The South an Anchor to America's progress

[packman]

Last edited Mon Jul 6, 2015, 05:26 PM - Edit history (1)

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Maybe it would be a good idea to rethink seccession (sarcasm , folks):

Fifth generation Southerner states the effect the South has on America's growth:

"Minus the South, the rest of the U.S. probably would be more like Canada or Australia or Britain or New Zealand—more secular, more socially liberal, more moderate in the tone of its politics and somewhat more generous in social policy. And it would not be as centralized as France or as social democratic as Sweden..."

Reasons:
1. Children of Southern families less likely to raise above their parents in income or status:

" children are far less likely to rise above the socio-economic levels of their parents in the U.S. than are those in Britain, Canada and Australia, as well as Germany, France and the Nordic nations. The American South, with the lowest rates of intergenerational social mobility in the U.S., clearly skews the national statistics, creating an embarrassing and depressing version of American exceptionalism.

2. "the South is the region with the greatest income inequality. Southern exceptionalism has helped to ensure that the American Dream is more likely to be realized in the Old World than in the New World"


3."Not until the 1960s, with the help of federal military intervention in Southern states, was the right of African-Americans to vote secured. And today white Southern Republicans are at the forefront of efforts to roll back the voting rights revolution by making voter registration more difficult."

Seems the South is the last gritty, dark corner of America and will remain so until it owns up to its destructive political choices that is handicapping the growth of America. Almost cancerous.



Read more: http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2015/07/how-the-south-skews-america-119725.html#ixzz3f7iUc7NS

[Hoyt]

1. You'll be accused of bashing the south, no matter how true if you don't acknowledge every liberal

in the south.

Doesn't matter if McCain/Palin would be in office now if the rest of the USA were like the south, southerners will take offense with singling them out. They'll say there are ignorant racists everywhere. True, but not the point.

[kcr]

52. Of course you were right. It only took till post number two.

What a shock.

We did everything we could to escape the south because it really is a lost cause there. I feel sorry for anyone who has to suffer there. There is no reason to deny the truth. That very denial is a part of the problem.

[Fawke Em]

2. This flamebait Southern-bashing story was posted yesterday.

It was bad enough then.

[CANDO]

9. Facts are flamebait?

I think we've jumped the shark on that one. I understand why southern liberals may be butt hurt over this stuff, but it's still factual. And it's not your fault. No one is saying it is.

[LanternWaste]

31. Melodrama and implication ride easiest on the saddle of facts...

Melodrama and implication ride easiest on the saddle of facts.

Not that melodrama nor implication is your fault by any means...

[csziggy]

20. It was posted at least TWICE over the weekend

It sucked then, it sucks now.

Not aimed at you, Fawke Em.

[Phentex]

21. Three times...

as if once wasn't enough.

[csziggy]

24. I am very tempted to start alerting on every South bashing thread

But I doubt it would do much good.

This type of piling on seems to be a tactic to divide the Democrats. It's an old right wing method of keeping people down, encouraging them to fight against one another rather than against the forces denying them equality and opportunities.

But so many of the people doing the South bashing are long term DUers I'd hate to think of them as right wing trolls even though their persistence makes me wonder. So instead of confronting them, I have increased my Ignore list far beyond what it has been in years. I don't want to be given a time out or banned for firing back at the offensive posters.

[Phentex]

26. I feel the same way...

but it has opened my eyes to certain people. I won't be bothering them in any way.

[csziggy]

35. Yes, there are several DUers who I respected

But who are adamant about South bashing.

Ignore works well for me - I don't take a chance on losing my temper and getting banned if I never see their messages.

[cwydro]

42. I agree.

It's the same posters, and it's obvious they don't care that they're insulting their fellow DUers.

There's a pattern lately, and one can't help but wonder about their ultimate goal.

That said, I won't bump anymore of these vile and divisive threads.

Let them embarrass themselves; they're doing a great job of it.

[B2G]

45. If it wasn't for the South, those black men in Baltimore,

Ferguson, Cleveland and New York would probably be alive and well right now, right?

[csziggy]

47. Their ultimate goal seems to be to divide us

And turn us against each other. As I said that has been a right wing and 1% method of keeping people down for ages. In this country it has been poor whites against poor blacks (or whatever the minority/recent immigrant of the moment that 'needs' to be villanized).

