# To all the ignorant people out there - stop making the South out to be some unique villain. **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [July 2, 2015, 4:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/to-all-the-ignorant-people-out-there-stop-making-the-south-out-to-be-some-unique-villain/724024 "2015-07-02T04:59:29Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Monty](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/monty/32/47_2.png) [@Monty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Monty)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2015, 8:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/to-all-the-ignorant-people-out-there-stop-making-the-south-out-to-be-some-unique-villain/724024/41 "2015-07-02T08:42:05Z")
> [@Shagnasty](#): > > All we ask is that we don’t get ostracized or discriminated against based on our heritage. I say this as somene who grew up in the South. You jerks aren’t getting ostracized based on the disusting heritage you’re celebrating. You’re getting ostracized because of the way you’re celebrating that heritage, and also the timing of the symbols of that celebration/heritage. When the [del]damn Yankee[/del] federal government started forcing your state governments to actually follow the federal laws and {gasp} treat your fellow human beings like they’re human beings, said state governments decided to boldly, proudly, and with a giant “fuck you”, change the state flags to honor the bigotry. That was the stated purpose in changing the damn state flags. Even Georgia managed to pull a “Hail Mary” and remove the confederate symbol without removing the confederate symbol. And this was in 2003. That was just 12 years ago. > [@](#): > > Everything I have seen in the media in the last ten days or so has been hostile to the South even though it was one asshole killing innocent people and almost everyone would be happy to see him go to prison for life or get executed for it. I’m 100% opposed to capital punishment. I’ll be happy to see that asshole get life in prison. I’ll also be happy to see every single other asshole in the South who continues to be a jerk by supporting that horrible symbol of horrible racism–get this: it’s a current symbol of current racism; it was never “co-opted” by racists because it started out as a symbol of racism and it was resurrected as symbol of racism–pull their heads out of their posteriors, quit pretending that they’re not being racist by celebrating with that horribe racist symbol, and start acting like sane people. Tomorrow is July 4th (I’m posting from Beijing). I’ve invited people of a few nationalities over to my apartment. One of the things we’ll be celebrating is the United States of America. One way we will celebrate that is to destroy (probably by burning, but see later) little confederate flags, little Georgia flags, little Tennessee flags, little Florida flags, little Texas flags…well, you get the picture. Some people may even celebrate by pissing on those flags. Good for them, I say. Oh, and the UDC can piss off with their quaint oath to that damn flag. They’re racists, too. The hostility you clowns are getting from the media and other quarters is hostility you brought on yourself. ---
**Author:** ![Monty](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/monty/32/47_2.png) [@Monty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Monty)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2015, 8:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/to-all-the-ignorant-people-out-there-stop-making-the-south-out-to-be-some-unique-villain/724024/42 "2015-07-02T08:49:51Z")
> [@Shagnasty](#): > > However, Southerners as whole joined the U.S. again and are among the most patriotic of all groups. As a whole and patriotic to the USA? Well, yeah, I guess that’s true. But only if you ignore the creation of the KKK. Seriously, **Shagnasty**. Where did you learn American history? ---
**Author:** ![Monty](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/monty/32/47_2.png) [@Monty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Monty)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2015, 9:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/to-all-the-ignorant-people-out-there-stop-making-the-south-out-to-be-some-unique-villain/724024/43 "2015-07-02T09:04:19Z")
> [@Monty](#): > > Tomorrow is July 4th (I’m posting from Beijing). Should be: > [@](#): > > The day after tomorrow is July 4th (I’m posting from Beijing). ---
**Author:** ![elbows](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/b3f665/32.png) [@elbows](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elbows)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2015, 11:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/to-all-the-ignorant-people-out-there-stop-making-the-south-out-to-be-some-unique-villain/724024/44 "2015-07-02T11:52:14Z")
Yes, yes, so very patriotic. Until the supremes don’t see it their way. Then it’s all activist judges, 9 unelected lawyers, and evil incarnate! We ALL elected the persons charged with filling that bench. We the people. ---
**Author:** ![Emiliana](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/f0a364/32.png) [@Emiliana](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Emiliana)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2015, 1:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/to-all-the-ignorant-people-out-there-stop-making-the-south-out-to-be-some-unique-villain/724024/45 "2015-07-02T13:08:12Z")
> [@BigT](#): > > Shaggy, you’re the guy who had a genuine black Mammy growing up, and still don’t see the problem with that. Your ability to detect racism is not very high. > > \ This pretty much sums it up. ---
