0 comment Monday, October 27, 2014 | admin
Some things never change. For example there are the politically correct myths regarding racial matters that keep getting passed around, even in the right-wing/race-realist blogosphere.
There is certainly no shortage of racially-charged stories in the news lately, what with the Tea Party/NAACP episode, and theShirley Sherrod controversy. It seems that racial controversies are cropping up everywhere since, oh, say, January of 2009. And the way many of us react to them is, unfortunately, influenced by many of the myths that persist.
Some of the PC myths that are widely accepted even among 'right-wing' White people are myths such as the following:
'Black people picked all the cotton in the past; thus mentions of cotton and picking cotton are racist by definition. Such mentions refer to slavery and Jim Crow.'
Or this broad claim, which is of fairly recent coinage:
'Blacks/slaves built America. Slaves built D.C., New York, and all the great cities. It was all built on the backs of slaves, who often died in the course of the hard labor involved.'
A variation on this alleges that blacks did all menial jobs and manual labor, while Whites, coddled by something called 'White Privilege', sat back and watched in comfort.
While it's pretty hard to disprove the idea that blacks 'built this country' (although immigrant advocates now claim that immigrants built this country; Whitey was only a spectator) it is hard to prove such a sweeping claim. First of all, blacks are now only about 13 percent of the population. How could such a small percentage of people, who were, pre-WWI, concentrated in the South, take credit for building the cities and anything else of note in this country? Many of the slaves were also agricultural workers and house-servants; were they hired out on Sundays to build skyscrapers and bridges? The whole idea that they were everywhere building this country is absurd.
As for blacks picking all the cotton, the older folks down South will tell you that poor Whites did a great deal of the picking; it was backbreaking, hard work, and the wages were minuscule, but poor Whites worked just as hard as any slave, perhaps harder, because they had to work to house and feed themselves unlike the slaves who had food and shelter guaranteed to them.
These days, of course, many of the former cotton fields are no longer producing cotton; I expect it is all being grown in Pakistan or China or somewhere now, thanks to 'globalism'.
A now-taboo stereotype image of blacks is that of the black shoe-shine man plying his trade in the cities. The fact is there were many White men and boys who shined shoes for a living. I collect old images of daily life, and there are plenty of depictions of poor White boys working as bootblacks and shoe-shine boys. Blacks (and immigrants, for that matter) did not invent hard work, and they didn't do all the lowly jobs.
But speaking of PC mythology, it seems that Sherrod made a public claim that her father was 'lynched' or 'murdered by a White man' and that the crime went unpunished because of prejudice.
Whether this is true or not, I can't judge, but forgive me my skepticism; there have just been too many false claims of 'hate crimes', and these hoaxes have seldom been noted in the controlled media; they prefer to cover up such stories because these hoaxes are awkward for them to deal with. They just don't fit the template of innocent black victimhood and White villainy.
But as to the larger story of lynching, it's a belief among most Whites that blacks were lynched on a grand scale back in the Bad Old Days ''just for being black', or just because Whites were so depraved and hateful.
To hear it told, it would seem that tens of thousands of innocent blacks were lynched for no reason in the days of Jim Crow. However, statistics don't seem to bear that belief out. I invite everybody to search out statistics; I've quoted them here or on the Forum in the past. One fact that needs to be emphasized is that people of all races were lynched. That means White people were lynched by White people. But to acknowledge that would be to cast doubt on the idea that lynchings were always 'race hate crimes.' Such was not the case. In the past here on this blog, I posted text from a news article about a near-lynching in the 1930s in Louisiana. The man who was almost lynched was an accused sex offender, and was apparently White.
The fact is, such things happened in the case of crimes involving sex offenses, especially where children were the victims, or in cases of brutal murders. Whites were not exempted from being lynched.
Almost all such cases involved violent crimes.
The issue was covered in a book review by Dwight D. Murphey at TOQ. Murphey says, in discussing a left-wing author's book on lynchings, that
Robert Zangrando, in his book The NAACP Crusade against Lynching, 1909-1950, indicates a total of 4,742 between 1882 and 1968; Of these, he says, 1,297 were white and 3,445 black; (The New York Times has on at least two occasions reported that all those lynched then were black, but that was the result either of the particular author's dishonesty or sloppiness.)
The number of fewer than 5,000 lynchings over 87 years is hardly "meaningless" when we compare it with the 85 to 100 million victims of Communism estimated by several prominent European scholars in their recent Black Book of Communism. Consider, also, the list published in Insight magazine of just the more recent genocidal killings: Sudan, where 1.5 million plus are dead; Rwanda, where estimates range from 500,000 to 800,000; East Timor, at least 100,000; Sri Lanka, 54,000; Tajikistan, 30,000 to 50,000; Algeria, 70,000 to 80,000; Liberia, 200,000; Chechnya, 80,000; Ethiopia-Eritrea, 10,000 in recent weeks; Iraq, 1 million; and Kosovo, 2,000 prior to the NATO bombing attacks.''
The review is in pdf format at this link.
For us to believe the PC narrative that innocent people were randomly murdered would be to believe that our ancestors, including our parents' and grandparents' generations, were malicious and bloodthirsty people who harmed others for little or no cause, or who would harm someone ''just because of skin color''. I know for a fact that this was not true of most Americans in the North or South. It always shocks me to see how readily most White Americans believe such slanders about their ancestors. I suppose if we are ready to believe our forefathers had such a dark, violent side, why on earth should we be proud of who we are and proud of our forebears? I suppose it must do harm to people's sense of themselves to accept these PC myths about the past.
Another reprehensible myth that is all too widely accepted by many Whites is the idea that ''most blacks have some White ancestry'' -- a notion that I think is exaggerated --and moreover, that this infusion of White DNA into the black gene pool is the result of 'rapist slave owners.' Somehow everybody seems to accept the allegation that slave-owning aristocrats routinely forced their 'attentions' on female slaves. There is little evidence to back up this notion. Presuming that the White genes were introduced back during slavery, why assume that the slave owner was the source? Why not overseers, White field hands, or others at lower levels of society? Methinks far too many people have been influenced by such trash as ''Mandingo''.
The White DNA might also have been more likely infused after emancipation, or during the days when many blacks moved North, where they found more Whites who interacted socially with them.
In any case, I think the amount of White genes among black Americans is greatly overestimated by many people; I've seen some statistics that indicate something like 17 or 18 percent at most.
And along these lines, another myth which is now all but accepted as gospel truth is the rumor about Thomas Jefferson and one of his slaves. I've nearly given up on correcting that one; any protestations on my part are dismissed as being biased because of my Jefferson family origins. So I am afraid that is a lost battle. In any case, the truth is here.
There are still so many politically correct myths that go unchallenged, and I think it's vital that we do our part to try to examine these things and refuse to let them pass without correction.
There is certainly no shortage of racially-charged stories in the news lately, what with the Tea Party/NAACP episode, and theShirley Sherrod controversy. It seems that racial controversies are cropping up everywhere since, oh, say, January of 2009. And the way many of us react to them is, unfortunately, influenced by many of the myths that persist.
