YR RACIST AND YR MOTHER DRESSES YOU FUNNY
Aug. 20th, 2008 10:48 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
defrogLet’s see, how else shall I bum you out today?
Ah, this will do.
For more info, see the accompanying photo essay on the official wardrobe maker for the KKK:
BACKGROUND: I find myself morbidly fascinated by the Klan at times. I loathe everything they stand for, but I grew up near Nashville, TN, and every year, the KKK – which originated in my home state, which to this day has more KKK chapters than any other state in the US – would hold an annual march in nearby Franklin. I’d see this on the evening TV news, and even in the early/mid-70s, they could still get a few hundred people to show up, though the number of hecklers was encouragingly bigger (or so it seemed at the time). Encouragingly, the number of KKK dingbats got smaller every year until finally, around the end of the 80s or thereabouts, they gave up. Or at least the media stopped covering it.
Anyway, I always kind of understood what they stood for, and that it was Wrong, but I got the Full Experience one Halloween during my impressionable teenage years.
Two friends and I were hanging around outside the Sir Pizza in Madison after pulling a shift working in a haunted house fundraiser. We were still in costume, and a couple of guys who turned out to be Klansmen (out of uniform) saw my friend’s black executioner’s hood and thought it was some anti-KKK statement.
(That’s how clever these people can be.)
We went through the whole “What’re yew, buncha gawdamn nigger-lovin’ faggots?” routine before they finally decided we weren’t the effort to beat up. Too many witnesses, dig? I walked away from that experience knowing that I’d just interacted with the most pathetic, saddest form of Evil I’ve ever encountered.
“Most distasteful thing I ever stand still for...”
To this day, the sight of grown men in pointy hoods touches a nerve in my psyche. And it’s depressing and alarming to see these people still exist – and are indoctrinating their kids with the same ignorant hatred. I suppose that’s why I feel compelled to report it. It’s been said better over atpopfiend’s, but pretending racism is not a problem to the point of refusing to talk about it is no way to run a country.
Still, I don’t mean to get you down. So, to ensure this post isn’t a total drag, here’s a relevant Ramones video.
The KKK took my baby away,
This is dF
Ah, this will do.
For more info, see the accompanying photo essay on the official wardrobe maker for the KKK:
Coming from five generations of Ku Klux Klan members, 58-year-old "Ms. Ruth" sews hoods and robes for Klan members seven days a week, blessing each one when it's done. A red satin outfit for an Exalted Cyclops, the head of a local chapter, costs about $140. She uses the earnings to help care for her 40-year-old quadriplegic daughter, "Lilbit," who was injured in a car accident 10 years ago.
BACKGROUND: I find myself morbidly fascinated by the Klan at times. I loathe everything they stand for, but I grew up near Nashville, TN, and every year, the KKK – which originated in my home state, which to this day has more KKK chapters than any other state in the US – would hold an annual march in nearby Franklin. I’d see this on the evening TV news, and even in the early/mid-70s, they could still get a few hundred people to show up, though the number of hecklers was encouragingly bigger (or so it seemed at the time). Encouragingly, the number of KKK dingbats got smaller every year until finally, around the end of the 80s or thereabouts, they gave up. Or at least the media stopped covering it.
Anyway, I always kind of understood what they stood for, and that it was Wrong, but I got the Full Experience one Halloween during my impressionable teenage years.
Two friends and I were hanging around outside the Sir Pizza in Madison after pulling a shift working in a haunted house fundraiser. We were still in costume, and a couple of guys who turned out to be Klansmen (out of uniform) saw my friend’s black executioner’s hood and thought it was some anti-KKK statement.
(That’s how clever these people can be.)
We went through the whole “What’re yew, buncha gawdamn nigger-lovin’ faggots?” routine before they finally decided we weren’t the effort to beat up. Too many witnesses, dig? I walked away from that experience knowing that I’d just interacted with the most pathetic, saddest form of Evil I’ve ever encountered.
“Most distasteful thing I ever stand still for...”
To this day, the sight of grown men in pointy hoods touches a nerve in my psyche. And it’s depressing and alarming to see these people still exist – and are indoctrinating their kids with the same ignorant hatred. I suppose that’s why I feel compelled to report it. It’s been said better over at
popfiend’s, but pretending racism is not a problem to the point of refusing to talk about it is no way to run a country.Still, I don’t mean to get you down. So, to ensure this post isn’t a total drag, here’s a relevant Ramones video.
The KKK took my baby away,
This is dF
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no subject
on 2008-08-20 05:54 am (UTC)I think ol Henry Rollins had the best idea about how to deal with the Klan, once and for all--invite them to march in Manhattan and then flood the streets with prancing men from the Village dressed in rainbow-coloured Klan outfits.
-- JF