**Author:** ![Bridget\_Burke](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7cd45c/32.png) [@Bridget\_Burke](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bridget_Burke)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2015, 1:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/to-all-the-ignorant-people-out-there-stop-making-the-south-out-to-be-some-unique-villain/724024/46 "2015-07-02T13:13:01Z")
> [@Locrian](#): > > Bible Belt = ‘Nuff said. (Or is that Sho’ 'nuff said?) > > Sorry, religion and slavery both make me equally sick, so no trips to Texas, the unsightly Oklahoma and no trips to Qatar either. Tennessee was scary enough. 😃 > > I’d be ecstatic if Texas, Oklahoma, Louisiana, Georgia, Alabama and South Carolina made their own country. Hey, their textbooks would make them REAL competitive. And as for Florida, we just sell it to Cuba for 1,000 bucks. That’s a profit. Ah, someone who preferred General McClellan and regarded Grant & Sherman as a bit lower class. Either let the secessionists leave or cut a deal–then settle down into a tight, white, Protestant little country. Let the Irish Papists stay on the bottom rung; things will remain a bit too stagnant to attract other immigrants. We’re ready to celebrate the Declaration of Independence–with those ringing words of freedom written by a pioneer in scientific racism. (Read _Notes on the State of Virginia_.) The USA began with a devil’s compromise because Virginia was too important. Washington believed in one country & had commanded black troops; the will freeing his slaves was a bit late but no other slaveholding president did as much. That generation of patriotic slaveholders at least gave lip service to ending slavery–but shipping the freed slaves far away was too expensive & supporting that gracious way of life kept them indebted. Then they died off & the rich Southerners declared slavery a positive good. So good they decided to break the Union. Lincoln believed the Civil War was a judgment on the whole country for the compromise. But the price was paid in blood & the Union survived. I’ve always regarded the Battle Flag as trashy. Does anybody remember that less publicized recent decision–where the Supremes told the Sons of Confederate Losers that, no, the State of Texas was \*not \*requried to put the Battle Flag on license plates? Does anybody remember how Governor Sam Houston preached against secession & was removed from office because he would not swear allegiance to the CSA? History is fascinating & complicated. Looking around, the North/South divide isn’t that meaningful to me. The SPLC finds [KKK groups all over](http://www.splcenter.org/get-informed/intelligence-files/ideology/ku-klux-klan/active_hate_groups). In the latest controversy, the urban Texas counties have been issuing marriage licenses to all while some podunk hellholes continue to drag their feet; time will tell. (And I’m pretty damn sure those whose “Sincere Religious Convictions” prevent them from doing their jobs have racial & ethnic prejudices to match.) ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2015, 1:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/to-all-the-ignorant-people-out-there-stop-making-the-south-out-to-be-some-unique-villain/724024/47 "2015-07-02T13:30:33Z")
> [@Shagnasty](#): > > As a Southerner by upbringing and a long heritage, I have found it astounding how quickly the rest of the country has turned against . . . . . . racism. The South gets singled out only because it has a flag representing same which some stubbornly and fatuously persist as a symbol of regional “heritage.” ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2015, 1:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/to-all-the-ignorant-people-out-there-stop-making-the-south-out-to-be-some-unique-villain/724024/48 "2015-07-02T13:32:39Z")
> [@Shagnasty](#): > > However, Southerners as whole joined the U.S. again and are among the most patriotic of all groups. It’s the only region where the concepts of “secession” and “nullification” are ever even still a thing. It’s a region where people hate the United States government more than in any other. It’s a region where “patriotism” only ever seems to come in play when it involves the chance to fight a war. ---
**Author:** ![Cheesesteak](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cheesesteak/32/3694_2.png) [@Cheesesteak](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cheesesteak)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2015, 1:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/to-all-the-ignorant-people-out-there-stop-making-the-south-out-to-be-some-unique-villain/724024/49 "2015-07-02T13:41:39Z")
> [@Shagnasty](#): > > All we ask is that we don’t get ostracized or discriminated against based on our heritage. This is the problem, you fuckers treat this like it’s “heritage” instead of “historical embarrassment”. The Battle Flag is flown with PRIDE, pride that, in order to continue enslaving people, the South started, and LOST, a war that killed a half million people. How about choosing something fine and good that folks from the South have done, and make THAT your heritage, instead of the single most reprehensible collection of acts in the history of the South. America (and Europeans before we were formed) have done a whole lot of terrible things, but that’s not part of our heritage, it’s just part of our history. It’s not celebrated, it’s acknowledged. ---