Some of the PC myths that are widely accepted even among 'right-wing' White people are myths such as the following:
'Black people picked all the cotton in the past; thus mentions of cotton and picking cotton are racist by definition. Such mentions refer to slavery and Jim Crow.'
Or this broad claim, which is of fairly recent coinage:
'Blacks/slaves built America. Slaves built D.C., New York, and all the great cities. It was all built on the backs of slaves, who often died in the course of the hard labor involved.'
A variation on this alleges that blacks did all menial jobs and manual labor, while Whites, coddled by something called 'White Privilege', sat back and watched in comfort.
While it's pretty hard to disprove the idea that blacks 'built this country' (although immigrant advocates now claim that immigrants built this country; Whitey was only a spectator) it is hard to prove such a sweeping claim. First of all, blacks are now only about 13 percent of the population. How could such a small percentage of people, who were, pre-WWI, concentrated in the South, take credit for building the cities and anything else of note in this country? Many of the slaves were also agricultural workers and house-servants; were they hired out on Sundays to build skyscrapers and bridges? The whole idea that they were everywhere building this country is absurd.
As for blacks picking all the cotton, the older folks down South will tell you that poor Whites did a great deal of the picking; it was backbreaking, hard work, and the wages were minuscule, but poor Whites worked just as hard as any slave, perhaps harder, because they had to work to house and feed themselves unlike the slaves who had food and shelter guaranteed to them.
These days, of course, many of the former cotton fields are no longer producing cotton; I expect it is all being grown in Pakistan or China or somewhere now, thanks to 'globalism'.
A now-taboo stereotype image of blacks is that of the black shoe-shine man plying his trade in the cities. The fact is there were many White men and boys who shined shoes for a living. I collect old images of daily life, and there are plenty of depictions of poor White boys working as bootblacks and shoe-shine boys. Blacks (and immigrants, for that matter) did not invent hard work, and they didn't do all the lowly jobs.
But speaking of PC mythology, it seems that Sherrod made a public claim that her father was 'lynched' or 'murdered by a White man' and that the crime went unpunished because of prejudice.
Whether this is true or not, I can't judge, but forgive me my skepticism; there have just been too many false claims of 'hate crimes', and these hoaxes have seldom been noted in the controlled media; they prefer to cover up such stories because these hoaxes are awkward for them to deal with. They just don't fit the template of innocent black victimhood and White villainy.
But as to the larger story of lynching, it's a belief among most Whites that blacks were lynched on a grand scale back in the Bad Old Days ''just for being black', or just because Whites were so depraved and hateful.
To hear it told, it would seem that tens of thousands of innocent blacks were lynched for no reason in the days of Jim Crow. However, statistics don't seem to bear that belief out. I invite everybody to search out statistics; I've quoted them here or on the Forum in the past. One fact that needs to be emphasized is that people of all races were lynched. That means White people were lynched by White people. But to acknowledge that would be to cast doubt on the idea that lynchings were always 'race hate crimes.' Such was not the case. In the past here on this blog, I posted text from a news article about a near-lynching in the 1930s in Louisiana. The man who was almost lynched was an accused sex offender, and was apparently White.
The fact is, such things happened in the case of crimes involving sex offenses, especially where children were the victims, or in cases of brutal murders. Whites were not exempted from being lynched.
Almost all such cases involved violent crimes.
The issue was covered in a book review by Dwight D. Murphey at TOQ. Murphey says, in discussing a left-wing author's book on lynchings, that
Robert Zangrando, in his book The NAACP Crusade against Lynching, 1909-1950, indicates a total of 4,742 between 1882 and 1968; Of these, he says, 1,297 were white and 3,445 black; (The New York Times has on at least two occasions reported that all those lynched then were black, but that was the result either of the particular author's dishonesty or sloppiness.)
The number of fewer than 5,000 lynchings over 87 years is hardly "meaningless" when we compare it with the 85 to 100 million victims of Communism estimated by several prominent European scholars in their recent Black Book of Communism. Consider, also, the list published in Insight magazine of just the more recent genocidal killings: Sudan, where 1.5 million plus are dead; Rwanda, where estimates range from 500,000 to 800,000; East Timor, at least 100,000; Sri Lanka, 54,000; Tajikistan, 30,000 to 50,000; Algeria, 70,000 to 80,000; Liberia, 200,000; Chechnya, 80,000; Ethiopia-Eritrea, 10,000 in recent weeks; Iraq, 1 million; and Kosovo, 2,000 prior to the NATO bombing attacks.''
The review is in pdf format at this link.
For us to believe the PC narrative that innocent people were randomly murdered would be to believe that our ancestors, including our parents' and grandparents' generations, were malicious and bloodthirsty people who harmed others for little or no cause, or who would harm someone ''just because of skin color''. I know for a fact that this was not true of most Americans in the North or South. It always shocks me to see how readily most White Americans believe such slanders about their ancestors. I suppose if we are ready to believe our forefathers had such a dark, violent side, why on earth should we be proud of who we are and proud of our forebears? I suppose it must do harm to people's sense of themselves to accept these PC myths about the past.
Another reprehensible myth that is all too widely accepted by many Whites is the idea that ''most blacks have some White ancestry'' -- a notion that I think is exaggerated --and moreover, that this infusion of White DNA into the black gene pool is the result of 'rapist slave owners.' Somehow everybody seems to accept the allegation that slave-owning aristocrats routinely forced their 'attentions' on female slaves. There is little evidence to back up this notion. Presuming that the White genes were introduced back during slavery, why assume that the slave owner was the source? Why not overseers, White field hands, or others at lower levels of society? Methinks far too many people have been influenced by such trash as ''Mandingo''.
The White DNA might also have been more likely infused after emancipation, or during the days when many blacks moved North, where they found more Whites who interacted socially with them.
In any case, I think the amount of White genes among black Americans is greatly overestimated by many people; I've seen some statistics that indicate something like 17 or 18 percent at most.
And along these lines, another myth which is now all but accepted as gospel truth is the rumor about Thomas Jefferson and one of his slaves. I've nearly given up on correcting that one; any protestations on my part are dismissed as being biased because of my Jefferson family origins. So I am afraid that is a lost battle. In any case, the truth is here.
There are still so many politically correct myths that go unchallenged, and I think it's vital that we do our part to try to examine these things and refuse to let them pass without correction.
Labels: Historical Bias, Historical Revisionism, Political Correctness, Propaganda
0 comment Monday, October 20, 2014 | admin
Tom Piatak writes about attending a live broadcast of Garrison Keillor's Prairie Home Companion radio show.
I have been listening, on and off, to Keillor�s show for many years, and I�ve read several of his books. The interesting thing about Keillor is not that he is a Democrat, but that, despite his liberal politics, the show he produces has a strong conservative, even reactionary, streak.
Last night�s show was no exception. We heard, as is typical for Keillor, a lot of old American music, including a song from the 1932 campaign. Although an unabashed liberal, Keillor is a Christian, and his show often features old hymns and Gospel songs, and last night�s program had a moving hymn about the Good Shepherd.''
