Interesting Observations

It's been interesting to see various reactions (in some cases, non-reactions) to the comments posted in the Backsass Facebook group by Pat Hines on September 26, specifically:

"The Beslan event was part of the war to rid Chechnya of the Russian hegemony. We Southrons will adopt exactly the same methods if the Untied (sic) States does not withdrawn (sic) from our lands. It is harsh, but will be done." And, "... we'll simply destroy a Yankee school and all that are in it. The Chechens didn't kill Chechen children, those were Russian children and teachers."

There was dead, ringing silence from several self-identified Southern nationalists I contacted directly by Facebook messenger.

There was also a post by Brooks D. Simpson on his Crossroads blog followed by a bunch of comments from his readers, both of which contained some interesting observations.

I note first that Simpson doesn't trust his readers to reach the proper understanding of what he posts unless he explains to them.   He posted screenshots of Hines' comments, interspersed with his own recap -- to make sure they understood what they read as he thought they should:

"Pat Hines Advocates the Murder of Schoolchildren? ... That’s right … Pat Hines, southern nationalist, advocates the murder of schoolchildren if the United States does not leave the South to itself. He did so on Connie Chastain’s “Backsass!”  Ms. Chastain and another poster were mourning the horror of the Beslan massacre some eight years ago, and they expressed concern that the same sort of horrible slaughter might happen in the United States.

Presumably, we are to assume that Simpson's readers cannot read the Backsass thread for themselves and properly conclude what Simpson feels he has to tell them.

Then Pat Hines piped up [screenshot of Backsass thread]....

Let’s give credit where credit is due here.  Chastain not only distances herself from Hines, but she expresses her incredulity that Hines actually means what he says. Hines has no problem confirming that he means what he says: [another screenshot] ... 

Again, it must be that Simpson's readers cannot read the Backsass thread for themselves and properly understand what they read, hence the necessity of his explaining it to them.

Folks, it’s time that these sorts of threats of violence are stopped.  Report the group and Hines to Facebook. ... Is this what southern nationalism is all about?  I doubt it, but let’s see what folks who like Hines do when they discover this.  That’s right, League of the South … I’m looking at you boys right now."

Following this post at Crossroads, there were some equally interesting tidbits in the comment thread from Simpson and from his readers.

Simpson notes, "Yet Ms. Chastain retains him [Hines] as a member of the group. So there are limits to her outrage."  As if  "limited outrage" is the only possible explanation for not removing Hines from the group. 

One of Simpson's regulars follows with, "Gee, just when I was beginning to have a little respect for her" --apparently buying into Simpson's notion that he has identified the only possible reason for not removing Hines from the group. (For the record, don't give a rat's patootie about this woman's respect for me, or lack thereof.)

They have extremely narrow tunnel vision over there, and the tiny tunnel aperture only focuses on whatever appears to support their pre-existing beliefs.

Eventually someone offers another (equally mistaken) explanation: "Well, I believe she has a flawed understanding of free speech. I think she very properly denounced him (Good going, Connie!) but wrongly believes that kicking him off her group is violating his free speech rights."

Nope, that's not what I believe.  I know that removing someone from group membership is not a violation of their free speech rights.  They're still free to speak elsewhere.

A couple of other Simpson followers posted that they'd reported Pat and  his comments to Facebook.  Another related his experience reporting the threat to the FBI:

Just got off the phone with the FBI. They tell me because it is a non-specific, non-targeted threat it is protected under the first amendment. The agent I spoke to was concerned and told me the FBI does take these matters seriously and it will be looked into. He told me their job in a situation like this was to investigate and make sure that nothing escalates beyond the threat. I think I got that all right. I directed the agent to this page and I hope we will all feel we can do our part to help him in his investigation.

As interesting as that is, this comment is what epitomizes the mindset over there:

"Threats of violence like this must be taken seriously. That means reporting them so that they can be investigated by people who are trained to do so. Connie should have reported him to the authorities, but, since she hasn’t, someone should."

I'm curious how this woman knows what I have or have not done...   I have not stated that I reported, or didn't report, Pat or his comments to the authorities.  So how does she know?  Did she look into a crystal ball?  Call Miss Clio?  Throw chicken bones?