If it were just one or two posts by various people, I wouldn't think about it much. But it is the same few posters over and over and over and over, bashing the South and bashing poor whites. I have seriously begun to conclude that they at sleepers with the goal to divide us and turn us against each other. In other words, trolls.

If they are simply individuals with a prejudice against a big chunk of our country, they are trolls in that despite it being made clear to them by numerous DUers that they are being offensive and they CONTINUE to do it. But it is too patterned and there are several who seem to use the same media, the same talking points and the same intractable attitudes - in which case they seem to be more than random internet trolls and more likely troll with an assignment and agenda.

In either case, they are long established here and calling them out would only get me banned. So my ignore list keeps growing...

[cwydro]

49. You said it very well.

Thank you.

[Uncle Joe]

57. Divide, distract and conquer is the Modus Operandi of the less than 1%

whether they be in the North or South.

[csziggy]

61. True and it disturbs me to see it operating here

Used by long time DUers who supposedly are here to try to improve our country.

[Uncle Joe]

62. It does me as well, csziggy, but it's understandable,

fear trumps reason, reason trumps faith and faith trumps fear.

The less than 1% would love nothing more than to keep the masses operating from a fear/hatred mindset in order to conquer both reason and faith.

The red flag isn't the real danger to the bull, it's the sword.

Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.

Martin Luther King, Jr.

Read more at http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/quotes/m/martinluth101472.html#qtS5DQTCUedM7Q8S.99

Those who enjoy their own emotionally bad health and who habitually fill their own minds with the rank poisons of suspicion, jealousy and hatred, as a rule take umbrage at those who refuse to do likewise, and they find a perverted relief in trying to denigrate them.
Johannes Brahms

Read more at http://www.brainyquote.com/search_results.html#2LUXH2zqDQTcAUKm.99


Anger is the most impotent of passions. It effects nothing it goes about, and hurts the one who is possessed by it more than the one against whom it is directed.

Carl Sandburg

Read more at http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/quotes/c/carlsandbu119183.html#iKTGByoL4tqKaA4X.99

History, despite its wrenching pain, cannot be unlived, but if faced with courage, need not be lived again.
Maya Angelou

Read more at http://www.brainyquote.com/search_results.html#DSoDQxzR4oUM09VG.99

[csziggy]

63. Wonderful quotes! n/t

[whatthehey]

3. to get in before the poutrage....

"the south" is a generic collective term describing region-wide charactersitics demonstrated by the population as an aggregate whole, and does not imply any universally applicable individual attribute.

[Fawke Em]

4. So why not pick on the solid mid-West?

That swath from Texas up to North Dakota is far more red than the South.

[whatthehey]

6. a) not really b) I'm not the OP c) the attributes in the article are worse in the south

[DrDan]

5. can we get over this and move on

[packman]

7. We'll get over it when

1. All children, especially those in the South, have equal opportunity
2. The South pays its fair share of taxes and stops being a taker from the more generous Northern states
3. Stops trying to suppress voting rights
4. Stops electing politicians who denigrate science and progress
5. Comes into the 21st Century
6. Realizes Religious choices should not be a factor in elections
7. Starts to recognize basic human rights for all people regardless of their race or choices in life

EXAMPLE:

"Five million public school students in Texas will begin using new social studies textbooks this fall based on state academic standards that barely address racial segregation. The state’s guidelines for teaching American history also do not mention the Ku Klux Klan or Jim Crow laws.

And when it comes to the Civil War, children are supposed to learn that the conflict was caused by “sectionalism, states’ rights and slavery” — written deliberately in that order to telegraph slavery’s secondary role in driving the conflict, according to some members of the state board of education.

Slavery was a “side issue to the Civil War,” said Pat Hardy, a Republican board member, when the board adopted the standards in 2010. “There would be those who would say the reason for the Civil War was over slavery. No. It was over states’ rights.”

http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/150-years-later-schools-are-still-a-battlefield-for-interpreting-civil-war/2015/07/05/e8fbd57e-2001-11e5-bf41-c23f5d3face1_story.html?hpid=z4

[seveneyes]

8. Yeah because nobody in the fucking north, east or west does that shit

Plenty of dumb fuckheads to go around without singling out a geographic location.

[packman]

10. I have freckles all over

but the most is on one particular part of my body which the doctor always is concerned about. Same with the South, it's the distilled, concentrated pollution of inequality, hate, and intractable mindset that is there that drags on the rest of America.

[MyOwnPeace]

15. Some people......

just don't like it when having to face facts!