I, too, was a listener to PHC some years ago, and I found a certain charm in the program, and in Keillor's soothing, mellow delivery and style. I love the old-time music which was usually featured on the show.
And although, like Piatak, I never lived in a town which closely resembled Lake Wobegon, the small-town old America motif was universal enough that all Americans, at least those old enough to remember the old America, could relate to many of the endearing qualities of Lake Wobegon as described on the show.
I was also able to relate somewhat to the Scandinavian-tinged culture of the fictional Lake Wobegon through my experience of the Northwest, which in times past had a strong Scandinavian presence and cultural influence. The 'new' Northwest is fast losing that character and is on the way to becoming just another multicultural Nowheresville.
When I used to listen to PHC, I was still quite the liberal, and I sensed very much that Keillor and the gang were of the same persuasion. You see, liberals, especially of the baby boom generation, have a certain kind of slumming nostalgia for the 'old America', in the form of liking vintage clothes for dress-up, antique furnishings and gewgaws, and old-time music, especially of the 'downmarket' variety such as bluegrass, honkytonk, and blues. It's a kind of American multiculturalism: aren't those hillbillies and hayseeds quaint and funny? And aren't we oh-so-sophisticated for condescending to listen to their primitive music?
That kind of cultural tourism and condescension is one of the things that I find most irritating about my own jaded generation. And I perceived it in spades on Keillor's show. So as I became a fully-fledged conservative recanting all the liberal nonsense that had accreted in my life, I rather lost my taste for Keillor and his somewhat arch portrayal of middle America. With liberals, there is often a fine line between nostalgia and a certain kind of snickering at old America as sophisticated folks would snicker at their awkward country cousins.
Keillor is not, I am sure, a Christian in the sense that perhaps Tom Piatak understands it. I suspect where the 'Christian content' of his show is concerned, it derives from Keillor's 'cultural Christianity.' Christianity, specifically of the Lutheran variety, seemst to be a central part of the old American culture of Minnesota, just as some variety of Bible-believing Christianity is a central part of all small-town Southern communities. It's part of the culture, and everybody who grew up in the old American South imbibed some of it, even if they were not churchgoers, or real believers. Keillor is a 'cultural Christian' or perhaps simply a liberal Christian, which involves liberal politics dressed up in clerical robes, speaking Christian lingo.
I recalled this story about Keillor from just after the 2004 elections:
Born-agains should not have right to vote
Posted: November 15, 2004
Speaking in the aftermath of the presidential election, Democrat radio host Garrison Keillor says he is on a quest to take away the right of born-again Christians to vote, saying their citizenship is actually in heaven, not the United States.
Keillor, host of the popular National Public Radio show "A Prairie Home Companion," made the comments during a speech at Chicago's Rockefeller Memorial Chapel and during his radio monologue the Saturday after the election.
"I am a Democrat � it's no secret. I am a museum-quality Democrat," Keillor said. "Last night I spent my time crouched in a fetal position, rolling around and moaning in the dark."
According to a report in the University of Chicago's Chicago Maroon, Keillor told the audience: "If born-again Christians are allowed to vote in this country, then why not Canadians?"
And yes, some said, 'oh well, he's just kidding, just being satirical.'
Here, however, on this blog Keillor's response to a reader who questioned his statement is quoted. The reader had asked whether he had in fact meant to say 'postmillenialists' and not 'born-again' Christians:
Caroline,
I grew up among post-millenialists and probably that's why I conflated them with born-agains in one big ball of wax and I apologize for my inaccuracy. However, I don't think that the term "post-millenialist" would instantly register with our public radio audience, so one is forced to use shorthand. Thanks for your thoughts...
Keillor then went on to another subject entirely, his memories of singing the Star Spangled Banner.
So, after reflection, Keillor says he does not advocate a constitutional amendment taking the vote away from all born-again Christians -- just some of them. Thanks for the clarification.
Addendum (11/20/04): I received the following e-mail regarding Ms. Sato's (and Garrison Keillor's) use of terms:
Caroline Sato is incorrect. It's dispensational premillennialists who believe the world is going to hell in a handbasket. They believe in an always imminent rapture. Postmillennialists believe that through the preaching of the gospel, the world can be transformed.''
I find it curious that a Protestant, even a liberal one, would put down 'born-again Christians.' First of all, he would be aware that the Lord said 'except a man be born again, he cannot enter the kingdom of Heaven.'
So in truth, all real Christians must be considered born-again. However, I've noted that liberal Christians often scorn that term, as do many Catholics. But if Keillor thinks 'born again' is a disparaging term, he is not a Christian in the Biblical sense, then.
Here, in the Wikipedia entry, there are many quotes from Keillor. For example, here's what he thinks of Republicans:
Keillor calls Republicans "hairy-backed swamp developers, corporate shills, Christians of convenience, freelance racists, hobby cops, misanthropic frat boys, lizardskin cigar monkeys, jerktown romeos, ninja dittoheads. .. .tax cheats, cheese merchants, cat stranglers, grab-ass executives, gun fetishists, genteel pornographers, nihilists in golf pants."
While claiming that his book describes "the politics of kindness, Keillor also says that Republicans are "criminal" and worse, "evil, deeply evil."
Well, a few years ago I would have been quite incensed by that tirade, but now, given my lowered opinion of Republicans and self-described 'conservatives', I have to say it's not 100 percent false. The truth hurts sometimes. Some Republicans are corporate shills, and all the rest.
The sad part is, many Democrats are worse, albeit their sins and crimes are simply different from those of the Republicans. But I suspect that Keillor's seething hatred of Republicans extends to real conservatives, and all of us who hold within us the old America, that of the era in which Keillor goes slumming and rummaging on his show.
As far as Keillor's own identity, which many are assuming he is drawing on in his performances, the Wikipedia article also contains quotes indicating that Keillor's on-air persona, with many references to Norwegian-Americans and Lutherans, is all fictional. He is not Norwegian by ancestry (his name should give that fact away) nor is he Lutheran by religious affiliation. Apparently his frequent references to Lutherans simply indicate his cultural familiarity with Lutherans in his native Minnesota. He says his family were members of an obscure group called the Plymouth Brethren.
Reflecting on all this, I can see that liberals like Keillor may wax nostalgic over old America, but the old America which they mine for quaint cultural relics is not the real old America, the one realists remember fondly. They put a liberal veneer on the past in order to make it acceptable by their standards. They expunge the parts of our cultural history that embarrass them. The bowdlerized liberal version of our past is, for some liberals, simply censored and cleansed of the un-PC parts. That's the Keilloresque version. It's apolitical for the most part.
For some, usually filmmakers, the view presented is a politically revisionist view of old America, in which political correctness reigned, and 'racists' were few and far between and were quickly put in their place by anachronistic liberals who saved the day. I've noticed how most movies of today have to inject some politically correct bits in order to show that the illiberalism they object to so much is the anomaly in our history, while their liberal, multicultural America was always there in an incipient form, at least. Movies like 'Gods and Generals', with the obligatory racial commentary scene, or The Patriot, which had its noble slave scene, and so on.
