The Confederacy (was Re: questions)

[Uday Mohan]

Yes, I know racism exists in the North and elsewhere, but it seems to me
a less overt part of the fabric of life than in the South. That doesn't
take away from its awfulness, but I think there is a qualitative
difference about the South. In 1997 a friend and I travelled around the
US for six weeks on a research trip. We went to a number of states
around the country. Only in the South did I personally feel marginalized
because of my color. In Clinton, Tennessee, a modern-looking
middle-class town, we had to replace our windshield. My friend and I
stood side-by-side while the manager of the auto part store imparted
price, time frame, directions toward food etc. She only spoke to my
friend (also male) during the entire conversation, refusing to look at
me. Further through Tennessee we pulled off the highway to eat at what
turned out to be a shrine to the lost cause. Table mats recounted some
heroic battle fought by the men in grey; photos of blacks picking cotton
hung on the walls on the way to the bathroom; and the following choice
mementoes were on sale at the front of the establishment: little
statuettes of a "pickaninny" eating watermelon and a "mammy" that you
could shake to ring the bell under her skirt. I asked who the place
belonged to: some fucker from the state legislature. Is this sort of
racist pathology--blatant, intensely crude, and politically
legitimate--evident anywhere else in the country the way it is in the
South (and in the white supremacist fringe)? It's the kind of racism in
which you are instantly supposed to know that you and your narrative
don't count and that there is nothing about this that can be negotiated.

Uday

Chris Kromm wrote:
> 
> > Yeah, well, I pretty much grew up in the U.S., been here 33 years, 32 of
> > them in the north, 1 in the South. Only in the South have I been hassled
> > or felt uncomfortable because of my skin color.
> >
> > Uday
> 
> Never been harassed in the North, Midwest or anywhere else? I'd call that
> luck, not analysis. From today's papers:
> 
> UPI: Despite of nearly two years of loud complaints and calls for reform,
> the number of minority traffic stops has gone up in Trenton, New Jersey, and
> its suburbs. The Trenton Star-Ledger says that amid much-publicized calls
> for reform, particularly from civil rights groups, the latest statistics
> show that over 40 percent of traffic stops involved members of minority
> groups . . .
> 
> MINNEAPOLIS STAR TRIBUNE: St. Paul police searched black and hispanic
> drivers or their cars at about twice the rate of white drivers, according to
> an analysis of eight months of traffic stop data.