Civil War Craziness - Part II

Guest Blogger: K Real

Civil War Craziness continues, and why am I surprised? After all, the Wilson Times said that this craziness would last another four years. In fact what was stated in their opinion section on 01-20-2011 the article Learning from the past. “For African Americans, finding events to be nostalgic about during these next four years may be difficult. Yet like it or not, there will be anniversary commemorations from now until 2015.” 

Well readers, I don’t like it! And what I don’t like the most about this is the easiness of acceptance of this craziness by the African American Community.


Ok folks, I get it that this is the south, however a few years back when the state legislators wanted to place the Rebel flag on vehicle license plates, Black People and yes White People opposed it and stood up against it. And today as they are seeking to re-segregate public schools in Wake County the Capitol county of North Carolina, it’s all over the news and not just in North Carolina but national news, and there are law suits pending in the courts to point out this madness and end it. And as some state legislators are attempting to institute laws requiring voter picture identification as a requirement to vote in the State of North Carolina, in-order to prevent citizens from exercising a most basic Constitutional Right, that is the right to Vote. The people who remember; the pole tax, the literacy test, the beatings and the bullying that was perpetrated against Blacks to deny them the vote, are standing up against this injustice, against this attempt to move this state and indeed this nation backward. So please don’t attempt to tell me that this civil war commemoration stuff will happen regardless what Blacks feel, say, or do.

I know and the Black Community knows that wrong is wrong! The Jews would not accept German Americans or anyone else for that matter commemorating the holocaust every fifty years, nor would Native Americans accept all of us immigrants or descendants of slaves commemorating or celebrating the up-heaving and slaughtering of their ancestors, every fifty years. Nor would non Japanese Americans accept Japanese Americans celebrating/commemorating, the bombing of Pearl Harbor every fifty years for a five year period, and neither would Japanese Americans accept non Japanese Americans celebrating/commemorating, the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki Japan, every fifty years for a five year period. So why then would anyone expect me or any African American to accept this civil war- commemoration/celebration/remembrance/honoring or what ever they choose to call it five year period every fifty years.

I say no! I say Black People need to come together and we need to put a stop to this insulting of our Race. You ask what can we do? We can start by enlisting the NAACP to action, we can seek legal action from the ACLU, we can seek legislation from the Black Caucus’ of the U.S. House of Representatives and the U.S. Senate, we can boycott media outlets such as the Wilson Times who constantly report on these civil war functions and events, we can march and demonstrate at these functions and events.

There are many things of substance we can do. Have we forgotten what Dr. Martin Luther King did and or suffered for achievement of civil rights in America, what he did for us? 

For those Wilsonians who are asking what lit a burr under his saddle this time? Well, it was the Wilson Times dated 05-04-2011 article, Lake to speak at Confederate Memorial Day service, same paper same day article, Theater of the American South Civil War the underlying theme this year. Same paper May 6, 2011 under Today In History. “ On May 6, 1861 Confederate President Jefferson Davis approved an act passed by the Confederate Congress recognizing that a state of war existed with the United States of America.” 

I sure hope someone out there is listening and caring, remember if they do this every fifty years with no opposition, in fifty years or a hundred the South will have won the war against an invading north seeking to deny them their states’ rights in their war of self defense. And there would never have been any slavery in the American South, at least not the horrific version of slavery our ancestors had to endure for more than a hundred years. While watching MSNBC I actually heard, on the TV news a South Carolina State Legislator say, “slavery wasn’t really that bad, slaves were actually treated rather good.” 

I’m telling you reader, folks love to rewrite history, you know tell the truth, the way they remember it, the way there parents told it to them, the way their favorite college professor said it was, you know the ones they invite to speak at their events. Let us come together to put a stop to this insulting, disrespecting, insensitive and truly embedded racial hatred toward African Americans.

In my Christian heart I truly believe that the good people of Wilson and indeed North Carolina are better than this. 

K. Real