Actually, re: my reference to being curious -- I'm exaggerating for effect.  I'm not curious in the least about this woman's apparently magical knowledge.  This is the sort of prejudging I've come to expect from memory/era/other stuff civil war bloggers and their followers because they so frequently demonstrate it -- that is, their spouting off things that they magically "know" (usually about heritage folks) without benefit of having been told.

If the Crossroads people are so astute that they can just "know" things presumably by magic, they ought to just know that social media is already heavily, heavily monitored by the feds.  Federal monitors likely knew about Hines' comments within hours of his posting them on the 26th, long before Simpson posted his interpretation  to his reading-comprehension-deficient followers, and two days before most of them replied.

 

I have to say, though, it's touching, the faith these  Crossroads folks have in the FBI and the federal government, which is among the most corrupt and dangerous institutions/enterprises on the planet.

If, God forbid, a school in the U.S. ever experiences a Beslan-style siege and murder spree by Islamic terrorists (the likelihood of siege and murder by Southern nationalists being miniscule to none), you have to hope and pray the school children survive their FBI "rescue" better than the Branch Davidians survived theirs.
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Photo: Branch Davidians' Mt. Carmel Center near Waco, Texas in flames and FBI tanks used in military-style assault on the center April 19, 1993.  Presumably this photo was taken by a government employee and as such is in the public domain, as it appears on numerous sites on the Internet with no attribution given.

A question for Southern Nationalists

Do you agree with one of your fellow nationalists who says,

"The Beslan event was part of the war to rid Chechnya of the Russian hegemony. We Southrons will adopt exactly the same methods if the Untied (sic) States does not withdrawn (sic) from our lands. It is harsh, but will be done." And, "... we'll simply destroy a Yankee school and all that are in it. The Chechens didn't kill Chechen children, those were Russian children and teachers."

The "Beslan event" was the September 2004 siege of a school in Beslan, Russia.by Chechen Muslim terrorists in which 334 hostages were killed, 186 of them children.

• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beslan_school_hostage_crisis
• http://www.examiner.com/article/the-8th-anniversary-of-the-rape-jihad

The Facebook thread where these comments occurred is reproduced below. (I mistakenly put 2006 in the initial post. The event occurred in 2004.) The identity and comments of one poster in the thread are blurred because I have not asked permission to reveal his/her identity.

The liar that keeps on lying

Over at Crossroads, Brooks D. Simpson is still obsessing on the Southern Heritage Preservation Group -- and showing his own hypocrisy in the effort:

The Southern Heritage Preservation Group on Nazis

Recently a poster here deplored the name-calling he claimed went on between various groups in the blogosphere.  The poster in question is a member of the Southern Heritage Preservation Group.

The request seems perfectly understandable. Goodness knows we wouldn’t want to upset anyone.

What request?  

Gary Adams held forth on this very issue yesterday.

Many of you surely have encountered the comparison of the Confederacy with Nazis, since there is no real comparison I can offer you little as how to proceed except again the truth.

Yet on that very newsgroup, within twenty-four hours of offering this declaration, what do we see on the SHPG’s Facebook page?

 Three likes within two hours.  Interesting.

But Kevin’s late to the party, so to speak.  After all, there was this comment yesterday:

Another three likes.

Two posts, two comments and six likes -- from a group of over 1700 members...  This is a perfect example of Simpson's straining out gnats and swallowing camels -- of focusing with dishonest narrowness on a tiny segment/sample in order to falsely defame an entire group.   He continues...

You all will remember Mr. John C. Hall (of Dublin, Georgia) as the member of the SHPG who was obsessed about people’s ancestry, who has made comments about people being Jewish, and who has complained when he is quoted on that score.

Obsessed about people's ancestry?   As far as I know, Mr. Hall hasn't done another person's actual genealogy solely for the purpose of trying to embarrass that person -- which is what Brooks D. Simpson attempted to do to me.  And lied about it, saying he only wanted to give a "more complete" accounting of my family history when, in fact, he had to leave out readily available information about my kinsman in order to make it appear said kinsman helped to "round up" Cherokees for the Trail of Tears.  

