A Slightly Hopeful Note on the Racial Situation
06/06/2016
Never let it be said that I'm all doom and gloom. This is from a review in the March New Criterion of a book called Dispatches from Pluto: Lost and Found in the Mississippi Delta, a rather interesting-sounding book about an English journalist who went to live in the Mississippi Delta. As will come as no surprise at all to anyone who knows the South, the reality of what he found there did not match the standard caricature. The reviewer, Richard Tillinghast, says:
The observations made by Bill Luckett, Mayor of Clarksdale and Morgan Freeman’s business partner, ring true from my own experience: “You’ve got five to ten percent on either side who hate. Most folks get along now, treat each other with politeness, courtesy, and respect, and that’s really all you can ask for. We don’t all have to be best friends.”
That rings true to my own experience, too. I just got back from the post office, where I listened to the friendly banter between the black man ahead of me in the line and the white woman behind the counter. "Have a blessed day," said the man as he left. "Thank you, and happy Monday," said the clerk. This is in my experience by far the most typical sort of encounter between the races. It would be foolish to pretend that racism, mild and severe, does not still exist. But every day I see--well, I used to see, before I stopped going in to work every day--people of all races working together and generally going about their business with, as the mayor says, politeness, courtesy, and respect to each other. The question for us now is whether this quiet movement will be stronger than the efforts to exacerbate the divisions. And let's not pretend that there are not parties on both sides who are doing that, for reasons which are mostly obscure to me.
I'm also reminded of something from several years ago which made me want to jump up and cheer. Artur Davis, at the time a Congressman from Alabama, was running for governor. In an interview, asked about racial opposition to him, he said (I paraphrase from memory), "There are a certain number of people who will vote against me just because of my race. There are a certain number who will vote for me just because of my race. I can't worry much about either of those groups. I just have to make my case to the others."
That's the attitude we need: not an absurd and contradictory demand that race be emphasized at all time so as to eliminate awareness of race...or something...but an acceptance of difference, and realism about the intractable nature of racial prejudice combined with a determination to remain above it. A tendency toward hostility among social groups (ethnic as well as any other, including allegiance to an football team) is as much a part of human nature as the very existence of social groups. It will never disappear completely. But we don't have to feed it.
Unfortunately Davis did not make it out of the Democratic primary. Having voted against Obamacare, he was all but expelled from the party. I'm not sure what he's doing now.
Here's a link to that book review, though the full text may not be available to non-subscribers.
Roll Tide Mac, Roll Tide.
Posted by: Stu | 06/06/2016 at 02:43 PM
Death to Auburn.
And Tennessee.
Also LSU.
Posted by: Mac | 06/06/2016 at 03:34 PM
I don't know if it's "only in the South", probably not, just the place I have lived where college football is the most rabid. But it amuses me that those who follow one school's program crazily not only dislike the other school's team, but also their students, their alumni, their fans, to the point that they disparage everything about them and are completely disgusted at their existence. I'm thinking, "isn't it just another state institution just like yours which is probably way more alike than different?"
Oh, maybe that is the point of your post.
Posted by: Stu | 06/07/2016 at 01:43 PM
I'm glad to see you've spared the team that beat you.
AMDG
Posted by: Janet | 06/07/2016 at 02:08 PM
Two years in a row.
AMDG
Posted by: Janet | 06/07/2016 at 02:09 PM
Who knew Janet was an Ole Miss fan? It was Ole Miss, right?
Posted by: Stu | 06/07/2016 at 03:42 PM
Recent Ole Miss wins are dismissible as flukes. If the behavior continues they might be worthy of hate. Last season's late collapse was well received.
There does seem to be sort of a consensus that the Alabama-Auburn rivalry is the craziest in college football.
Posted by: Mac | 06/07/2016 at 05:32 PM
I'm not sure why the fact that you were defeated by flukemen makes it any better.
AMDG
Posted by: Janet | 06/07/2016 at 05:45 PM
Anybody could be beaten by flukemen.
Posted by: Mac | 06/08/2016 at 08:37 AM
Eaten, did you say?
AMDG
Posted by: Janet | 06/08/2016 at 09:04 AM
What I really like about this blog is that we can turn a serious discussion about race into a discussion of flukemen.
AMDG
Posted by: Janet | 06/08/2016 at 09:20 AM