Liberal nostalgia is the cultural form of revisionist history; liberals like to conjure up a 'real' old America in which people make speeches full of 21st century cliches about tolerance and inclusiveness, and in which the people who represented the real beliefs and attitudes of the era portrayed are shown as slimy villains.
Keillor's Lake Wobegon may be a kinder and gentler kind of liberal nostalgia than the Hollywood preachy kind, but it's ironic that liberals who like to sentimentalize about certain aspects of the past are hellbent on destroying everything that remains of that past, content, it seems, to turn our heritage into a quaint museum piece, which is long-gone, and deservedly so.
In what appears to be willful ignorance, they refuse to see that the Lake Wobegons of our country are the unique creations and reflections of the people, the specific group of people who inhabit that place. The Norwegian bachelor farmers of Keillor's Minnesota created a distinct place which will never be the same once it is dominated by Mexicans, Somalis, or Hmongs. Those who believe that people are interchangeable and that the place makes the people, and not vice-versa, are taking a sledge-hammer to our unique heritage, and wreaking untold damage.
I have been listening, on and off, to Keillor�s show for many years, and I�ve read several of his books. The interesting thing about Keillor is not that he is a Democrat, but that, despite his liberal politics, the show he produces has a strong conservative, even reactionary, streak.
Last night�s show was no exception. We heard, as is typical for Keillor, a lot of old American music, including a song from the 1932 campaign. Although an unabashed liberal, Keillor is a Christian, and his show often features old hymns and Gospel songs, and last night�s program had a moving hymn about the Good Shepherd.''
I, too, was a listener to PHC some years ago, and I found a certain charm in the program, and in Keillor's soothing, mellow delivery and style. I love the old-time music which was usually featured on the show.
And although, like Piatak, I never lived in a town which closely resembled Lake Wobegon, the small-town old America motif was universal enough that all Americans, at least those old enough to remember the old America, could relate to many of the endearing qualities of Lake Wobegon as described on the show.
I was also able to relate somewhat to the Scandinavian-tinged culture of the fictional Lake Wobegon through my experience of the Northwest, which in times past had a strong Scandinavian presence and cultural influence. The 'new' Northwest is fast losing that character and is on the way to becoming just another multicultural Nowheresville.
When I used to listen to PHC, I was still quite the liberal, and I sensed very much that Keillor and the gang were of the same persuasion. You see, liberals, especially of the baby boom generation, have a certain kind of slumming nostalgia for the 'old America', in the form of liking vintage clothes for dress-up, antique furnishings and gewgaws, and old-time music, especially of the 'downmarket' variety such as bluegrass, honkytonk, and blues. It's a kind of American multiculturalism: aren't those hillbillies and hayseeds quaint and funny? And aren't we oh-so-sophisticated for condescending to listen to their primitive music?
That kind of cultural tourism and condescension is one of the things that I find most irritating about my own jaded generation. And I perceived it in spades on Keillor's show. So as I became a fully-fledged conservative recanting all the liberal nonsense that had accreted in my life, I rather lost my taste for Keillor and his somewhat arch portrayal of middle America. With liberals, there is often a fine line between nostalgia and a certain kind of snickering at old America as sophisticated folks would snicker at their awkward country cousins.
Keillor is not, I am sure, a Christian in the sense that perhaps Tom Piatak understands it. I suspect where the 'Christian content' of his show is concerned, it derives from Keillor's 'cultural Christianity.' Christianity, specifically of the Lutheran variety, seemst to be a central part of the old American culture of Minnesota, just as some variety of Bible-believing Christianity is a central part of all small-town Southern communities. It's part of the culture, and everybody who grew up in the old American South imbibed some of it, even if they were not churchgoers, or real believers. Keillor is a 'cultural Christian' or perhaps simply a liberal Christian, which involves liberal politics dressed up in clerical robes, speaking Christian lingo.
I recalled this story about Keillor from just after the 2004 elections:
Born-agains should not have right to vote
Posted: November 15, 2004
Speaking in the aftermath of the presidential election, Democrat radio host Garrison Keillor says he is on a quest to take away the right of born-again Christians to vote, saying their citizenship is actually in heaven, not the United States.
Keillor, host of the popular National Public Radio show "A Prairie Home Companion," made the comments during a speech at Chicago's Rockefeller Memorial Chapel and during his radio monologue the Saturday after the election.
"I am a Democrat � it's no secret. I am a museum-quality Democrat," Keillor said. "Last night I spent my time crouched in a fetal position, rolling around and moaning in the dark."
According to a report in the University of Chicago's Chicago Maroon, Keillor told the audience: "If born-again Christians are allowed to vote in this country, then why not Canadians?"
And yes, some said, 'oh well, he's just kidding, just being satirical.'
Here, however, on this blog Keillor's response to a reader who questioned his statement is quoted. The reader had asked whether he had in fact meant to say 'postmillenialists' and not 'born-again' Christians:
Caroline,
I grew up among post-millenialists and probably that's why I conflated them with born-agains in one big ball of wax and I apologize for my inaccuracy. However, I don't think that the term "post-millenialist" would instantly register with our public radio audience, so one is forced to use shorthand. Thanks for your thoughts...
Keillor then went on to another subject entirely, his memories of singing the Star Spangled Banner.
So, after reflection, Keillor says he does not advocate a constitutional amendment taking the vote away from all born-again Christians -- just some of them. Thanks for the clarification.
Addendum (11/20/04): I received the following e-mail regarding Ms. Sato's (and Garrison Keillor's) use of terms:
Caroline Sato is incorrect. It's dispensational premillennialists who believe the world is going to hell in a handbasket. They believe in an always imminent rapture. Postmillennialists believe that through the preaching of the gospel, the world can be transformed.''
I find it curious that a Protestant, even a liberal one, would put down 'born-again Christians.' First of all, he would be aware that the Lord said 'except a man be born again, he cannot enter the kingdom of Heaven.'
So in truth, all real Christians must be considered born-again. However, I've noted that liberal Christians often scorn that term, as do many Catholics. But if Keillor thinks 'born again' is a disparaging term, he is not a Christian in the Biblical sense, then.
Here, in the Wikipedia entry, there are many quotes from Keillor. For example, here's what he thinks of Republicans:
Keillor calls Republicans "hairy-backed swamp developers, corporate shills, Christians of convenience, freelance racists, hobby cops, misanthropic frat boys, lizardskin cigar monkeys, jerktown romeos, ninja dittoheads. .. .tax cheats, cheese merchants, cat stranglers, grab-ass executives, gun fetishists, genteel pornographers, nihilists in golf pants."
While claiming that his book describes "the politics of kindness, Keillor also says that Republicans are "criminal" and worse, "evil, deeply evil."
Well, a few years ago I would have been quite incensed by that tirade, but now, given my lowered opinion of Republicans and self-described 'conservatives', I have to say it's not 100 percent false. The truth hurts sometimes. Some Republicans are corporate shills, and all the rest.
The sad part is, many Democrats are worse, albeit their sins and crimes are simply different from those of the Republicans. But I suspect that Keillor's seething hatred of Republicans extends to real conservatives, and all of us who hold within us the old America, that of the era in which Keillor goes slumming and rummaging on his show.