I recap this slimy episode from the professor of history, here: http://mybacksass.blogspot.com/2012/08/how-professor-of-history-does-history.html

That may not be "nazi-ish"  but it certainly isn't the behavior of someone who is committed to truth and accuracy, and it's appalling, coming from a professor at a major state university. And as long as Simpson practices such dishonesty and basically lies, outright or by implication, with innuendo or or flatout false statements (which he has done numerous times about me), he simply has no moral authority for complaining about the SHPG.

And what's wrong with commenting that someone is Jewish -- if they are Jewish? Apparently, to people like Brooks D. Simpson, who have swallowed the diversity Koolaid in huge gulps, for some people just to mention the word Jew is ... anti-semitic.  

Ah, yes, the Southern Heritage Preservation Group … the gift that keeps on giving. What a way to honor Confederate heritage.

Ah, yes.  Professor Brooks D. Simpson ... the liar who keeps on lying.  What a way to showcase the bias and dishonesty of the educational establishment.

The Beslan School Massacre

...eight years ago this month.

September 1, 2004 Chechen Muslim terrorists lay siege to a school in Russia, rape and kill children, hold them hostage in a non-ventilated gymnasium, without food or water. ...338 people were murdered, 172 of them were children.

Rehearsal for an assault on schools in the US? ... floor plans for half a dozen schools in Virginia, Texas and New Jersey have been recovered from terrorist hands in Iraq.

http://www.examiner.com/article/the-8th-anniversary-of-the-rape-jihad

The Dark Side of Academia

One has to wonder why an academician with the, um, credentials of Brooks D. Simpson is so obsessed with an informally organized Facebook social media history group that he must frequently post about them on his "history"/hockey/baseball blog...

The underlying message of his posts about the SHPG and various individual members is, "What a bunch of idiots." Oh, he doesn't use that terminology (but close to it, sometimes). But that's the message.

If they're as mistaken and as ineffective as he likes to portray, then what threat do they represent to the history memory/era/other stuff blogs? Nevertheless, these bloggers -- primarily Simpson, Hall, Levin and Meyer -- just have to blog their put-downs of these folks.

Brooks D. Simpson's latest attack on Gary Adams and the SHPG includes this:

The best way for the SHPG and its “action group” … the Southern Historical and Heritage Preservation Group … to fail is to allow Gary Adams to continue to post what he thinks is history. That will go far to discredit the group’s efforts. Godspeed to them as they speed forward to disaster.

If these people are so ineffective and speeding to disaster, why blog about them? Indeed, why consider them important enough to blog about? Why pay them any attention at all?

I have a theory about that. Academia is a lure for people who have to be always right -- so, naturally, to them, anyone who sees things differently is ... wrong.

But that's not enough for these, um, historians. They have to make sure everyone knows people who disagree with them are wrong. So they blog to their followers, identify the people who are wrong about history and give examples of the wrongness.

But even that is not enough. No, they can't just present the two viewpoints -- they have to denigrate, mock, scorn and excoriate those they deem wrong about history, and whip their followers and commenters into a similar frenzy of verbal clubbing. That is the truly interesting aspect of the memory/era/other stuff bloggers -- the apparent need to ridicule.

It's the dark side of academia.

The question is, why? Why these over-the-top WWE displays translated to the academic world and showcased on internet blogs?

Do they feel threatened in some way by folks like the SHPG, who are no threat to them whatever? I ask again, if the SHPG is so severely wrong, and disaster for them is inevitable, why pay them any attention at all?

Is it ego so gargantuan that it allows no differences of opinion? Or some kind of academic pecking order -- analogous to the behavior seen in groups of baby chicks or other birds who peck to death the weakest among them? (Not that people who disagree with these, um, history bloggers are weak, necessarily -- but that's how the history bloggers see them.) Sure looks that way, when you detect the frenzy behind attacks on folks who are absolutely no threat to the memory/era/other stuff history academicians....

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Photo of baby chicks from the public domain.

Sneak Preview -- Sweet Southern Boys video trailer

We interrupt our regular programming to present the opener -- the first minute or so -- of the video book trailer for my latest novel. This video segment is basically finished. The rest of the video is still in progress. I'm setting it aside for a few days while I do another trailer and a book edit for Word Slinger customers.

