Remember When - USM Forum -- Message Board

Date: Mar 30, 2006

Remember When

Date: Mar 30, 2006

Backstrom said Lucas was caught in a system beyond his control.

So is this what happened when the board asked him point blank about SFT and he didn't tell what he knew.

Date: Mar 30, 2006

AKL was 25 years of age when all of this happened. How many of us would want to have to defend our actions when we were 25?

AKL should be judged on his record regarding what he did to promote diversiity and the enhancement of minorities.

Examine what he did when he had power. That is what counts.

Date: Mar 30, 2006

And what he did AFTER he left office and could have made a difference. I love AKL, but he wasn't a stand up guy when it counted about SFT. He knew the truth .

Date: Mar 30, 2006

I cannot defend all of the things I did at age 25. But many people got their butts thrown in jail for participating in civil rights marches including me when I was that age. It was not a Northern jail; it was a good old Georgia jail. I do not know what the cost would have been for Lucas. I suspect he could have resigned his post and gone back to his first love of teaching. I would cut him more slack, but he used the weasel word, "we". Real regret would be shown by saying I did a terrible thing because I did not want to lose my job. I will give him the benefit of the doubt and say that perhaps he wishes now he had resigned rather than do what he did. Only AKL can answer that question.

Date: Mar 30, 2006

This article plays well on this board because race is an issue that has, over a number of years, become the focus of the public guilt for several generations of white people. Suddenly, white people whose families never owned slaves and who were most probably struggling to survive in the poor South are being chastized for not standing up against a system they did not help to create. My forebearers were sharecroppers who struggled from year to year, working someone else's land. They worked alongside blacks in the fields. I'm not buying into this race-baiting and guilt-dishing.

I would like someone to tell me what the result would have been if AKL had resigned rather than deliver that letter. Would it have resulted in Kennard's admission to MSC? No, it would not. Would it have shaken the social order of Mississippi? No, it would not. It would, however, have resulted in AKL being out of a job with a young family and no prospects. Did he do right? No. Can we say that he did wrong? Yes, you may be free to do that. Can you understand why he didn't resign at the time? If you can't then you are either lying to yourself or you have no one depending on you.

It's easy and comfortable to drag this up 35 years after the fact when our entire nation has changed. If AKL uttered a kind word to Kennard that day, it would surely have been viewed as a social faux pas. No amount of 2006 guilt will bring Clyde Kennard back, nor will it undo what was done. Continuing to drag this up is like admitting to your spouse that you cheated on him or her...it only makes you feel better.

While AKL may have been a less than perfect president, I'd trade him for Thames any day.

Date: Mar 30, 2006

brown bag wrote:

This article plays well on this board because race is an issue that has, over a number of years, become the focus of the public guilt for several generations of white people. Suddenly, white people whose families never owned slaves and who were most probably struggling to survive in the poor South are being chastized for not standing up against a system they did not help to create. My forebearers were sharecroppers who struggled from year to year, working someone else's land. They worked alongside blacks in the fields. I'm not buying into this race-baiting and guilt-dishing. I would like someone to tell me what the result would have been if AKL had resigned rather than deliver that letter. Would it have resulted in Kennard's admission to MSC? No, it would not. Would it have shaken the social order of Mississippi? No, it would not. It would, however, have resulted in AKL being out of a job with a young family and no prospects. Did he do right? No. Can we say that he did wrong? Yes, you may be free to do that. Can you understand why he didn't resign at the time? If you can't then you are either lying to yourself or you have no one depending on you. It's easy and comfortable to drag this up 35 years after the fact when our entire nation has changed. If AKL uttered a kind word to Kennard that day, it would surely have been viewed as a social faux pas. No amount of 2006 guilt will bring Clyde Kennard back, nor will it undo what was done. Continuing to drag this up is like admitting to your spouse that you cheated on him or her...it only makes you feel better. While AKL may have been a less than perfect president, I'd trade him for Thames any day.

I'm with you on not speculating too heavily on what Aubrey did back then. None of us was there. None of us was him. And it isn't as though he could look into the future and know what was in store for Clyde -- perhaps if he could he might have done something differently. But certainly this action (or inaction) isn't the moral equivilent of holding a gun to someone's head and threatening them. There are times in my life when I've stood tall and risked things. There are times in my life when I haven't and now live with the regrets.

I do take issue, however, with your declaration that NOTHING would have resulted if Aubrey had taken a stand. We also can't know that either. Just as it probably isn't fair to weigh in judgment on someone who was clearly caught in the middle, it is also not right on to justify that inaction with speculation that taking action would have meant nothing. If somewhere a a horse's twitching ear can change the course of the history, it is possible that action at the right time and right place might create unexpected ripples. We'll never know.