As far as Keillor's own identity, which many are assuming he is drawing on in his performances, the Wikipedia article also contains quotes indicating that Keillor's on-air persona, with many references to Norwegian-Americans and Lutherans, is all fictional. He is not Norwegian by ancestry (his name should give that fact away) nor is he Lutheran by religious affiliation. Apparently his frequent references to Lutherans simply indicate his cultural familiarity with Lutherans in his native Minnesota. He says his family were members of an obscure group called the Plymouth Brethren.
Reflecting on all this, I can see that liberals like Keillor may wax nostalgic over old America, but the old America which they mine for quaint cultural relics is not the real old America, the one realists remember fondly. They put a liberal veneer on the past in order to make it acceptable by their standards. They expunge the parts of our cultural history that embarrass them. The bowdlerized liberal version of our past is, for some liberals, simply censored and cleansed of the un-PC parts. That's the Keilloresque version. It's apolitical for the most part.
For some, usually filmmakers, the view presented is a politically revisionist view of old America, in which political correctness reigned, and 'racists' were few and far between and were quickly put in their place by anachronistic liberals who saved the day. I've noticed how most movies of today have to inject some politically correct bits in order to show that the illiberalism they object to so much is the anomaly in our history, while their liberal, multicultural America was always there in an incipient form, at least. Movies like 'Gods and Generals', with the obligatory racial commentary scene, or The Patriot, which had its noble slave scene, and so on.
Liberal nostalgia is the cultural form of revisionist history; liberals like to conjure up a 'real' old America in which people make speeches full of 21st century cliches about tolerance and inclusiveness, and in which the people who represented the real beliefs and attitudes of the era portrayed are shown as slimy villains.
Keillor's Lake Wobegon may be a kinder and gentler kind of liberal nostalgia than the Hollywood preachy kind, but it's ironic that liberals who like to sentimentalize about certain aspects of the past are hellbent on destroying everything that remains of that past, content, it seems, to turn our heritage into a quaint museum piece, which is long-gone, and deservedly so.
In what appears to be willful ignorance, they refuse to see that the Lake Wobegons of our country are the unique creations and reflections of the people, the specific group of people who inhabit that place. The Norwegian bachelor farmers of Keillor's Minnesota created a distinct place which will never be the same once it is dominated by Mexicans, Somalis, or Hmongs. Those who believe that people are interchangeable and that the place makes the people, and not vice-versa, are taking a sledge-hammer to our unique heritage, and wreaking untold damage.
Labels: Cultural Marxism, Historical Revisionism, Nostalgia, Old America, Old Days, Vanishing America
0 comment Friday, August 1, 2014 | admin
On a recent McNeil-Lehrer Report, the subject of Reconstruction was brought up, in the context of the meaning of the recent elections. The video is here.
And over at the Kinism.net forum there has been some discussion of the issue of Reconstruction, sparked by the remarks made by Peniel Joseph. There is a 'Reconstruction References' thread here.
And because I think it's important to look back at those little-discussed events in our history, I've posted a little basic background on the subject over at the Forum, also. I hope those interested, especially those who are unfamiliar with that sad chapter in our history, will check out any information over at the Kinist forum and also at the VA Forum. Our schools do not teach the full story on that era, and the facts are hard to come by.
Our current politically correct histories will not tell the truth about some past events, so it's always best to seek out older sources.
And over at the Kinism.net forum there has been some discussion of the issue of Reconstruction, sparked by the remarks made by Peniel Joseph. There is a 'Reconstruction References' thread here.
And because I think it's important to look back at those little-discussed events in our history, I've posted a little basic background on the subject over at the Forum, also. I hope those interested, especially those who are unfamiliar with that sad chapter in our history, will check out any information over at the Kinist forum and also at the VA Forum. Our schools do not teach the full story on that era, and the facts are hard to come by.
Our current politically correct histories will not tell the truth about some past events, so it's always best to seek out older sources.
Labels: Historical Revisionism, Reconstruction, War Between The States
0 comment Monday, July 21, 2014 | admin
David Yeagley over at BadEagle.com has been writing something of a series on the South and the War Between the States. Recently he offered a piece, Home of the Patriots, in which he stresses the importance of the traditions of the South, and their distinctive place in the American story, and the American nation.
Those who are not of Southron origin may feel this is irrelevant to them, but I am increasingly convinced that this North-South issue is crucial to understanding how we got where we are today. The obvious area in which the history of the North-South division is relevant is that of the perennial race question. Race, whether people are willing to acknowledge it or not, is at the heart of much of what is threatening not only our country but the entire Western world. In essence, our great fear of addressing the race issue directly, and our guilt about it, and the strong taboos surrounding it, are paralyzing us at the very moment when we stand in danger of being displaced or replaced, blended out of existence as a people.
Most people, in our maleducated age, know little about the War Between the States, more commonly called the Civil War. The very name of the conflict is dependent on one's viewpoint; many unreconstructed Southerners call it the War of Northern Aggression, or, less pugnaciously, The War for Southern Independence. To Northerners, it's the Civil War, usually viewed as an act of treason by rebellious and disloyal Southerners who fought to retain possession of slaves.
But whatever the conflict is called, it is a terrible wound to our nation, which has never really healed, and possibly cannot be healed.
And without some knowledge and understanding of what really happened, and why, we cannot really resolve anything and come to terms with it.
The issue of race and slavery are issues that we never cease hearing about, in this liberal age in which we are expected to castigate ourselves because of our 'original sin', as Obama referred to it, or our 'birth defect', as Condoleezza Rice called it. Lately various states have issued apologies for slavery, even though no American today owns slaves or has been a slave. Next on the agenda: reparations. There will likely be a reparations payment in my lifetime, but count on it: reparations will not resolve the issue. Reparations would only create further demands.
But with a country populated mostly by people who have been fed only propaganda about the War Between the States and the 'peculiar institution' of slavery, we are destined to go on and on in the endless cycle of recriminations, apologies, demands, and conflicts.
It's time we were able to examine the history behind the Gordian knot of race in our country, and it would be helpful for most of us to go back and re-examine the War Between the States and Reconstruction, in order to give us some context and some background of how we got to the present impasse.
The South and her people are inevitably depicted as the caricatured villains in this piece. Most people, having been fed on Hollywood or other fictional depictions, have images in their minds of evil white slave-hunters as depicted in the fantasy "history" of Roots. We all know the stereotypes of Southern whites as evil and cruel and ignorant.
The real ignorance is exemplified by the persistent stereotypes of the South and of the Civil War era.
Dr. Yeagley, to his credit, examines the culture of the South with a sympathetic eye. I am not sure how much Dr. Yeagley, an Oklahoman, identifies as a Southerner; I surmise that his identity is as a Comanche and an American, but he is sympathetic to the South.
Here he describes the Southron culture, and American identity:
...The South was culture chiefly of gentlemen, men of honor. Men of bravery. Men of war.
