Mississippi Sucks, Big Time!

[Convinced]

Please excuse the language, but I am pissed! My lovely southern state of MS recently put it to a public vote as to whether or not we should keep the Rebel flag. 70% of Mississippians voted to keep it. Tonight, Cheryl Martin had this idiot (a Negro!!!) who has led all kind of rallies to keep the flag. I am also pissed at our Governor and other leaders, because if they had REALLY wanted to remove the flag, they would have done like South Carolina and Georgia and just removed the dang thing! Putting it to a vote all but guaranteed that it would remain. Our state NAACP is talking about economic boycotts, like they did in N. Carolina... why oh why am I in such a backwards state?

[tickledpink]

I feel your pain. Let me share this with you...

When I was in 2nd grade (many, many years ago... ) in S.C., our school had a circus that came to visit. I remember was that it was so much fun! There were clowns, cotton candy, NO CLASS... Anyway, back then, the TV show "The Dukes of Hazzard" was very popular. So, when they started selling "General Lee (for those of you that remember it, that was the name of the car in the show)" flags, EVERYONE bought one. They sold out. Well, when we got back to the classroom, our teacher (African American) was FURIOUS and near tears. She politely collected each and every one of those flags and took them back to the circus. We didn't understand at first what was happening, but then she sat the entire class down and explained the meaning of the "General Lee" aka Confederate flag and the fact that even in the show, the car played "Dixie". She explained that the circus owners took advantage of our ignorance when they sold that to us. Needless to say, that killed my "Dukes of Hazzard" watching.

Sorry this was so long, but I hadn't thought of that in years. For those of us that lived in S.C., it was difficult to watch the state embrace the Confederate flag. Hopefully, a boycott will help Mississippi wake up, although it's sad that it has to come to that.

[1 Woman of Virtue]

I was watching a news report on this and they basically said that as Mississippi is ranked between 48-50 in most every category (48-50 in things like education, health care, poverty level, etc) that a boycott would not make as much of an impact. Any thoughts on that?

[Monique]

As a Mississippian, let me first say that I AM SO ASHAMED THAT WE COULD NOT EVEM GET OFF OUR LAZY *%$ AND VOTE FOR A NEW FLAG. What The F#@% is wrong with my fellow Sips people. We have been talking and talking about this for FOREVER.. Now That the time finally came for us to do something about it MOST OF US JUST SAT ON OUR A$%@SSSSSS..THAT PISSES ME OF..UGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH WHAT THE F*&# IS WRONG WITH USSSSS..I AM SOOOO MAD I COULD CRY. AT TIMES LIKE THIS WE KNEW THEY WERE GOING TO STICK TOGETHER WHY THE HELL COULDN'T WE? WE *N-E-V-E-R* STICK BY ONE ANOTHER. WHAT IS IT GOING TO TAKE SLAVERY AGAIN?

[Eclipse]

Monique, what was the voter turn out? Were we that complacent??

[AKA2D '91]

it was 65% for the flag and 35% against the flag...

[Intriguing18]

Sorors,

I know this probably won't make you feel any better but Alabama is not far behind. We are usually the last state to do anything. We just recently got the law that banned interacial marriages off the books and 40% of the people in this state wanted to keep the stupid law. It wasn't being enforced at the time but it was stupid for them to still have it. I will pray for the people of your state.

[LikeASista]

Originally Posted by Convinced

Please excuse the language, but I am pissed! My lovely southern state of MS recently put it to a public vote as to whether or not we should keep the Rebel flag. 70% of Mississippians voted to keep it. Tonight, Cheryl Martin had this idiot (a Negro!!!) who has led all kind of rallies to keep the flag. I am also pissed at our Governor and other leaders, because if they had REALLY wanted to remove the flag, they would have done like South Carolina and Georgia and just removed the dang thing! Putting it to a vote all but guaranteed that it would remain. Our state NAACP is talking about economic boycotts, like they did in N. Carolina... why oh why am I in such a backwards state?

I REMEMBER THIS EVENT! I hate that I wasn't around GC when this occurred, because I, too, voted in that election and was horrified as to how complacent and passive our people were about the changes offered to us. I actually heard people say things like, "That's the stupidest election I've ever heard of. It's just meaningless. It's a waste of my time." I've felt the same way about it for years now, and I am still boiling over at how nonchalant we are about having a voice nowadays. It's so sad

[Jody]

Maybe there are people in your state that think that being 49th in almost every state ranking (health, education, etc) is more important than wasting time on what appears on the State flag.

