>A lot of white people in the states which once made up the confederacy now
>understand this equation. Many others, of course, still do not. But
history is
>against these reactionaries. When even the South Carolina legislature can
vote to
>remove the confederate flag from the top of the state capitol building,
then the
>times are a changing.
This only happened grudgingly as a longstanding boycott against the entire
state began to take a cumulative economic effect, and 50,000 strong crowds
agitated on the Capital steps. The vast majority of white folk in SC
stubbornly continued to support flying the stars and bars, until the
petit-bourgeoisie began to get hit hard in the pocket book.
>
>This week in Mississippi, deepest south of the deep south, they voted to
hold a
>referendum on removing the confederate emblem from the state flag, of
which it
>currently occupies about a quarter.
The referendum is being called by CONFEDERACY SUPPORTERS, who know that
whites still block vote, even on outlandish hot button issues like this,
and it is designed to give them "democratic" cover.
>
>Gradually, the south is rising above confederate nostalgia. It is taking
time, but
>it is happening, even if gradually. More and more people recognise that
confederacy
>commemoration is simply not as important for modern America as racial
equality.
>Unfortunately, two of those who don't get it are on the verge of joining
the Bush
>administration.
If only it were true. It is not confederacy commemoration that is going
on. Therefore, CC is not what is counterposed to racial equality--which
has never been a goal of Republicans, Democrats, Conservatives, or
Liberals. That's why "equal opportunity" became the mantra after
McCarthyism turned its guns on the anti-colonial, pan-Africanists like
DuBois (also a communist), and "leaders" from the black colonial-surrogate
bourgeoisie began hanging out with the ruling class and pretending to be
spokespersons for African-Americans.
The Guardian--far away like the passengers on an airplane who see pretty
patchworks below--is engaging in terribly wishful thinking. Mississippians
repeatedly elect Trent Lott, a senator who is associated with the Council
of Conservative Citizens, a KKK-like front group that advocates
aggressively for white purity against "mongrelization," and for the
supremacy of the WASP male.
Contrary to the gradual progress the Guardian describes, MS and other
places are experiencing a deep and abrupt regression, sometimes called
white backlash, now emboldened by conservative courts. The white "middle
class" is up to their neck in it, too. Racial polarity is starker than it
has been in years, but the right wants us to shut up about it. By naming
it, they say we are creating it... stirring up the natives, you see, who
were happy just to stay in their places before we agitators came along.
"I am not a Marxist."
-Karl Marx
"Mask no difficulties."
-Amilcar Cabral
"Am I to be cursed forever with becoming
somebody else on the way to myself?
-Audre Lorde
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