Making the video trailer for Sweet Southern Boys is very time consuming because most of the images have to be highly processed to "match" the story, setting or characters. But hopefully, the trailer will be completed by late September.

For now, enjoy the opener!


To give you an idea of what's involved in processing the images, the graphic below shows all the photos used to make the bulletin board frame in the video.

Thank you for your patience. Our regular programming -- rants and tirades against anti-Southern bigotry -- shall resume sooner or later.

Sherman and Grimsley

Note: The blog post at Crossroads where Gary Adams' letter is under discussion is proof positive that those who are always touting "history" -- always putting down others for putting heritage above history, always claiming heritage folks don't know history -- don't give a rat's patootie about history themselves. Brooks D. Simpson didn't make this post about Gary for the sake of history. Neither he nor his commenters offer a syllable of historical correction of Gary's letter. No, the only reason he made that post was to ridicule another human being. Presumably, people like Brooks D. Simpson and the mockers and ridiculers who frequent his blog get off on that kind of put down far more than they do on history....

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Brooks D. Simpson and his minions are frothing over a letter to a college president sent by Gary Adams of the Southern Heritage Preservation Group. The letter is about historian Mark Grimsley.

First, they tsk-tsk'd over typos, assumed Gary couldn't spell, etc. The type of errors I saw makes me wonder if Gary posted a copy of his letter to Facebook using a smart phone. I've seen similar errors in texts transmitted by smart phone. Of course, when you're motivated to denigrate a person, such alternate explanations will be rejected before they can be stated....

Simpson sez, "Gary Adams is the best that the SHPG can do. Reflect on what that implies."

What it implies is that Simpson knows all 1,735 members of the SHPG -- he would have to know them all -- know each individual's level of knowledge and education in history, know what they do outside of the group, etc. -- in order to know who's best. You think he knows all 1,735 members that well? Of course not. This is just another way to mock and ridicule other human beings.

Oh, btw, Andy Hall, if you're reading this, you might want to correct these typos in your comments on your blog following the entry where you skewer Billy Bearden for doing only what you do (see my previous blog entry)....

crtiical
Y'all slogan
lagrely

Just outta curiosity, did you send your comments from your smart phone?

So, folks. How do you spell hypocrisy? S-I-M-P-S-O-N or H-A-L-L? Or maybe S-I-M-P-S-O-N -- A-N-D -- H-A-L-L.

Incidentally, if the paper in question is this one, "Thieves, Murderers, Trespassers": The Mythology of Sherman's March -- what he's saying is that the destructiveness of Sherman's march is myth. In other words, Grimsley is sanitizing Sherman.

Basically, his message seems to be that if Sherman had been destructive (although he, you know, really wasn't all that destructive) it would have been okay because slavery was destructive, too.

Years ago when I first got online, I came across information about a historian who specialized in the civil war.It claimed that as far back as high school, he intended to become a historian just so he could make the South look bad.... (Hmmm... an admission by a civil war historian of his aim to evilize the South....)

I've had numerous occasions to regret that I did not copy and keep that information, which included the historian's name, which I have long since forgotten. After skimming some of Grimsley's stuff online, I've wondered if it was him. But then, making the South look bad seems to be the goal of nearly all civil war historians since the PC era began, whether they admitted it as far back as high school or not....

Brooks D. Simpson says Gary's letter doesn't specifiy complaints about Grimsley's paper. I'll provide some specific complaints.

First, Grimsley says historians have known for a long time that claims of widespread rape and murder by union soldiers lack historical foundation. (I'm paraphrasing because of the copyright notice on the page.) Well, not necessarily. It's only lacking in the "historical foundation" Grimsley and his ilk are willing to accept and in the interpretation they put on it.

Second -- he basically implies that Southern women were post-war liars, emphasizing their "fear" and "outrage" above the not-all-that-awful facts. But his only "proof" is a reference to one woman, Grace Pierson Beard. And, of course, he reminds us that the only thing "uncritical readers" pick up on is the fear and outrage in her writing and don't notice the facts. Exactly how he knows they do this isn't explained. Maybe he consults a crystal ball, or calls Miss Clio, or throws chicken bones. Or... maybe he read Mrs. Beard's story uncritically once and now he's projecting his experience onto all.