**Author:** ![jimbuff314](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/c57346/32.png) [@jimbuff314](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jimbuff314)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2015, 1:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/to-all-the-ignorant-people-out-there-stop-making-the-south-out-to-be-some-unique-villain/724024/50 "2015-07-02T13:45:36Z")
> [@Shagnasty](#): > > […] I am getting different numbers than you are but it is indisputable that New England was the major slave trading center until the trans-Atlantic trade was abolished and **owners had to work with existing stock.** > […] [emphasis added] Black mammy notwithstanding, I cannot imagine anyone without racist roots making such a statement about human beings. That aside, why does Oklahoma get dragged into this shit? It didn’t even _exist_ at the time! ---
**Author:** ![iiandyiiii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iiandyiiii/32/7924_2.png) [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2015, 1:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/to-all-the-ignorant-people-out-there-stop-making-the-south-out-to-be-some-unique-villain/724024/51 "2015-07-02T13:54:58Z")
I’m a Southerner – born in Georgia, grew up in Louisiana and (briefly) Arkansas, and went to LSU. Until the idea that the historical South was anything but a monstrously evil culture built on slavery, degradation, and dehumanization, that happened to have a few non-evil cultural characteristics like great food, then Southerners will continue to endure criticism of the sort in this thread. This doesn’t mean that the rest of the US at the time was great and a haven for civil rights – it wasn’t – in fact, it was pretty awful… it just wasn’t quite as bad as the South (except for the parts that allowed slavery), but there’s a big giant difference – **the rest of the US eventually accepted that this stuff was monstrously evil eventually and ended it by choice, in general, while the South and Southern white people never did (in general) and it was ended by force**. That’s what it will take, in my mind. Southern white people have to accept that, in many ways we’re like the descendants of Nazi Germans, just a bit farther removed from the atrocities. That doesn’t mean we should feel shame or guilt – I don’t feel any shame or guilt for any bad actions by my ancestors (who, coincidentally, are almost half Southern white, half escaped-from-Europe Ashkenazi Jews, and about 1/32nd black). But we should recognize that, in general, _the historical South should not be celebrated in any way_ – that it was a bad, dark place, filled with suffering and evil, and to not recognize it as such is willful blindness, willful ignorance, and willful disrespect of the suffering of all those slaves and all those who suffered under Jim Crow and segregation. ---
**Author:** ![carnivorousplant](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnivorousplant/32/3563_2.png) [@carnivorousplant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnivorousplant)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2015, 1:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/to-all-the-ignorant-people-out-there-stop-making-the-south-out-to-be-some-unique-villain/724024/52 "2015-07-02T13:55:08Z")
Shagnasty, you shouldn’t try to teach a pig to sing. You waste your time, and you annoy the pig. ---
**Author:** ![magellan01](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@magellan01](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/magellan01)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2015, 1:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/to-all-the-ignorant-people-out-there-stop-making-the-south-out-to-be-some-unique-villain/724024/53 "2015-07-02T13:57:37Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > It’s the only region where the concepts of “secession” and “nullification” are ever even still a thing. It’s a region where people hate the United States government more than in any other. It’s a region where “patriotism” only ever seems to come in play when it involves the chance to fight a war. This is an impressively stupid post, even for you. And that’s definitely saying something. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2015, 1:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/to-all-the-ignorant-people-out-there-stop-making-the-south-out-to-be-some-unique-villain/724024/54 "2015-07-02T13:59:32Z")
400 years of heritage and the OP is whining about the four years his ancestors were at their most dickish? Cry me a river. ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2015, 2:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/to-all-the-ignorant-people-out-there-stop-making-the-south-out-to-be-some-unique-villain/724024/55 "2015-07-02T14:04:54Z")
> [@Shagnasty](#): > > The South was the loser in the Civil War and still has to take the blame for everything associated with slavery to this day. Let me tell you a story about two brothers, John and Mike. John was the elder of the two, and liked to smoke weed. He continued smoking weed right up into adulthood, in fact. He quit at 35, after 17 years. Mike was three years younger. Just as John stopped smoking pot, Mike started. In fact, he started going to John’s old dealer. One day, Mike was pulled over with a dime bag, and arrested. John was in the back of the car, but had no drugs on his person and was allowed to go. The cop even phoned in for a ride home for him. “It’s not fair,” said Mike, “he smoked pot for damn near 20 years and I just started!” The cop looked at him thoughtfully, and said, “hey, that _isn’t_ fair at all! You’re right.” So he let Mike go and arrested John instead. ---
