Dispatches from the Fringe Element

(With occasional cockroach input)

Over the next few, oh, I dunno, days, weeks, months, I'm going to have fun here examining blog postings and comment threads from: Civil War Memory, Dead Confederates, Civil War Crossroads and The Blood of My Kindred, mostly as they relate to me and things I've written, but also as they relate to Southern Heritage Preservation Facebook Group and its members, and general subjects related to the war, the South, Southerners, etc.

A related subject will be my insights and opinions about the academic mindset, based on my (admittedly limited) interaction with, and observation of, the two academic bloggers, Kevin Levin and Brooks Simpson. So people will know, I'm not followers of these blogs. I've read more posts on Levin's than any others, but even there, no more than a dozen or so.

At the end of this entry, you'll find the timeline and blog entries/comment threads that will provide fodder for my remarks. (If more are added as time goes on, I'll update the list).

I'm going to start with Simpson's blog entry about Michelle Bachmann's comments on slavery. I'm not real interested in Bachmann or anybody else running for president of a crumbling empire. I mention it for two reasons.

First reason, Mr. Simpson has denied being a leftist, but I note that when referencing Bachmann's slavery quote, he doesn't link to raw video of Bachmann so we can see for ourselves what she said. He links to a post by Adam Serwer, a leftist journalist at the leftist The American Prospect, so he can interpret it for us and make sure we understand it and the significance of it. Isn't that thoughtful of him? Interesting thing about Serwer -- he was one of Ezra Klein's Journo Listas. Not surprising when you realize that The American Prospect was Klein's perch at the time.

What? You never heard of the Journo List? By all means, make yourself acquainted with this private, closed email group of leftist journalists that was running hot and heavy back during the run up to the Presidential election. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/JournoList

Read Tucker Carlson's Daily Caller Journo List archive: http://dailycaller.com/buzz/journolist/

(Mr. Simpson can hardly criticize me for using a rightwing source if he's gonna use a leftwing one, can he?)

Second reason, the comment by Andy Hall referencing Serwer's post on Black Confederates. Wrote Serwer:

The attempt to minimize the suffering caused by slavery and segregation, to recast the Lost Cause as one motivated by “honor” and self-determination rather than racial supremacy and the preservation of chattel slavery, arises out of the same contemptible emotional impulse. The Lost Causer insisting that the Confederacy was not built on racism because of the presence of black soldiers isn’t any less mired in guilt than the liberal quietly mouthing the names of their black friends as they count them on their fingertips. In both cases, the individual trying to free themselves from history ends up drowning in a bottomless pit of self-pity and self-deception that, over time, can only ferment into rage over inability to find an absolution that will be forever beyond their reach.

Serwer seems to be substituting his perception for other people's intention. He also seems to be placing total responsibility for racial supremacy on the South when we know it was as prevalent in the north, and Aby-baby himself was a racial supremacist who wanted to rid the whole freakin' country of blacks.

We also know that abolitionist Julia Ward Howe's views on race were an exact match for those of Alexander Stephens (only stated in much more insulting terms, and stated earlier) right down to the notion that slavery was necessary for blacks (she called it "compulsory labor" but it means the same thing).

We know that the "preservation of chattel slavery" is far, far too narrow a motive for the war, particularly when other motives were recorded in the documents of the day and we can actually, you know, read them.

Wonder if Serwer can name some "Lost Causer" insisting that the Confederacy was not built on racism because of the presence of black soldiers. A single one. Well, I wonder if he can name ten. Or a hundred. A thousand. Ten thousand. Unless he can and does, I'll have to chalk this up to his very vivid leftist, Journo-Lista imagination, and likely his own tendency to see everything in terms of race, a very common liberal tendency.

Maybe, as a liberal, he needs absolution. If so, he needs to quit projecting.

Look at the evidence, look at the history, and what you see is a South no worse than the north. You see northern sins every bit as shameful and ugly as any you can name on the part of the South. Of course, you don't hear much about northern sins in classrooms or on leftist Journo-Lista mentality blogs or even academic "civil war" blogs.

The north must be forever shielded from its slaving past with the "fighting to free slaves" fable. The south must be forever condemned and evilized with the "fighting to keep slavery" fable. These two falsehoods (false in the sense that they're presented as the whole story when they certainly are not) are masks on the country's history that must never, never, never be allowed to slip. Careful and don't jostle 'em, you black Confederate researchers....

We cannot let the north's true motives show, and we certainly cannot acknowledge its bloodlust and savagery toward Southerners. They have to be recast in terms of the war of the righteous North against unspeakable Southern evil that deserved all the misery and brutality it got....

Serwer's doing his part in the recasting, sure 'nuff.

________________

Blog Posts and Comment Threads Timeline

August 8 -- Great gusts of ridicule from Southern gentleman Andy Hall and commentators on his Dead Confederates blog, directed toward Black Confederates researcher Ann DeWitt http://deadconfederates.wordpress.com/2011/08/08/famous-negro-cooks-regiment-found-in-my-own-backyard/

August 8 -- Brooks Simpson and his sycophants jump on the let's-bash-Ann bandwagon.
http://cwcrossroads.wordpress.com/2011/08/08/a-primer-in-basic-research/

August 9 -- Kevin Levin and his myrmidons continue the ridicule, accompanied by a breathtaking display of his bootheel in the teeth of the First Amendment, telling Ann to take down her website. http://cwmemory.com/2011/08/09/an-open-letter-to-ann-dewitt/

August 11 -- Brooks Simpson throws in the towel, ain't gonna study war (with fringy, cockroachy Southern heritage defenders) no more. http://cwcrossroads.wordpress.com/2011/08/11/an-embarrassment-to-southerners-and-southern-heritage/

August 11 -- Andy Hall blockquotes Simpson, confesses to enabling "odious folks," (but no mention of friggin' Opies) and sez he's gonna throw in the towel, too.
http://deadconfederates.wordpress.com/2011/08/11/maybe-i-am-enabling-some-odious-folks-after-all/

August 11 -- Corey Meyer announces he's jumpin' on the Simpson bandwagon and ain't gonna engage us in urinatorial contests any more. http://kindredblood.wordpress.com/2011/08/11/time-for-a-change/

August 12 -- Simpson, unable to remain true to his resolve, posts about the League of the South
http://cwcrossroads.wordpress.com/2011/08/12/another-version-of-southern-heritage/

August 14 -- Simpson, STILL unable to remain true to his revolve, posts about ME
http://cwcrossroads.wordpress.com/2011/08/14/too-funny-to-pass-up/

August 14 -- Simpson on Michelle Bachmann
http://cwcrossroads.wordpress.com/2011/08/14/michele-bachmann-on-slavery/#comments

August 20 -- Corey Meyer, unable to hold it any longer, cites the League of the South Rebellion Blog. http://kindredblood.wordpress.com/2011/08/20/rebellion-blog-sad-over-changes-at-tbomk/

August 22 -- Simpson, once again forgetting his resolve, rants about the League of the South
http://cwcrossroads.wordpress.com/2011/08/22/reenacting-redemption/

Now, what I choose to discuss based on these blog entries and their comment threads will come in no particular order -- just what I feel like addressing at the time. Stay tuned!

(Photos: Penny Lane and Wikimedia Commons)