Here’s the best part: the store was
managed by two extremely amusing black people who
loved their
Southern heritage.
This is what has happened since:
A couple weeks ago, I
wrote about two boys in Missouri who were suspended
from school after unfurling a Confederate flag at a
multicultural (gag)
assembly.
The response from our readers was
overwhelming—and overwhelmingly outrage at this PC
atrocity.
So I looked into the issue a bit
further and found a story of two girls at a school in
Texas who met a similar fate over their handbags.
The girls carried "rebel purses"
to school which had the rebel flag (the
Battle Flag of the Armies of Northern Virginia)
painted on one side.
Rather than surrender their
apparently offensive handbags to the principal, the
girls agreed to leave the school for the day.
They also refused to stop carrying
their "rebel purses" and the school continues to
send them home—their parents are fighting the district
as we speak. [Girls
to fight ban on rebel-flag purses, by Jim
Douglas, WFAA-TV, January 7, 2006]
Then I saw an article written by
somebody called Tim Wise for Counterpunch called
Racism, Neo-Confederacy and the Raising of Historical
Illiterates [February 3, 2006.]
First of all, do you think Tim Wise
could have fit more liberal buzz words into that title
if he tried?
The only one missing is
"white supremacy." But not to worry, that one
gets ample playing time in the actual article.
Wise addressed the flag fracas down
in Texas and the student revolt that ensued following
the girls’ dismissal from school.
Several students began carrying
purses and school bags with the word "censored"
written across the front. Mr. Wise wrote:
"[the
students responded] by plastering ‘censored’ signs
over their purses (be they rebel or not) and book bags,
all the while caring quite little as to how the whole
thing might feel for the statistical handful of blacks
in the school."
This is what his comment sounds
like to me:
The supposed feelings of Black
students are more important than the
constitutionally protected freedoms of everybody
else.
White people may only celebrate
history that is
acceptable to other races.
In contrast, non-white races may
take pride in and celebrate the history of anything
they want.
It’s actually worse than that.
Once-upon-a-time during a dinner
discussion (at a political function no less, because I’m
such a genius) I said Nelson Mandela may have done well
for South Africa but that
did not change the fact that he was also
basically, a murderer.
I barely made it out of there
alive—I broke the rules, you see.
Black history (any
non-white actually) is not to be questioned or
criticized. And should you deign to call it
"offensive," you will undoubtedly walk away from the
fray with a special parting gift:
The
label of racist.
After reading his column and
glancing at some of his books, I decided that Tim Wise
is one of the few people I would call an expert.
He’s an expert on
White Liberal Guilt…in fact he might be the Grand
Poobah of the Lodge.
From his website [timwise.org]
"Wise
is the author of
White Like Me: Reflections on Race from a
Privileged Son, NY: Soft Skull Press
(2005); and
Affirmative Action: Racial Preference in Black and
White, NY: Routledge (2005)."
In his anti-Confederate article,
Wise wrote:
"But
what, other than wallowing, and most certainly pitiable,
can we call those who insist on
waving the standard of a
defeated government, some one hundred and forty one
years after it fell?"
What indeed should we call them?
"But what, other than
wallowing and most certainly pitiable, can we call
those who insist" on elevating the worth of one
ethnic heritage above another—by censoring that which is
displeasing to the liberal elite?
(Then again, after glancing at the
content of Mr. Wise’s books I am not sure why they are
not all titled: Why I Hate My Race by Tim Wise.)
Those who hate the Civil War
claim that it was about slavery because they have
to…how else can they justify more than a century’s worth
of guilt and compensation?
Was slavery wrong? Absolutely!
But there is more to American
history than our moral blemishes. And there is more to
this war than a single hot-button issue.
More soldiers died at the Battle of
Gettysburg alone than during the Revolutionary
War, the War of 1812, the
Mexican War and the Spanish-American War
combined.
This was a war that saw a man
killing his own brother…literally.
This was a war that saw our nation
split in half—12 states (arguably 13) seceded from the
Union.
Maybe we have become desensitized
to the magnitude of such an occurrence. But a lot of
Americans at the time were angry enough to take up arms
against the federal government.
My Lord, are we to believe that all
of this was because of slavery…just slavery?
Are we to believe that man was
willing to kill his neighbor, his fellow countryman and
indeed, his own brother just to preserve the slave labor
on his plantation?
That is beyond ridiculous and I
refuse to believe that even the liberal elite (Tim Wise)
really believe it.
Here’s the bottom line:
I don’t care what started the Civil
War…I don’t care if Lincoln just lost a bet with Davis
and the bullets started flying.
I don’t care if it was about
slavery…I don’t care if the Confederate flag reminds
people about slavery.
We should accept American history
for exactly what it is…not what we think it should have
been or what we need it to be.
The Civil War and the Confederate
Battle Flag should not be
reduced to a symbol so that professional
guilt-mongers can
point and say "see…see, racism is alive and well
so let’s
throw more money at the phony idea of social
equality."
Hmm…people like Tim Wise (email
him) should be careful.
If they succeed in removing
Confederate symbols from society, what would they left
to complain about?
Oh, wait—that other banner of
slaveholders—Old Glory itself!
Bryanna Bevens [email
her] is a political consultant and former chief of staff
for a member of the California State Assembly.