Sounds familiar, doesn't it?

As Andy claims that "the SHPG" (all 1,730 members?) believe/claim that the UDC is a "support group" for the SCV when only one member said that ... and as Brooks D. Simpson has tried to attribute words expressed by a handful of SHPG members to the entire 1,737-member group, so Grimsley projects Mrs. Beard's "myth-constructing" (no indication that's what she was actually doing; that's just the name he calls it) to thousands of other white Southerners.

Here's another complaint. Grimsley's "explanation" that the union army's destructiveness was mostly "targeted" implies more than an explanation -- it implies acceptability. Damned secessionists -- they deserved it.

Sorry, no.

There was NO justification for the union army's presence in the seceded states and no justification for a union soldier so much as kicking a Southern dog. Regardless of how much or how little destruction Sherman and his rapacious men did, regardless of Mark Grimsley's efforts, and the efforts of every other Confederacy-bashing "historian" to santitize Sherman and downplay the destruction wrought upon the South by the union army, it was ALL too much because the union army should not have been down here to begin with.

Nothing -- not secession, not "preserving the union," not ending slavery, not anything -- justified the union's barbaric war on the South.

Follow Up -- Observations on Andy's Double Standard

Andy sez, "When I’m critical of those organizations..." (UDC, SCV) ..."it’s usually because I see them as doing a disservice to the history they’re organized to celebrate."

More arrogance from a self-appointed Civil War Thought Cop. See, that's precisely why Billy Bearden is being critical of the UDC -- because he sees them as doing a disservice to the history they're organized to celebrate...

So when Andy sees the UDC doing that, he is being "...very crtiical (sic) of some of the things they say and do that I consider to be very bad, even dishonest history." When Billy and the flaggers do the same thing for the same reason, they are having a "temper tantrum in slow motion." They are "...stamping their feet and saying Look at me! Look at me!" They're picking fights lagrely (sic) -- in Andy's opinion -- as a way to raise their own visibility and to establish themselves as more-unreconstructed-than-thou. It’s a shame, he sez, because any legitimate arguments they have are regularly eclipsed by foolishness such as this.

Andy further sez, "The Flaggers are, first and foremost, all about promoting the Flaggers, and establishing themselves as the sole arbiters of what constitutes 'honoring' Confederate veterans. As a descendant of many, many Confederate veterans on both sides of my family, I’m not willing to let them presume to speak for me or my relatives."

But he certainly presumes the authority to speak for other people and their relatives. His blog posts and his comments on his blog and on other people's blogs establish clearly enough that he thinks he is the sole arbiter of what constitutes honoring Confederate veterans. And where Andy is coming from is the belief that Confederate veterans should NOT be honored. That's why he put "honoring" in irony quotes.

The underlying purpose of his blog -- like Levin's, Simpson's and others' -- is to portray Confederates as scum-sucking racist slavers... That's why it's a "civil war era" blog -- the "era" being a time frame Andy alone defines. That way, his "interest" in the war is a very clever cover for writing about what he's truly interested in -- pinning the racist label on white Southerners, then and now -- the "era" extending right up until this very moment, giving him an enormous time-frame in which to find scum-sucking racist slavers and their descendants and current day supporters.

Betcha didn't know you was livin' in the civil war era, didja?

Presumably, it is okay for him to practice this double standard, because he's not a scum-sucking racist (by his standards). In the current PC era, not being a scum-sucking racist gives one all sorts of privileges other people don't have.

For example, before he blocked me from commenting at his blog, he mentioned that my nickname for The Huffington Post (Huffpoo) was "childish" but he hasn't let out a peep about Betty Giragosian insulting Billy by calling him the stereotypical Southern redneck name "Billy Bob." Three times in that one comment thread.

If he wasn't too skeered to take me on, he would no doubt take me to task for assuming that I know what his motive for blogging about the "civil are era" is -- to tar white Southerners (with a few exceptions, such as himself) with the racist label. My answer to him would be -- "I know as much about this motive of yours, from your blog and comments, as you know about the motives of the flaggers from reading Facebook."

