“Confederate Southern Americans” a minority like hispanics and african americans?
 

The most unusual candidate for S.C. Senate this year may be Ron Wilson, the national commander of the 30,000-plus-member Sons of Confederate Veterans.

Running as a Republican for an Anderson County seat in Tuesday’s primary, Wilson openly promotes the right of secession. He also wants to have “Confederate Southern Americans” designated a specific minority group, like Hispanics or African-Americans.

“Confederate Southern Americans are a separate and distinct people,” Wilson said in a statement posted on the Internet. “As a people, Confederate Southern Americans are tired of being the ‘whipping boy’ for the rest of the country’s racial problems.”

Wilson, an Easley resident, did not respond to repeated requests for an interview.

However, in his Internet posting, Wilson has qualified his remarks on secession. While he believes states have the right to secede from the Union, he said he is not “in any way an advocate of modern secession.”

The Southern Poverty Law Center, an Alabama-based group that monitors what it calls the “Radical Right,” has placed Wilson on a nationwide list of “40 to Watch.”

“Wilson has radicalized the Sons of Confederate Veterans,” said Law Center spokeswoman Heidi Beirich, who called Wilson a “neo-Confederate.” By that, she said she meant someone who wants to return to pre-1860 United States and is dismissive of slavery.

http://www.thestate.com/mld/thestate/8844744.htm

If this guy is elected I will be amazed.

Whew! For a minute I thought I read it as Confederate South Americans...

Actually, a contingent of Southerners after the Civil War packed up and left the Deep South and moved even further south... to Brazil! The descendants of these settlers still honor their ancestors' traditions today, even though most of 'em speak Brazilian Portuguese instead of Southern English. :)

More info: http://www.comm.unt.edu/histofperf/t...ction_page.htm
http://www.mablanentertainment.com/conf.htm
http://www.nationmaster.com/encyclop...ricana,-Brazil

P.S. And they don't have a hang-up over flying the Stars and Bars!

I read about them before. That is quite interesting.

Re: “Confederate Southern Americans” a minority like hispanics and african americans?
 

I won't.

I'm sorry to all you Gamecocks out there, but I have to co-sign with Phasad. This is the same state that's still hung up over stars and bars, is 50th in education, and contains a whole family who believes one of their own is innocent of a murder that DNA has confirmed thrice already.......


Course, I WAS watching Jingle All The Way, and In reminded that the main character is now OUR GOVERNOR.....

I've tried really hard to stop making fun of the south but WTF?!?!?! In that case I think Irish Catholic girls need a special designation too. We're sick of wearing plaid kilts and not getting any respect.

That's Scottish I thought.

-Rudey
--Stop riding off another European minority

I don't have a problem..
 

What is wrong with some folks wanting to be called a "minority"?

Really?

They are low in population numbers.

They are impoverished.

Their educational advancement is miniscule at best.

If these folks want to be labeled and cornered into an "ethnic group" that has some cultural relevancy (to some), then, hey, this is America and they ought to feel good about something...

Because really, I can't help it if these folks "ain't got no kinna game"...

And livin' in a trailer park hardly qualifies as public housing--dayum near close to homeless...

And reading 1979 "Hustler" magazines does not qualify as "sex ed"...

And watchin' the "fishin' channel" off some stolen cable connection is not sports...

But that's my opinion, and I might be wrong...

Besides, how about all the former slave owners that raped many slave women and produced children? Does that qualify me as "part of the confederacy"--'cuz my great-great grandfather was a Confederate Army officer...

So if these folks get legitamized, then a whole new can of worms will be opened up (Jerry Springer style) that they will have to answer to...

Monet, you actually kind of made me think of something there...

What this guy is suggesting in a round-about way is that status as an oppressed group shouldn't be conferred by race, he's suggesting that we look past race and look at socioeconomic background.

If we look at the notion of white privilege, we might say that your trailer-trash-Americans are not recipients of white privilege -- in fact, most middle to upper class whites discriminate against these folks as much as (and perhaps more than) people of color. Not because of any race, but because of their socioeconomic status.

If someone grows up in a meth infested trailer park, they are equally disadvantaged as someone who grows up in east-central Memphis.

I'm not sure that this guy is consciously aware of this, as it just seems like a populist appeal to gain votes. However, I think that maybe this is something that should be addressed -- in other words, reexamine affirmative action to help those of low socioeconomic beginnings, not necessarily those of a certain ancestry.