**Author:** ![watchwolf49](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/e9c0ed/32.png) [@watchwolf49](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/watchwolf49)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2015, 2:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/to-all-the-ignorant-people-out-there-stop-making-the-south-out-to-be-some-unique-villain/724024/56 "2015-07-02T14:08:28Z")
But the South is a unique villain in the USA … no other region has such a nasty reputation of racism, under-education or government corruption. The only ignorance is to believe it’s a _completely_ deserved reputation, and I agree not every soul in the South is a racist. However … Within living memory, there existed **LAWS** in the Southern States _requiring_ racism … damage done … you-uns have a hell of a lot of work to fix that. And thank you to the OP and those like him who are trying to get it fixed … ---
**Author:** ![Small\_Hen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ad7895/32.png) [@Small\_Hen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Small_Hen)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2015, 2:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/to-all-the-ignorant-people-out-there-stop-making-the-south-out-to-be-some-unique-villain/724024/57 "2015-07-02T14:18:17Z")
> [@Monty](#): > > Tomorrow is July 4th (I’m posting from Beijing). I’ve invited people of a few nationalities over to my apartment. One of the things we’ll be celebrating is the United States of America. One way we will celebrate that is to destroy (probably by burning, but see later) little confederate flags, little Georgia flags, little Tennessee flags, little Florida flags, little Texas flags…well, you get the picture. Some people may even celebrate by pissing on those flags. Good for them, I say. I find this to be a rather ugly way for you to display your “national pride” in front of a group of people who may very well have never been to the United States. I hope they have other personal frames of reference for Americans that a man who symbolically denounces millions upon millions of his fellow county-people without any regard for what their ideology might be. I hate the Confederate flag, and would have no issue publicly burning it. It is a symbol of hate. My state flag is not a symbol of hate. Why would you treat it as such? ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2015, 2:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/to-all-the-ignorant-people-out-there-stop-making-the-south-out-to-be-some-unique-villain/724024/58 "2015-07-02T14:23:28Z")
> [@Shagnasty](#): > > It was once legal in all of the original 13 colonies plus many more as states were added. If you are from New York, New Jersey, Connecticut, Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, New Hampshire, Rhode Island or any of the early states, they had slavery too. The difference is we don’t embrace that part of our history the way southerners do. We don’t turn our old slave markets into historical sites, we don’t re-enact slave auctions, we don’t print up and sell reproductions of bills of trade, we don’t put up statues to slave traders, we don’t talk about how those were the “good old days”. We treat slavery the same way we treat killing Indians and burning witches - yes, it happened, but we feel bad about it and we’d rather talk about some other part of our long history. We certainly don’t declare that it’s our “heritage”. We’d have no problem with letting the Civil War fade into history. We’ve done that. We don’t talk about the Civil War all the time. That’s on you guys. Southerners are the ones keeping the Civil War alive in popular culture. All we’re doing is noticing what you’re doing. ---
**Author:** ![Omar\_Little](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/omar_little/32/269_2.png) [@Omar\_Little](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Omar_Little)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2015, 2:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/to-all-the-ignorant-people-out-there-stop-making-the-south-out-to-be-some-unique-villain/724024/59 "2015-07-02T14:48:51Z")
> [@Cheesesteak](#): > > America (and Europeans before we were formed) have done a whole lot of terrible things, but that’s not part of our heritage, it’s just part of our history. It’s not celebrated, it’s acknowledged. I don’t know…one might argue that by giving permission to all of the native American tribes to open casinos for the enjoyment and entertainment of the rest of us, celebrates the white man’s victory over them. > [@](#): > > Dixie And when are we getting rid of those fucking cups!?! ---
**Author:** ![Love\_Rhombus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/love_rhombus/32/10694_2.png) [@Love\_Rhombus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Love_Rhombus)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2015, 2:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/to-all-the-ignorant-people-out-there-stop-making-the-south-out-to-be-some-unique-villain/724024/60 "2015-07-02T14:49:22Z")
> [@Little\_Nemo](#): > > we don’t re-enact slave auctions, Wait, people actually do that? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/to-all-the-ignorant-people-out-there-stop-making-the-south-out-to-be-some-unique-villain/724024.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/to-all-the-ignorant-people-out-there-stop-making-the-south-out-to-be-some-unique-villain/724024.md?page=4)