And men of a homeland, and a way of life. Never before had America--any portion of America, had to fight for their homes and their way of life. The Southern came out of the war with an unforgettable image of home. And that's really what patriotism is about--the home. Love of home. To the Southerner, his own state was one giant, extended family. The unity and brotherhood they felt was akin to a nationhood. Their state was more important than any political theory or economic congolmerate pawned off as "nationhood." To the Southerner, home wasn't an idea. It was a place, a real place, with real houses and land, that grew real food and had real people--family, living on it. Those stars and bars stand for home. The "idea," or we should say, the reality, of home, is expressed in that Confederate battle flag. In a way, the Stars and Stripes were never the same. Home came with the victory. The South was held as part of the Union. The North bought a home, really. At least a sense of it, as never before.
The Union should remember the South for that mighty lovely cause. Home. Otherwise, the idea of the United States is little more than a giant business. Without the South, there is no sentiment of home in the United States. (I wouldn't expect most American people to understand how the Indians feel about the homeland, but, they should be able to grasp how Southerners feel. But, in a way, Southerners are like Indians. Indians still today enlist in the armed services from sheer intuition of valor, or warriorhood. Our home is still here, our land is still here, despite what has happened to us. The same is true for true Southerners. After the Civil War, their reservation was a bit larger, I must say, but, they were never trying to rule the world either. Like Indians, they just wanted to be left alone.)
[...] In a sense, the Civil War will never be over. It was the expression of an ever-occurring battle of ideas. Who shall rule, and to what extend. The nature of the country is under perpetual examination. With the trend toward globalism, the abolition of nationhood, and the delusion of global financial imperialism, we do well to raise the Confederate flag, and fly it high--above every other issue. The nature of our country, the meaning of our nationhood, the idenity of the United States of America is under seige--the enemy being Washington, DC. The challenge is from traitorous, avaricious failures who are unable to understand America, and behave like angry opportunists, like children fighting over the biggest piece of pie. At least the Confederate flag reminds us of something in the way of origins, something of how that pie came about. The Confederate flag calls our attention to the true identity of the United States. Obviously, we need to reconsider--when we see the kind of people running for the highest office in the country today.''
Dr. Yeagley has also written about the women of the South, who are often caricatured as vacuous and vain 'Southern belles', and he presents a much fairer picture, recommending some primary sources: the writings of Southern women themselves. I highly recommend reading some of these sources for another view of life in the Old South. He cites Mary Boykin Chesnut; she wrote A Diary from Dixie which is a very interesting account of her life during the War. She was the wife of a Confederate general, so she knew many of the principal figures in the Confederacy, and gives a good description of the times and the people. She was obviously very well-educated and articulate, and does not fit at all the shallow stereotype of the Hollywood Southern belle, who was always an empty-headed and manipulative creature. Mary Boykin Chesnut is nothing at all like Scarlett O'Hara or other such fictional creations.
Read some of the excerpts from her diary, describing daily life before,during, and after the War, and the interactions between the races, and between Southron and Yankee during that same era. We have heard one side of the story relentlessly in the years since the War, and the propaganda is the fiction on which our present politically correct house of lies is founded.
Are there not two sides to every story?
I think we need to go back to that era and read the whole story, from original sources as much as possible, not from some modern-day revisionist with a liberal agenda. Some perspective and some balance is desperately needed. The whole story of the War Between the States and Reconstruction is the background of our current situation. We can never really see our way out of this maze we are in until we get the whole truth and look at it through the eyes of those who were there, who participated in the events of the time.
There are still old sources to be found; read the old books and reference sources. As much as possible, avoid more recent sources, which are tainted with the PC agenda.
There are many sources to be found out there on the Internet; you can find Mary Boykin Chesnut's Diary from Dixie here.
The same collection has many works of Southern literature online.
It's vital to be able to understand and freely examine what happened in the past to have a correct and full perspective on what is besetting us now. As it is, we are crippled by a lack of knowledge and information; we are like amnesiacs, having only fragmentary or false memories of our past.
In our present presidential campaign, the issue of race will be front and center, and so far, the usual politically correct falsehoods go unchallenged and unquestioned. We need to be armed with real knowledge. The truth will set us free.
Those who are not of Southron origin may feel this is irrelevant to them, but I am increasingly convinced that this North-South issue is crucial to understanding how we got where we are today. The obvious area in which the history of the North-South division is relevant is that of the perennial race question. Race, whether people are willing to acknowledge it or not, is at the heart of much of what is threatening not only our country but the entire Western world. In essence, our great fear of addressing the race issue directly, and our guilt about it, and the strong taboos surrounding it, are paralyzing us at the very moment when we stand in danger of being displaced or replaced, blended out of existence as a people.
Most people, in our maleducated age, know little about the War Between the States, more commonly called the Civil War. The very name of the conflict is dependent on one's viewpoint; many unreconstructed Southerners call it the War of Northern Aggression, or, less pugnaciously, The War for Southern Independence. To Northerners, it's the Civil War, usually viewed as an act of treason by rebellious and disloyal Southerners who fought to retain possession of slaves.
But whatever the conflict is called, it is a terrible wound to our nation, which has never really healed, and possibly cannot be healed.
And without some knowledge and understanding of what really happened, and why, we cannot really resolve anything and come to terms with it.
The issue of race and slavery are issues that we never cease hearing about, in this liberal age in which we are expected to castigate ourselves because of our 'original sin', as Obama referred to it, or our 'birth defect', as Condoleezza Rice called it. Lately various states have issued apologies for slavery, even though no American today owns slaves or has been a slave. Next on the agenda: reparations. There will likely be a reparations payment in my lifetime, but count on it: reparations will not resolve the issue. Reparations would only create further demands.
But with a country populated mostly by people who have been fed only propaganda about the War Between the States and the 'peculiar institution' of slavery, we are destined to go on and on in the endless cycle of recriminations, apologies, demands, and conflicts.
It's time we were able to examine the history behind the Gordian knot of race in our country, and it would be helpful for most of us to go back and re-examine the War Between the States and Reconstruction, in order to give us some context and some background of how we got to the present impasse.
The South and her people are inevitably depicted as the caricatured villains in this piece. Most people, having been fed on Hollywood or other fictional depictions, have images in their minds of evil white slave-hunters as depicted in the fantasy "history" of Roots. We all know the stereotypes of Southern whites as evil and cruel and ignorant.
The real ignorance is exemplified by the persistent stereotypes of the South and of the Civil War era.
Dr. Yeagley, to his credit, examines the culture of the South with a sympathetic eye. I am not sure how much Dr. Yeagley, an Oklahoman, identifies as a Southerner; I surmise that his identity is as a Comanche and an American, but he is sympathetic to the South.
Here he describes the Southron culture, and American identity:
...The South was culture chiefly of gentlemen, men of honor. Men of bravery. Men of war.
