Neo-Confederates

Since John Scalzi was just kind enough to link to one of my posts from his AOL Journal, this may look like crass pandering. But I was really going to mention this anyway, because on his other blog Whatever, he's taken up one of my favorite topics, the strangeness of neo-Confederate nonsense.

He's posted a useful index to some of his earlier takes on the subject. His posts like "The Confederacy Is Evil" show that he has a pretty good grasp of the subject. For a Yankee, I mean. Yankees are always inclined to be overly generous about this kind of thing.

In a post from 2001 taking on the neo-Confederate groups (which he calls "Southern heritage" groups in this one), he gives a very good brief overview, including an appropriate reference to the greatest writer in the English language, who was also a native Mississippian:

Let us make no mistake, there is a Southern Heritage -- a fine tradition of music and literature and food. However, your typical dumbass bigot waving his Confederate Battle Flag couldn't identify Bill Faulkner in a line up, much less claim to have read, say, Absalom, Absalom! His Southern Heritage seems largely confined to the battle jack and a yearning for a time when you could whip the darkies when they got out of line.

Really not bad. Although Yankees should really refer to him as William Faulkner, but we'll let that slide. :) In the wrap-up, he takes off on the saying "American by birth, Southern by the grace of God." I have a t-shirt with that logo on it myself.

Let me be clear to all you good ol' boys out there: Celebrate your southernness. I mean, really, knock yourself out. Have a ball. But do it without fetishizing the Confederacy. It is possible to do one without the other. You are Southern by the grace of God, but being a dumbass bigot is something you do all on your own.

Maybe he has some Southern connections somehow. Because it's obvious that the whole topic really gets under his skin. Y'all check it out.

Tags: authoritarianism, john scalzi, neo-confederates