denounce. People change and should be allowed to change. Now they say that there position is “evolving” on a subject. Certainly no person is locked into one belief without option to grow and mature in their views. Many people from all parts of the political spectrum have publicly supported positions out of political expediency as well. It isn’t admirable but it also isn’t unique to any party.

393

People of the past should not be judged by today’s standards. Someone who lived in the 20th century and held KKK views can be judged more harshly IMHO.

394

That is true. And people who revere and celebrate those views in the 21st century can be judged more harshly still.

395

In reading the comments sections on some of the articles on removing Confederate symbols, I came across one who wanted to blow up Stone Mountain, Georgia. It brought to mind the Taliban blowing up the Buddhas.

396

Byrd lived roughly 50 more years after he gave up his Klan membership. From Wikipedia:

Byrd joined with Democratic senators to filibuster the Civil Rights Act of 1964,[30] personally filibustering the bill for 14 hours, a move he later said he regretted.[31] Despite an 83-day filibuster in the Senate, both parties in Congress voted overwhelmingly in favor of the Act, and President Johnson signed the bill into law.[32] Byrd also opposed the Voting Rights Act of 1965 but voted for the Civil Rights Act of 1968. In 2005, Byrd told The Washington Post that his membership in the Baptist church led to a change in his views. In the opinion of one reviewer, Byrd, like other Southern and border-state Democrats, came to realize that he would have to temper “his blatantly segregationist views” and move to the Democratic Party mainstream if he wanted to play a role nationally.[12]

So Byrd worked against civil rights then eventually voted for them. Maybe it really was a Baptist awakening and maybe it had more to do with political expediency. Either way over the next 30 or so years he did “evolve”.

397

@EarlVanDorn

The EU is not a country. And Greece is only under threat of leaving the EuroZone, not the EU. There are already a bunch of countries that are members of the EU but not the EuroZone.

398

This . . . I am incredibly moved by the words of Paul Thurmond on the floor of the state house. Scroll down for the video.

http://www.postandcourier.com/article/20150623/PC16/150629748/1177/paul-thurmond-calls-for-flag-to-come-down

399

@saintfan, thanks for posting that. A great speech.

400

Even though heretofore, I had no idea who Paul Thurmund was, I must express how very proud he’s made me. He has encouraged me that my often tattered faith in humankind persists not in vain, because, despite his long heritage of cultural and ancestral racism, he has chosen to break free and stand in the light. He should serve as an example to all the apologist, and deniers. He is a signifier of the inevitable change that’s soon to come to the grounds of the South Carolina Statehouse; the arc of America’s ideals bending closer and closer to justice. Hallehlua!