Pots and kettles, Mr. Hall. Motes and beams...

Andy Hall throws another hissy fit ...

... because not everyone sees the "civil wowah era" (whatever that is -- presumably whatever he up and decides it is) the way he does. He's aimed his current hissy fit at Billy Bearden (again) for Billy's hissy fit over a Texas UDC chapter putting First National flags rather than battle flags on Confederate soldiers' graves.

All I know of this issue is what's on Andy's blog, so I can't vouch for the accuracy of the claims (about the Texas UDC chapter or Billy Bearden). However, I can make some comments about Andy's tirade.

Sez Andy:

"Billy Bearden, Flagger extraordinaire, continues his unhinged rant against the United Daughters of the Confederacy, when they don’t live up his own personal standard of butternut patriotism:

... the offense here is that a Dallas chapter of the UDC bought a bunch of “First National” flags to use on graves at a local cemetery, instead of the Confederate Battle Flag. Billy seems unaware that the First National has been the official flag of the UDC for more than a century, a part of its logo (right) in the same way that the CBF is part of the SCV emblem. Then again, the Flaggers’ allies at SHPG seem to believe that the UDC is a “support group to the SCV,” when in fact they are parallel organizations, with the UDC having been founded first, and thus is actually the senior of the two.

It’s amazing how little the Confederate Heritage™ folks seem to know about actual Confederate heritage."

Ah, excuse me? What is the significance of the First National being the official flag of the UDC and a part of its logo -- when the issue is decorating the graves of Confederate soldiers?

I seem to recall reading that it was Confederate veterans themselves who voted for the battle flag to be used to honor and commemorate them and their service and sacrifice, so it isn't so much Billy Bearden's personal standard of butternut patriotism at issue here. It's what Confederate soldiers wanted.

But, heck, what did they know, huh? And who cares what they wanted, huh? Andy points out the real issues that should decide what flag to use to honor them -- that the UDC is older than the SCV. Never mind that they weren't the ones who fought and bled and died from horrific wounds and disease during the war -- they're the "senior" organization, and that's what matters.

And, again, as Andy points out, the First National is the official flag of the UDC and appears in their logo. Everybody knows that the way to honor soldiers is with the flag of your organization, not the flag of their preference.

Andy seems to think that the Southern Heritage Preservation Group considers the UDC to be a support group for the SCV. (You just knew the SHPG would show up somewhere in Andy's tirade, diddin cha?) I followed the link to the SHPG embedded in Andy's blog post and found that opinion expressed by one -- one, that's o-n-e one (1) -- member of the group, appearing in one -- one, that's o-n-e one (1) -- post in one -- one, that's o-n-e one (1) -- thread.

One out of 1700+ members.

Andy, who presents himself as such a stickler for accuracy, truth, justice, apple pie and the American way, appears to be taking a page from serial liar and SHPG obsessive Brooks D. Simpson, when it comes to characterizing a whole group with the words or actions of a few -- or, in Andy's case, with the words of one -- one, that's o-n-e one (1).

To be on the safe side, when I visited the SHPG Facebook page, I did several keyword searches (search terms: support group, UDC support group, support, support group SCV and so forth) and according to Facebook's search results, the only place where the opinion appears that the UDC is a support group for the SCV is in the one thread already acknowledged.

Civil war "memory" and "era" and "other stuff" bloggers are all the time putting down the SHPG, the Flaggers and other heritage types for putting heritage above history, or for not knowing history.

The implication is that the memory/era/other stuff bloggers are motivated only by the pure and pristine pursuit of true and accurate history. But, as this post from Andy demonstrates, now and then another motive breaks the surface (or, in the case of Brooks D. Simpson, pretty much stays on the surface), encapsulated thusly:

How dare somebody disagree with my 21st Century progressive, politically correct denigration of the Confederacy! Buncha ignorant, scum-sucking racist hicks!

Well, Andy, in this case, if you want to convince people that ignoring what Confederate veterans wanted and going along with the act of putting the First National on their graves, you need a better authority than its being the official flag of the "senior" -- and, dare I say, 21st Century progressive, politically correct -- UDC. Your arguments are absolute pablum.

Go git 'em, Billy Bearden!