I respectfully disagree, but I see your point. :) Might I mention that White Privilege does not mean that you are going to be rich.

As I understand it, socioeconomic background is considered at some level for some college scholarships and entrances into college...

I think it is more a triumph over all the poverty that one faces that the admissions committees are examining at some level in graduate and professional schools--probably not undergraduate level courses...

For some folks, especially those of color that are underrepresented in academia, it is the historical context and no guarentees of any future "state-sponsored" and legal segregation of folks that make it an issue in regards to affirmative action.

As for these folks: they can do whatever they set their mind to do. They just choose not to follow what "society" has asked them to do--such as paying federal taxes. It is not a matter of being drugged out and undereducated, it is more of matter of the choices the made in their lives and the exclusionary living they choose to live...

For the most part, many folks of color will look at one not in their ethnic group rather oddly at first, but slowly start to include them once they learn of the earnest behavior of the person--e.g. "judging someone by the content of their character..." However, I have been in many situations that I have presented myself with the utmost articulation and pristine behavior in a "majority" and mainstream arena and have been treated as a leper or at best, like my hard working enslaved anscestors...

How should I be capable of reconciling that issue?

Re: I don't have a problem..
 

With all due respect, look at what has been written in this thread. Some horrible things. I have lived a number of places, and I have never lived anywhere that had better racial relations than SC. People of different races interact and respect each other.

I have lived in bigger cities were different races ignore each other at best. This guy is sick of everything being brought back to race. The funny thing is that the majority of the south has gotten over it, while the rest of the country digs it up every 5 minutes.

Are there any bigots and racists out there? Yes, there are. And those people deserve to rot in Hades.

I just get a kick out of people who consider themselves open to different cultures, but feel free to mock and humiliate southerners.

Snaps to krazy. Why do people get so offended if a person even mentions race, but it's okay to make fun of people who were born or live in the South? Guess what - we're not all racists, we don't marry our cousins, we wear shoes except when we're on our beautiful beaches going into our warm water, we don't eat dirt, and I've seen as many trailer parks in the Northeast and out West as I have in the South. Monet, we don't steal cable anymore than any other racial or ethnic group. It's admirable that GeekyPenguin has "tried really hard to stop making fun of the south." I could just imagine the reaction if she said she was trying to stop making fun of a particular racial group.

What we need to do is stop stereotyping individuals on the basis of race, gender, geography, hair color, sexual preference, religion, etc. Instead, we should all make fun of Ron Wilson, who sounds like an idiot no matter where he lives or was born. Ridicule him for his policies and platform, but don't lump every other southerner in with him.

I have tried to stop making fun of the South, too. After 18 years straight of living there, I got out when I could and I feel I have earned the right to make fun of the South. I've received more racial negativity there than any other place I've lived (which includes a few cities on the eastern seaboard and abroad).

There's a huge difference in my mind between making fun of someone's location and racial harassment. But maybe after experiencing one, the other seems trivial.

My entire extended family is born and reared below the Mason-Dixon line...

And I am a Southern Californian... :rolleyes:

However, my folks still have not lost their drawls after living in California for over 35 years... Go figure... :confused:

Making fun of Southerners is easy to do especially since I am ceremoniously one because of my anscestor's blood --both Black and White--leaked onto its soil in Dixieland during the War of Northern Aggression...

Being a true Southerner is not just a place, it is a state of mind...

:rolleyes: (I couldn't help myself!)

You're inferring things from my argument that weren't there. People in Wisconsin do stupid stuff all the time too, like stuff themselves into vending machines and stand in shorts for four hours in -20* weather to watch a football team, and shoot each other while they're hunting, and if you guys want to make fun of that, it's fine. Nowhere did I say "every single person from the south ever is stupid." I have a lot of relatives in the south and they make fun of people like this just as much as I do.

Stupid people are everywhere. As much as some people would like to believe the South has the market on stupidity, it just isn't true.

As do I because they are funny. I love the South, but it does have it's fair share of wackos, just like everywhere else. I just choose to look at it a lot like Jimmy Buffett...

"With all of our running and all of our cunning, if we couldn't laugh, we would all go insane."

I like to call things as I see them.

There is a difference between all Southerners are racist and there is a lot of racism in the South. This isn't about racism but I just wanted to point that out.

My personal opinion about the South can be brought down to one damn experience: People use their freedoms to the point where it can upset someone else - for example smoking.