And men of a homeland, and a way of life. Never before had America--any portion of America, had to fight for their homes and their way of life. The Southern came out of the war with an unforgettable image of home. And that's really what patriotism is about--the home. Love of home. To the Southerner, his own state was one giant, extended family. The unity and brotherhood they felt was akin to a nationhood. Their state was more important than any political theory or economic congolmerate pawned off as "nationhood." To the Southerner, home wasn't an idea. It was a place, a real place, with real houses and land, that grew real food and had real people--family, living on it. Those stars and bars stand for home. The "idea," or we should say, the reality, of home, is expressed in that Confederate battle flag. In a way, the Stars and Stripes were never the same. Home came with the victory. The South was held as part of the Union. The North bought a home, really. At least a sense of it, as never before.
The Union should remember the South for that mighty lovely cause. Home. Otherwise, the idea of the United States is little more than a giant business. Without the South, there is no sentiment of home in the United States. (I wouldn't expect most American people to understand how the Indians feel about the homeland, but, they should be able to grasp how Southerners feel. But, in a way, Southerners are like Indians. Indians still today enlist in the armed services from sheer intuition of valor, or warriorhood. Our home is still here, our land is still here, despite what has happened to us. The same is true for true Southerners. After the Civil War, their reservation was a bit larger, I must say, but, they were never trying to rule the world either. Like Indians, they just wanted to be left alone.)
[...] In a sense, the Civil War will never be over. It was the expression of an ever-occurring battle of ideas. Who shall rule, and to what extend. The nature of the country is under perpetual examination. With the trend toward globalism, the abolition of nationhood, and the delusion of global financial imperialism, we do well to raise the Confederate flag, and fly it high--above every other issue. The nature of our country, the meaning of our nationhood, the idenity of the United States of America is under seige--the enemy being Washington, DC. The challenge is from traitorous, avaricious failures who are unable to understand America, and behave like angry opportunists, like children fighting over the biggest piece of pie. At least the Confederate flag reminds us of something in the way of origins, something of how that pie came about. The Confederate flag calls our attention to the true identity of the United States. Obviously, we need to reconsider--when we see the kind of people running for the highest office in the country today.''
Dr. Yeagley has also written about the women of the South, who are often caricatured as vacuous and vain 'Southern belles', and he presents a much fairer picture, recommending some primary sources: the writings of Southern women themselves. I highly recommend reading some of these sources for another view of life in the Old South. He cites Mary Boykin Chesnut; she wrote A Diary from Dixie which is a very interesting account of her life during the War. She was the wife of a Confederate general, so she knew many of the principal figures in the Confederacy, and gives a good description of the times and the people. She was obviously very well-educated and articulate, and does not fit at all the shallow stereotype of the Hollywood Southern belle, who was always an empty-headed and manipulative creature. Mary Boykin Chesnut is nothing at all like Scarlett O'Hara or other such fictional creations.
Read some of the excerpts from her diary, describing daily life before,during, and after the War, and the interactions between the races, and between Southron and Yankee during that same era. We have heard one side of the story relentlessly in the years since the War, and the propaganda is the fiction on which our present politically correct house of lies is founded.
Are there not two sides to every story?
I think we need to go back to that era and read the whole story, from original sources as much as possible, not from some modern-day revisionist with a liberal agenda. Some perspective and some balance is desperately needed. The whole story of the War Between the States and Reconstruction is the background of our current situation. We can never really see our way out of this maze we are in until we get the whole truth and look at it through the eyes of those who were there, who participated in the events of the time.
There are still old sources to be found; read the old books and reference sources. As much as possible, avoid more recent sources, which are tainted with the PC agenda.
There are many sources to be found out there on the Internet; you can find Mary Boykin Chesnut's Diary from Dixie here.
The same collection has many works of Southern literature online.
It's vital to be able to understand and freely examine what happened in the past to have a correct and full perspective on what is besetting us now. As it is, we are crippled by a lack of knowledge and information; we are like amnesiacs, having only fragmentary or false memories of our past.
In our present presidential campaign, the issue of race will be front and center, and so far, the usual politically correct falsehoods go unchallenged and unquestioned. We need to be armed with real knowledge. The truth will set us free.
Labels: American History, Historical Revisionism, Political Correctness, South, Southron Heritage, War Between The States
0 comment Sunday, June 1, 2014 | admin
This is rather depressing.
For some years now, I've wanted to go to Virginia, visit my cousin there, and particularly to visit Williamsburg. But perhaps unsurprisingly, the Colonial Williamsburg "living history museum" is apparently another venue for promoting the politically corrected rewriting of our history.
Blogger MRB describes his visit to CW, and describes the 'historical' markers along the footpath:
Along the path there are numerous markers that try to get the visitor into the mind set of someone from an earlier period. Walking in one reads the following:
1954 "You tolerate segregated schools"
1920 "You accept that women cannot vote"
1913 "You pay no income tax and receive no Social Security"
1865 "You know people who own other people"
My reaction to these and most of the others (there were probably ten in all), was, "yes, times have changed, and mostly for the worst." Mine was probably not the reaction anticipated by the Colonial Williamsburg Foundation (CWF).
Far more distasteful than these are the markers that one reads when walking back over the bridge. Below is a list of the "high points" of America history according to the CWF.
1786 Thomas Jefferson: "Made religion a matter of personal choice"
1805 Sacagawea: "Led Lewis and Clark to the American West"
1837 Horace Mann: "Inspired a universal thirst for public education"
1863 Abraham Lincoln: "Proclaimed freedom for 3 million Americans"
1879 Thomas Edison: "Turned night into day"
1908 Henry Ford: "Gave Americans the car keys to everywhere"
1928 Louis Armstrong: "Set America�s free spirit to music"
1955 Rosa Parks: "Moved civil rights to the front of the bus"
1961 John F. Kennedy: "Ask not what your country can do for you � ask what you can do for your country"
If it isn't immediately evident to you what is wrong with each of these descriptions, read the blog entry linked.
Obviously there are a lot of "high points" in American history that might have been commemorated there; how on earth is Louis Armstrong or Rosa Parks, or Sacajawea for that matter, deserving of mention where so many more important contributions and people were omitted?
Why have we gone so mad as to bow down to a small minority of people while at the same time slighting our own people? Yes, it is mostly a rhetorical question. I know the obvious reasons, but I still cannot get over the irrationality of it, or the self-denigration involved in doing perpetual penance and willingly abasing ourselves.
I had been particularly interested in Williamsburg because quite a few of my ancestors lived there, or were otherwise associated with the landmarks there, for example, the Carys being involved in rebuilding the College of William and Mary. My ancestors including the Carys, the Tabbs, the Langhornes, the Blands, and many others had some ties to that area.
However I only learned through reading the Wikipedia entry linked above that the Rockefellers were involved in the building of the 'living history museum' of Colonial Williamsburg. No wonder there is now a strong globalist/PC slant to everything there. I suspect my Virginia ancestors are turning in their graves at what their homes have now become.
The Wiki describes the usual cultural Marxist influence in the story depicted at CW:
Colonial Williamsburg has been criticized for neglecting the role of free African-Americans in Colonial life, in addition to those who were slaves.
[...]