[CANDO]

11. But...

When the fuckheads seem to be concentrated in geographic locales....? Of course there are fuckheads everywhere, but concentrated in the south.

[cwydro]

25. Never mind.

The OP does not know the difference between succession and secession.

Really too funny!

[DrDan]

33. Yet he bashes education in the south (post 7)

[cwydro]

36. I know, right?

You can't make this stuff up!

[DrDan]

43. I guess I could be misreading his post

Perhaps he wants the south to succeed

[packman]

50. Indeed I do want it to succeed

AND A big thank you to all who caught my spelling error. Unlike the South, I admit my mistake, correct it and move on. And, I know it just made you feel ohhhh so good.

[DrDan]

54. Wrong - you are reluctant to move on - as you yourself have said

[CANDO]

16. Pretty much talk to any modern conservative...

And they agree with the "states' rights" argument. Yet they are so pissed when it gets pointed out that said rights are nearly always used to subjugate certain minority populations. And hence their inclination to go along with and outright push for racist policies and then they get indignant about being called racists. And the south arguing the civil war was about states rights instead of slavery? It was about states rights to keep slavery, so it was really about slavery.

[former9thward]

55. Everyone agrees with states rights.

Depending on the issue. I read about states rights all the time when it comes to allowing states to do what they want on marijuana. Do you agree states have the right to have their own marijuana policies?

[CANDO]

59. Weed = slavery?

I know you're not saying that, but why do liberals try to enhance freedoms with states' rights and cons seek to subjugate with it? For an example, Vermont may be the 1st state to enact single payer using states rights, yet many conservatives seek to deny any number of freedoms such as the right to vote, and the right to organize, or a woman's reproductive choice.

[former9thward]

60. Some liberals try and reduce 2nd amendment rights through the federal government.

I am opposed to that but many disagree with me. Again, people are for or against states rights depending on what side of an issue they are on.

[tymorial]

56. You'll have to wait until another tragedy.

The people who took the issue about the battle flag and turned it into a condemnation of the south in general are behaving this way because they seek to sooth their internalized guilt through splitting (black and white thinking) which is ultimately an exercise in moral superiority. They judge everything based upon how they feel and when facts are required, they find those facts which validate their feelings first. Because their world view is derived from emotionalism, they feel tragedy deeply and will react. The tragic death of 9 people in such a racist and hateful manner requires lashing out. Racism is the ultimate problem and as many have stated, it is everywhere. For many, this produces a fear response... perhaps their neighbors are racist. Perhaps their coworkers or family members. It is easy to blame the south because the south has a history of racism and oppression. It is the easiest target and as such the simplest method of personal validation of one's feelings. Another example is the continued bashing of Christians over objections to same sex marriage and abortion. Muslims do not support same sex marriage and abortion yet if you substituted Muslim for Christian in any of the comments which discuss Christian opposition, you would be called and Islamophobe. The reason is the same, they are uncomfortable so they lash out in the simplest manner to make themselves feel better.
-
The fact is, while those statistics are probably true, there are fine and decent people who live in the south. There are people who only want to live in harmony with their neighbors. They don't care if the person is Black, White, Asian, Hispanic etc. They want to move forward. Moving forward is not possible when everything is criticized. That is what these people I describe above do not understand. They only accept perfection because they believe themselves to be morally perfect.

[DrDan]

58. Your last sentence summarizes it very well

[davidn3600]

12. Some of the most segregated cities in the nation are in the North

Just saying...

The south has it's problems, but the North isn't some civil rights paradise.

[B2G]

29. Just ask the folks in

Baltimore, New York, Cleveland and Ferguson.

[ileus]

13. If only we had a final solution for those people...

[Erich Bloodaxe BSN]

17. I'd love to give them their own nation.

(If by 'those people' you mean RW nutjobs, and not just 'people from the south'.) Create a 'red' nation, give relocation bonuses and moving expense help to people to move there, and help any blue folks who live in that area help in moving out.

They'd 'final solution' themselves into oblivion without any help from anyone else, winding up being a slum nation much like North Korea within a few decades, but at least they wouldn't be screwing up our political system any more.

[Go Vols]

14. The greatest income inequality occurs

in DC,New York,Conn. and Mass.


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_U.S._states_by_Gini_coefficient

[DrDan]

18. Now now - let's not interrupt this region-bashing bigotry with facts

[Orrex]

34. Help us understand the Gini coefficient.

Since you're comfortable rolling it out in support of your argument, I'm sure that you must be able to provide a clear articulation of its meaning and significance in this context.