-Rudey

Very funny story that speaks volumes about regional bias:

We were travelling through upstate New York on a family vacation when I was probably 11 or 12. Had just visited Lake George and were on our way to somewhere else. Pulled off and got gas at some hicksville gas station.

The attendant who must have had two teeth in her smile actually said to us (imagine the worst possible hick drawl) "Oklahoma? We know all about y'all" -- as if she because she was in New York was some kind of blue blood.

The fam had a good laugh pulling away from that gas station -- and it's something that has stuck in my mind ever since.

Somehow, I think where we are we always picture our region as having the best and brightest -- especially on somewhere such as GC. Typically, we, as GLO members associate with only the best and brightest and therefore have a somewhat insulated view of what the world is like where we live. I was shocked when I checked the FBI crime data base statistics and found that Oklahoma City outranked Compton, California in all crime statistic areas except for murder.

Everywhere you go, you'll find the dregs of society and you'll find the best society has to offer. I don't think that any region or area has a monopoly on this.

No, no we make fun of people from upstate NY too. I would stay they are just as much hicks as any place in the South.

-Rudey

And people from upstate NY make fun of you as well :D

Anyone that makes fun of someone because of the area that they come from without knowing a damned thing about who they are -- for example, this upstate hick had no idea that the people they were accusing of being ignorant okies were a lawyer and someone who has an MA in French Lit.

It's ignorant, generally speaking, to make fun of anyone because of where they're from -- unless that's southeastern Oklahoma ;).

I didn't say you did, GP. Nor did you say that all southerners are racist. What you did say was that you're trying to quit making fun of the south. I'm simply trying to point out that making fun of an entire group of people, as you're trying so hard to quit doing, is wrong whether it's based on race or geography. If you had said that you're trying to quit making fun of Asian-Americans, you would be flamed endlessly and possibly banned from GC.

Is Ron Wilson an idiot? Yes. Are the midwesterners who wear shorts when it's 20 below outside idiots? Yes. Is it because they are from a particular place? No. (Okay, maybe the place is relevant because of the weather, but you get the point ...) There are idiots everywhere, but for some reason people think they can magnify the idiocy by emphasizing that a particular idiot is from the south. I think we can both agree that it's not relevant.

Am I the only southerner secure enough to take a joke?

Re: “Confederate Southern Americans” a minority like hispanics and african americans?
 

I'm sure my brother would be interested in this as well as most of my family. They still use the levels of southernness:

1st level - "Civil War" - You're not from the South
2nd level - "War Between the States" - You're a Southern sympathizer.
3rd level - "War of Northern Aggression" - You're Southern!

Most of the neo-confederates that I've had the...umm...displeasure of dealing with have been low down folks. My brother, though he loves his history, doesn't even deal with these groups and most likely wouldn't fight for southern minorities.

I believe these people are mistaking the impetus behind classification of minorities. Of course there are different groups of people, in some sort of minority, who aren't "recognized" as minorities. For the confederate americans, those who are euro-american are still benefitting from being white in the South and, therefore, shouldn't be asking for extra privileges!!!!

Just my $.97.

Yep.

hey wait here, while I go find links

http://www.politics1.com/parties.htm

check out the Southern Party and the Southern Independence party.

I really can't think of anything more unpatriotic, but whatever.

Some of those third parties (Including the SP and SIP) are REEEAAALLLY SCARY!!!

Yeah they are. I'm glad that they're all angry at each other and don't join forces. That would be insane.

I agree. I am the first generation of my family born outside of the South. However,I spend a great deal of time down there. I feel more comfortable there. Also, I would somewhat agree with the person that stated that race relations in the South are better than in the North. Southerners, of all races, are friendly. ALL of my negative racial encounters occurred outside of the South.

Agreed. We've been forced to see the dirtiness of racism/discrimination and to deal with it as best we can. In other parts of the country, there is definite racial segregation in the communities.

I am secure enough to take a joke, I just felt it needed to be addressed.

It is too hot in the South, sometimes... And the humidity!!! Whew... Glad I love me sum sweet tea... Ain't nuthin' like dat dere... It jus' cools the insides right nicely... :D

(Besides, you do not get anything remotely sweetened in teas in other states beyond the line)

Isn't sweet tea the best thing ever!!! Man, I think I miss that more than anything. I went to a Creole Restaurant last week and was shocked that they didn't have SWEET TEA. Talk about hot!!!That, and getting Pralines from the Georgia Candy Company!!

I miss ATL!!