My family is from Mississippi and I have property there (my retirement lot!) I'm going to concentrate on improving the community I live in, only when capacity is built within the community, will things like this become non issues.

If folks REALLY don't like it, they could always move...maybe a mass migration would encourage a change

[jon1856]

Very old thread to be brought back to life.
I do understand why some people when they see a symbol
can be upset and even hurt.

But give some thought here:
It is a flag, a flag that brave young men, women and boys (black and white BTB) fought under and for. And they were all, for the most part, Americans. Would that not make it an American flag? One whose honor was taken from it after the War.

For your summer reading I would suggest James M. McPherson's For Cause & Comrades: Why Men Fought in the Civil War.

Little story from several years ago. There was a weekend Civil
War reenactment scheduled somewhere in the Mid-West. Another group thought that it would be a good idea to show up as they thought they had a large group of supporters there.

Well, that was not what they found. The news got into the camps. The officers stopped the reenactment and called the camps together. They formed up together behind their combined Honor Guards and marched off the field and into town with fixed bayonets. The police did not stop them and the guys in the white robes took one look and ran.

In interviews, most said that they were just defending their Flags' Honor.

I know and understand that this rather narrow view of the situation and that others have a right to have other POV's.

BTB, if any group really wanted to show that they were serious about boycotting over a flag, they would go after Florida. And
that has yet to happen.

[UrbanizdSkillz]

Interesting Topic to bring up.

There is a young man by the name of Corey Maye who is sitting on death row in the state of Mississippi. The issue with that? Well, read for yourself below:

Maye today sits on Mississippi's death row, convicted of capital murder for shooting police officer Ron Jones. It's probably worth mentioning that Jones is white, and Maye is black. It's probably also worth mentioning that at the time of his death, Jones' father was police chief of Prentiss, Mississippi, where the shooting took place. The jury that convicted Maye contained two black women, but was otherwise white.

Here are the details, culled from various media reports and conversations with a couple of people close to the case:

Sometime in late 2001, Officer Ron Jones collected a tip from an anonymous informant that Jamie Smith, who lived opposite Maye in a duplex, was selling drugs out of his home. Jones passed the tip to the Pearl River Basin Narcotics Task Force, a regional police agency in charge of carrying out drug raids in four surrounding counties. The task force asked Jones if he'd like to come along on the raid they'd be conducting as the result of his tip. He obliged.

On the night of December 26, the task force donned paramilitary gear, and conducted a drug raid on Smith's house. Unfortunately, they hadn't done their homework. The team didn't realize that the house was a duplex, and that Maye -- who had no relationship with Smith,-- rented out the other side with his girlfirend and 1-year-old daughter.

As the raid on Smith commenced, some officers - including Jones -- went around to what they thought was a side door to Smith's residence, looking for a larger stash of drugs. (Note added on 12/12: This is Maye's first attorney's account of the raid. Police did have a warrant to both residences, though Maye wasn't named in either.) The door was actually a door to Maye's home. Maye was home alone with his young daughter, and asleep, when one member of the SWAT team broke down the outside door. Jones, who hadn't drawn his gun charged in, and made his way to Maye's bedroom. Police did not announce themselves. (Note added on 12/09/05: Police said at trial that they did announce themselves before entering Maye's apartment -- Maye and his attorney say otherwise. I'm inclined to believe Maye, for reasons outlined in this post. However, even if they did, announcing seconds before bursting in just before midnight, isn't much better than not announcing at all. An innocent person on the other end of the raid, particularly if still asleep, has every reason to fear for his life.). Maye, fearing for his life and the safety of his daughter, fired at Jones, hitting him in the abdomen, just below his bulletproof vest. Jones died a short time later.

Maye had no criminal record, and wasn't the target of the search warrant. Police initially concluded they had found no drugs in Maye's side of the duplex. Then, mysteriously, police later announced they'd found "traces" of marijuana. I talked to the attorney who represented Maye at trial. She said that to her knowledge, police had found one smoked marijuana cigarette in Maye's apartment. Regardless, since Maye wasn't the subject of the search, whether or not he had misdemeanor amounts of drugs in his possession isn't really relevant. What's relevant is whether or not he reasonably believed his life was in danger. Seems pretty clear to me that that would be a reasonable assumption.