Despite abolition of slavery in 1865 after the American Civil War, later that century and during the first half of the 20th century, racial segregation persisted in Virginia, with many Jim Crow laws requiring it. When it first opened in the 1930s, Colonial Williamsburg had segregated dormitories for its reenactors. African-Americans filled historical roles as servants, rather than free people as in the present day. Colonial Williamsburg allowed the entry of blacks, but Williamsburg area hotels denied them accommodation, and state law forbade blacks from eating in the restored taverns and from shopping in nearby stores. In the 1950s, African-Americans were only allowed to visit Colonial Williamsburg one day a week until after the U.S. Supreme Court's landmark Brown vs. Board of Education decision in 1954 began dismantling segregation laws and practices. Colonial Williamsburg offered some of the earlier public accommodations on an integrated basis.
In the 1970s, in reaction to increasing scorn of its one-sided portrayal of colonial life, Colonial Williamsburg increased its number of African-American slave interpretors. In 1994 it added slave auctions and slave marriages; the NAACP and the Southern Christian Leadership Conference later protested. In 1999 Colonial Williamsburg added a new program to explain slavery and its role in Colonial America.''
The Wiki also tells us:
''The motto of Colonial Williamsburg is "that the future may learn from the past."
Maybe that should be: "that the future may feel guilty about the past'', and of course be shamed into endless apologies and subservience.
This phenomenon of rehearsing and rehashing our past national or racial 'sins' is uncomfortably like the trend seen in many troubled young people today: the trend towards 'self-harm' or self-injury. I know of some young people who for some bizarre reason inflict cuts or wounds on their own flesh. We are doing this on a national or civilizational scale, inflicting harm and pain on ourselves. What healthy person would do that? What healthy person would endlessly dwell on how bad we are/were as a nation, or how evil our forefathers were? Surely all this recrimination takes its toll on the collective psyche.
I don't know whether I will visit CW; I may go and visit my colonial ancestors' graves, most of whose locations I know. But I really don't care to be subjected to somebody's piously PC revisionism, or to be reminded of what "bigots" my ancestors were. The "bigotry" is simply on the other foot now. But the politically correct are too blind to see this.
For some years now, I've wanted to go to Virginia, visit my cousin there, and particularly to visit Williamsburg. But perhaps unsurprisingly, the Colonial Williamsburg "living history museum" is apparently another venue for promoting the politically corrected rewriting of our history.
Blogger MRB describes his visit to CW, and describes the 'historical' markers along the footpath:
Along the path there are numerous markers that try to get the visitor into the mind set of someone from an earlier period. Walking in one reads the following:
1954 "You tolerate segregated schools"
1920 "You accept that women cannot vote"
1913 "You pay no income tax and receive no Social Security"
1865 "You know people who own other people"
My reaction to these and most of the others (there were probably ten in all), was, "yes, times have changed, and mostly for the worst." Mine was probably not the reaction anticipated by the Colonial Williamsburg Foundation (CWF).
Far more distasteful than these are the markers that one reads when walking back over the bridge. Below is a list of the "high points" of America history according to the CWF.
1786 Thomas Jefferson: "Made religion a matter of personal choice"
1805 Sacagawea: "Led Lewis and Clark to the American West"
1837 Horace Mann: "Inspired a universal thirst for public education"
1863 Abraham Lincoln: "Proclaimed freedom for 3 million Americans"
1879 Thomas Edison: "Turned night into day"
1908 Henry Ford: "Gave Americans the car keys to everywhere"
1928 Louis Armstrong: "Set America�s free spirit to music"
1955 Rosa Parks: "Moved civil rights to the front of the bus"
1961 John F. Kennedy: "Ask not what your country can do for you � ask what you can do for your country"
If it isn't immediately evident to you what is wrong with each of these descriptions, read the blog entry linked.
Obviously there are a lot of "high points" in American history that might have been commemorated there; how on earth is Louis Armstrong or Rosa Parks, or Sacajawea for that matter, deserving of mention where so many more important contributions and people were omitted?
Why have we gone so mad as to bow down to a small minority of people while at the same time slighting our own people? Yes, it is mostly a rhetorical question. I know the obvious reasons, but I still cannot get over the irrationality of it, or the self-denigration involved in doing perpetual penance and willingly abasing ourselves.
I had been particularly interested in Williamsburg because quite a few of my ancestors lived there, or were otherwise associated with the landmarks there, for example, the Carys being involved in rebuilding the College of William and Mary. My ancestors including the Carys, the Tabbs, the Langhornes, the Blands, and many others had some ties to that area.
However I only learned through reading the Wikipedia entry linked above that the Rockefellers were involved in the building of the 'living history museum' of Colonial Williamsburg. No wonder there is now a strong globalist/PC slant to everything there. I suspect my Virginia ancestors are turning in their graves at what their homes have now become.
The Wiki describes the usual cultural Marxist influence in the story depicted at CW:
Colonial Williamsburg has been criticized for neglecting the role of free African-Americans in Colonial life, in addition to those who were slaves.
[...]
Despite abolition of slavery in 1865 after the American Civil War, later that century and during the first half of the 20th century, racial segregation persisted in Virginia, with many Jim Crow laws requiring it. When it first opened in the 1930s, Colonial Williamsburg had segregated dormitories for its reenactors. African-Americans filled historical roles as servants, rather than free people as in the present day. Colonial Williamsburg allowed the entry of blacks, but Williamsburg area hotels denied them accommodation, and state law forbade blacks from eating in the restored taverns and from shopping in nearby stores. In the 1950s, African-Americans were only allowed to visit Colonial Williamsburg one day a week until after the U.S. Supreme Court's landmark Brown vs. Board of Education decision in 1954 began dismantling segregation laws and practices. Colonial Williamsburg offered some of the earlier public accommodations on an integrated basis.
In the 1970s, in reaction to increasing scorn of its one-sided portrayal of colonial life, Colonial Williamsburg increased its number of African-American slave interpretors. In 1994 it added slave auctions and slave marriages; the NAACP and the Southern Christian Leadership Conference later protested. In 1999 Colonial Williamsburg added a new program to explain slavery and its role in Colonial America.''
The Wiki also tells us:
''The motto of Colonial Williamsburg is "that the future may learn from the past."
Maybe that should be: "that the future may feel guilty about the past'', and of course be shamed into endless apologies and subservience.
This phenomenon of rehearsing and rehashing our past national or racial 'sins' is uncomfortably like the trend seen in many troubled young people today: the trend towards 'self-harm' or self-injury. I know of some young people who for some bizarre reason inflict cuts or wounds on their own flesh. We are doing this on a national or civilizational scale, inflicting harm and pain on ourselves. What healthy person would do that? What healthy person would endlessly dwell on how bad we are/were as a nation, or how evil our forefathers were? Surely all this recrimination takes its toll on the collective psyche.
I don't know whether I will visit CW; I may go and visit my colonial ancestors' graves, most of whose locations I know. But I really don't care to be subjected to somebody's piously PC revisionism, or to be reminded of what "bigots" my ancestors were. The "bigotry" is simply on the other foot now. But the politically correct are too blind to see this.
Labels: American History, Creeping Liberalism, Cultural Marxism, Historical Revisionism, Political Correctness