Is it an across-the-board comparison between the top and bottom of the income scale? Is it a comparison between two people working in the same industry? For the same company? At the same job? What, exactly, does it compare?

If we're comparing a Manhattan-based hedge fund manager to a Bronx-based dishwasher, then sure. But is that the comparison? Is that comparison relevant here? If it is, then please indicate exactly how it's relevant.

Alternatively, if we're comparing a Manhattan-based restaurant owner to a dishwasher at that same restaurant, I'm not sure that that's relevant either. Is it? How so?


Please be clear and specific, in deference to those of us without advanced degrees in economics. Thanks!

[Go Vols]

44. I have to mow/bushhog right now

but heres a link for ya.Its a 10 min read.

The Gini coefficient is a measure of statistical dispersion intended to represent the income distribution of a nation's residents, and is the most commonly used measure of inequality.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gini_coefficient

[4Q2u2]

40. Look deeper into why

Those NE States were power houses of manufacturing where middle class people earned good wages that were fought for by unions.
Enter the South with Right to Work, tax breaks for corporations and the race to the bottom.
What is worse? A Chinese person stealing a job from America or a Fellow American Stealing that job from another.

http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/1954/01/new-england-and-the-south/376244/

For Shame

[n2doc]

19. The solution is not to ignore the South, or wish it to go away

The South is part of America. Balkanization of America needs to be reversed.

One big issue that Liberals ignore is that they keep losing states. Wisconsin, Michigan, Iowa, Florida, North Carolina, Ohio. Start getting those back. It is not enough to win them every four years in the Presidential elections, the repubs controlling those states are causing real harm. And generating more repub candidates for higher office.

[Comrade Grumpy]

22. I hope you feel better now.

[cwydro]

23. Um, the word you were looking for is "secession."

Not "succession."

Lmao.

[Orrex]

37. Good point.

That insignificant misspelling invalidates the entirety of the linked and quoted article written by another author.

[cwydro]

41. Insignificant?

The words are completely different, pronounced differently, and have different meanings.

But nice try.

[Orrex]

48. Yes, insignificant. And no shit.

Do you seriously think that anyone read the post and honestly misunderstood the point that the OP was making? Did you? If so, then that's truly unfortunate.

Also, since the three syllables that have your guts in a twist are entirely separate from and irrelevant to the linked/quoted article, the OP's mistake becomes even more irrelevant.

Nice try at shifting the focus from a real problem to the perils of a spellchecker glitch.

[KamaAina]

27. Rethink succession?

You mean, like, not having the Speaker of the House next in line behind the Vice President?

[cwydro]

38. Lol!

Well played!

I was put in mind of the British royal family!

[Phentex]

30. You don't see any hatred in your post?

Do you honestly believe everyone in the south feels as you have described? Seriously?

[Phentex]

53. Oh, I see you needed to get rid of the evidence...

no, no. There was no south bashing there!

Y'all come back, now!

[djean111]

32. Like I would want to move from Florida to Kansas or Wisconsin or any other of the northern batshit

states ruled by GOP assholes. When you swing such a broad brush, you get paint all over yourself.

[cwydro]

39. I know of no one who wants to secede.

You are misinformed.

[DemocraticWing]

46. You think everyone wants it to be like this?

What about the poor people in the South (white, black, and Hispanic) who get dumped upon because 55% of the Southern electorate keeps voting Republican? Are we going to ignore all the people who vote Democrat? Are we going to ignore the fact that wealthy Southern elites have a history of suppressing the votes of the poor (of all races, but especially black people) to keep a firm grip on power, and that wealthy Northerners are complicit in this?

The rest of the country shouldn't sit and blame poor Southern people for our problems, they should help us kick the thugs out. And we'll stand in solidarity while you fight to keep your cops from shooting 12 year old boys and choking people to death with street cop vigilante justice, and we'll stand in solidarity when you throw out thugs like Scott Walker, Chris Christie, Rick Snyder, Paul LePage, Mike Pence, and more.

This country has a problem, and a big part of that's in the South. But it's the country's problem, and we damn well better do something rather than let them divide us so the more privileged can sneer at the most victimized people. It's exactly what the powerful want you to do.

[stage left]

51. This again?

Frankly, you can't make me secede. I'm an American. Union now! Union tomorrow! Union forever!