It apparently wasn't so clear to Mississippi's criminal justice system. In January of last year, Maye was convicted of capital murder for the shooting of Officer Jones. He was sentenced to death by lethal injection.

Let's summarize: Cops mistakenly break down the door of a sleeping man, late at night, as part of drug raid. Turns out, the man wasn't named in the warrant, and wasn't a suspect. The man, frigthened for himself and his 18-month old daughter, fires at an intruder who jumps into his bedroom after the door's been kicked in. Turns out that the man, who is black, has killed the white son of the town's police chief. He's later convicted and sentenced to death by a white jury. The man has no criminal record, and police rather tellingly changed their story about drugs (rather, traces of drugs) in his possession at the time of the raid.

The story gets more bizarre from there.

Maye's attorney tells me that after the trial, she spoke with two jurors by phone. She learned from them that the consensus among jurors was that Maye was convicted for two reasons. The first is that though they initially liked her, Maye's lawyer, the jury soured on her when, in her closing arguments, she intimated that if the jury showed no mercy for Maye, God might neglect to bestow mercy on them when they meet him in heaven. They said the second reason May was convicted was that the jury felt he'd been spoiled by his mother and grandmother, and wasn't very respectful of elders and authority figures. The facts of the case barely entered the picture. Gotta' love the South.

It gets weirder. Maye's family terminated his trial attorney after he was convicted. In her place, they hired a guy from California with no legal experience who convinced them that he'd had bad representation (given his lawyer's closing argument, he was probably on to something). The new fellow has since failed on several occasions to file the proper appeals.

Maye's case is an outrage. Prentiss, Mississippi clearly violated Maye's civil rights the moment its cops needlessly and recklessly stormed his home in the middle of the night. The state of Mississippi is about to add a perverse twist to that violation by executing Maye for daring to defend himself.


Source

Yeah, I was outraged too. But this isn't the sort of case you see people rallying for. No, you find people declaring it a holiday because a spoiled princess got early release from jail.

[LadiBug]

Speaking as a Mississippian and a graduate of the state's most prestigious university, I would like to remind all that several African Americans got out to vote...even those who lacked education. However, we were outnumbered. Some African Americans from the South still have that "fear" mentality. Those of you who have seen pictures of Emmitt Till or heard about the dreadful murders of those who spoke against "the man." Fear is NOT an excuse, but a lot of those people who voted FOR the flag really just were so used to fear. HOWEVER, our people came out in record numbers to elect our BELOVED OBAMA! I have never been more proud of my state. Mississippi gets a bad rep, but I need for you all not to give up on us yet!

[SBA]

Originally Posted by LadiBug

Speaking as a Mississippian and a graduate of the state's most prestigious university, I would like to remind all that several African Americans got out to vote...even those who lacked education. However, we were outnumbered. Some African Americans from the South still have that "fear" mentality. Those of you who have seen pictures of Emmitt Till or heard about the dreadful murders of those who spoke against "the man." Fear is NOT an excuse, but a lot of those people who voted FOR the flag really just were so used to fear. HOWEVER, our people came out in record numbers to elect our BELOVED OBAMA! I have never been more proud of my state. Mississippi gets a bad rep, but I need for you all not to give up on us yet!

speaking as someone who was born, raised, and lived in Mississippi for 13 years, we still have a long way to go as black people in our state. I'll be a Mississippian in my heart till the day I die, but the complacency of a lot of the people tears me up.

[LadiBug]

Let's keep it real, them. We have a long way to go as Black people in the COUNTRY...pretty much in general. I loathe complacency as much as the next person, but it is unfair to generalize every African American Mississippian. Instead of allowing their complacency to bother us, we have to continue to work until they understand our points of view.

[SBA]

Originally Posted by LadiBug

Let's keep it real, them. We have a long way to go as Black people in the COUNTRY...pretty much in general. I loathe complacency as much as the next person, but it is unfair to generalize every African American Mississippian. Instead of allowing their complacency to bother us, we have to continue to work until they understand our points of view.

Its just from my experiences. I have lived in the midwest, west, and deep south (twice), but nothing frustrates me more than to see my family and people suffer like they do in Miss. but do nothing to try to change their situation


and what school did you graduate from? My sister actually crossed AKA at USM - IK chapter in 06