Your post goes a long way to explaining it. It’s unsatisfying—that the people in power engineered it, and that basically regular, ordinary people will fall for it.
Another BRILLIANT post. I’m originally from a steel town in northeastern Ohio. I moved to Texas for work in 1978. The longer I’ve lived here, the more cofounded I’ve been by the deep-seated, virulent, and completely unrational racism. I was married to a man from Brownsville, Texas for a while. His mother was a WWII bride from Ireland. His father was from Chicago. So there’s no southern family history to explain his racism. He and I both worked in hospitals—in the South, a lot of the administrative hospital workers are Black women. But he was deeply racist.
That’s anecdotal, though. From a larger perspective, I have been trying to figure out how hatred for Black folks become Southern society’s deeply held belief? Plantation owners, sure. It was in their own best interest. But poor white sharecroppers? I’m reading Heather Cox Richardson’s “West from Appomattox.” She says “The families of white yeomen farmers lived in two-room cabins, and poor whites lived in shacks. Most white southerners would never go to school, would never see a city, and would eat a diet of corn, game, pork, molasses, and greens. Some of the poorest “white trash” would struggle endlessly with hookworm, malaria, and pellagra that sapped their strength and gave them a reputation for laziness.”
I’m from a steel town in Northeastern Ohio. You didn’t have to speak English or, in the case of the Irish, for example, be able to read and write English. But it was a strongly union town.
I’ve always thought it was schooling that made the difference. But those immigrants had very little schooling. Why did the newly arrived immigrants in a little town in northeastern Ohio join the unions, and the people in the South reject unions? Why would you fight to the death for a rich man’s right to NOT employ you and pay you a living wage?
Your post goes a long way to explaining it. It’s unsatisfying—that the people in power engineered it, and that basically regular, ordinary people will fall for it.
And I guess the question is how do we STOP this?
Alas there is no Kinsey scale for politics, so let me create one.
The Kinsey scale has been subjct to right shift and that which was in the center has moved to the right
B.M. Before MAGA (or bowel movement)
L........c........R
A. M. After MAGA
L....................C.......R
Another BRILLIANT post. I’m originally from a steel town in northeastern Ohio. I moved to Texas for work in 1978. The longer I’ve lived here, the more cofounded I’ve been by the deep-seated, virulent, and completely unrational racism. I was married to a man from Brownsville, Texas for a while. His mother was a WWII bride from Ireland. His father was from Chicago. So there’s no southern family history to explain his racism. He and I both worked in hospitals—in the South, a lot of the administrative hospital workers are Black women. But he was deeply racist.
That’s anecdotal, though. From a larger perspective, I have been trying to figure out how hatred for Black folks become Southern society’s deeply held belief? Plantation owners, sure. It was in their own best interest. But poor white sharecroppers? I’m reading Heather Cox Richardson’s “West from Appomattox.” She says “The families of white yeomen farmers lived in two-room cabins, and poor whites lived in shacks. Most white southerners would never go to school, would never see a city, and would eat a diet of corn, game, pork, molasses, and greens. Some of the poorest “white trash” would struggle endlessly with hookworm, malaria, and pellagra that sapped their strength and gave them a reputation for laziness.”
I’m from a steel town in Northeastern Ohio. You didn’t have to speak English or, in the case of the Irish, for example, be able to read and write English. But it was a strongly union town.
I’ve always thought it was schooling that made the difference. But those immigrants had very little schooling. Why did the newly arrived immigrants in a little town in northeastern Ohio join the unions, and the people in the South reject unions? Why would you fight to the death for a rich man’s right to NOT employ you and pay you a living wage?