Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Path: utzoo!linus!philabs!seismo!harpo!eagle!mhuxt!mhuxi!mhuxa!houxm!hocda!spanky!burl!duke!mcnc!jwb From: jwb@mcnc.UUCP Newsgroups: net.flame Subject: Re: racism and hi-tech Message-ID: <1688@mcnc.UUCP> Date: Wed, 8-Jun-83 14:18:04 EDT Article-I.D.: mcnc.1688 Posted: Wed Jun 8 14:18:04 1983 Date-Received: Thu, 9-Jun-83 19:11:56 EDT References: hou5e.539 rabbit.1540 Lines: 42 I'm a little tired of some of the stereotypes of the south. They aren't direct but are such things as "We all know racial prejudice doesn't only occur in the South." I am white, anglo-saxon and love the south for its good characteristics. I don't try to apologize for its truly bad historical or present aspects. My parents both graduated from a college founded in the 1850's by abolitionists (Berea College, Kentucky). My school was integrated when I was in the second grade (1952). The teachers made such a deal about how fortunate we were to be able to understand another culture (which then it was, more than now) that some children cried because we didn't get a black student in our room. I then watched integrateion forced only on 7 southern states. This seemed hypocritical to me then and still does. Later events in Chicago, Detroit, Boston, etc. bore this out to me. Although there were sitins etc and undoubtedly deplorable violence in the 50's and 60's in the south, it was not all that way. In about 1960 the lunch counter at the Corner Drug Store in the small southern town where I was raised was integrated in the following manner. Blacks had always been able to purchase hamburgers to go and stood patiently at the end of the counter (or sat on a stool if there were empty ones). This particular day an imaginative black ordered a hamburger to go and then sat down on the stool and ate it. From that day on this lunchcounter was integrated and I think EVERYONE was happy that a silly prejudice had fallen. I am sure I am prejudiced about some things. I am sure everyone is prejudiced about some things. I don't think I am prejudiced about race but maybe I am. I cannot be objective enough. This is long and rambling, but my messages are really two. 1 Please don't stereotype the south or any other group. 2. The federal government's attempts to enforce racial equality depend in the final analysis on the people and the interpersonal relationships involved. I would like to think that most people would like NOT to be prejudiced. Positive reinforcement of this characteristic is more fruitful than ramming somthing down anyone's throat, as history should make obvious. Jack Buchanan University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill duke!mcnc!jwb