Monday, August 22, 2005

Oh, I'm glad I'm down in Dixie, Hooray, Hooray!!!

I want to know why some people in this country are so afraid of commemorating the South? I especially want to know why people that aren't even from the South are so involved in what we Southerners can and can't do.

Apparently, some Johnny-come-latelys in Hanover County, Virginia, near the Confederate capital of Richmond, want the name of the annual Civil War commemoration changed from "Dixie Days" to something less reminiscent of the South.

"Dixie Days" is offensive? Jamelle Wilson seems to think so. She says calling the event Dixie Days is "problematic" and says that calling a Civil War commemoration by that name "tends to represent the past." Hello, Jamelle? In case you haven't noticed, the Civil War is in the past.

My guess is that Jamelle is from somewhere north of the Mason-Dixon. I couldn't find anywhere that confirmed that but I'm pretty sure I'm right. And even though the story didn't say if Jamelle was black or white, my guess is that she is black.

Jamelle, erasing any trace of the history and heritage of the South is not going to change the fact that once upon a time in America, we practiced slavery. But before you go dragging Dixie through the mud one more time, consider this: ships from Northern ports like Boston and New York were still engaged in the slave trade AFTER the War of Northern Aggression (or Civil War as you Yankees like to call it.)

One would think that if the "Civil War" were about ending slavery that all of its forms would have been abolished in 1865 but that is not the case. Since the North was still engaged in the slave trade, the natural conclusion to draw is that the "Civil War" had very little to do with slavery and everything to do with states rights and freedom.

But Jamelle and her Northern-biased education will continue to equate the "D-word" with slavery, ignoring the fact that long after slavery was abolished in the Southern states, the North was still profiting from it.

Maybe we Southerners should be offended by the "Y-word" from now on? Let's start by demanding that Steinbrenner change the name of his baseball team! (If this sounds ludicrous, it was meant to...)

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