It is interesting to me that local black people from that period seem more compassionate -- I suspect they know exactly what it feels like to feel helpless and unable to change the actions of those around you . . . . even when you might be seething with anger at the injustice on the inside.

Date: Mar 30, 2006

brown bag,

There is a great deal of your post that I agree with. Reliving the past and casting stones in not helpful. However, I also agree with Professor Judd. Those who stood up in that period, particularly in the South, had no way of knowing the future outcome when they stood up to the wrong that was segregation. A few paid the ultimate price and in the South their killers were not brought to justice until recently, and some not at all. I understand why many want to put all of this behind, it is ugly and unpleasant. However, I stand by my post that using the word "we" in stead of "I" is acting sorry without having to humiliate yourself and say I did it and I am sorry. The real question is; what would he do if he had the chance again under the same circumstances.

Date: Mar 30, 2006

Cossack wrote:

brown bag,

There is a great deal of your post that I agree with. Reliving the past and casting stones in not helpful. However, I also agree with Professor Judd. Those who stood up in that period, particularly in the South, had no way of knowing the future outcome when they stood up to the wrong that was segregation. A few paid the ultimate price and in the South their killers were not brought to justice until recently, and some not at all. I understand why many want to put all of this behind, it is ugly and unpleasant. However, I stand by my post that using the word "we" in stead of "I" is acting sorry without having to humiliate yourself and say I did it and I am sorry. The real question is; what would he do if he had the chance again under the same circumstances.

Cossack--

This is an unfair question. Was AKL a racist while USM's president? If so, then you have your answer. If not, then you do as well. I guess it's human nature to watch for AKL's next "racist" move, even if his last questionable move was 40 years ago and he hasn't made another since.

Date: Mar 30, 2006

This is an unfair question. Was AKL a racist while USM's president? If so, then you have your answer. If not, then you do as well. I guess it's human nature to watch for AKL's next "racist" move, even if his last questionable move was 40 years ago and he hasn't made another since.

Large numbers of people who participated in segregation were not racist nor mean people. Your post implies that an action that disadvantaged Blacks during that period was undertaken because the person was racist. Non-racists participated in the system because it was difficult for you if you did not. As time passed it became a little easier to resist, but even those who stood up have been tarred by some as racist (read Charles Pickering's book). My take on AKL is that he was not and is not racist in the usual sense. My focus is narrow. He was given a choice to stand up for what was right and he admits he did not. Yes, the cost may have been high, and for him it was too high. When he uses we instead of I, he is spreading the blame over many people. The series of posts here have to do with Clyde Kennard and Lucas' decision to participate in denying him admittance to USM. It was AKL who had the choice to participate or not. He chose to participate.
You ask if he was a racist during his presidency, since I state I do not believe he is or was a racist, then the answer is no.

Date: Mar 30, 2006

Cossack wrote:

This is an unfair question. Was AKL a racist while USM's president? If so, then you have your answer. If not, then you do as well. I guess it's human nature to watch for AKL's next "racist" move, even if his last questionable move was 40 years ago and he hasn't made another since.

Large numbers of people who participated in segregation were not racist nor mean people. Your post implies that an action that disadvantaged Blacks during that period was undertaken because the person was racist. Non-racists participated in the system because it was difficult for you if you did not. As time passed it became a little easier to resist, but even those who stood up have been tarred by some as racist (read Charles Pickering's book). My take on AKL is that he was not and is not racist in the usual sense. My focus is narrow. He was given a choice to stand up for what was right and he admits he did not. Yes, the cost may have been high, and for him it was too high. When he uses we instead of I, he is spreading the blame over many people. The series of posts here have to do with Clyde Kennard and Lucas' decision to participate in denying him admittance to USM. It was AKL who had the choice to participate or not. He chose to participate.
You ask if he was a racist during his presidency, since I state I do not believe he is or was a racist, then the answer is no.

So AKL's choice was to admit Kennard, be fired, and have to move out of the South to get another job (keeping in mind that there was and is rampant racism in the North as well) OR refuse to admit Kennard.

Again, would AKL have been able to override McCain's veto? What's the value of a moral victory that corresponds to a real defeat?

Date: Mar 30, 2006

Perspective Please wrote,

So AKL's choice was to admit Kennard, be fired, and have to move out of the South to get another job (keeping in mind that there was and is rampant racism in the North as well) OR refuse to admit Kennard.

Again, would AKL have been able to override McCain's veto? What's the value of a moral victory that corresponds to a real defeat?

I never implied it was an easy choice or a low cost choice. As far as your question of the moral value, I cannot answer that. You will have to ask it of someone who really sacrificed to help rid us of segregation. I cannot tell you now what choice I would have made given what AKL faced. Maybe you know what you would have done. All I know if I had made that choice that was made by AKL, it would haunt me until I died.

Date: Mar 30, 2006

Cossack wrote:

Perspective Please wrote, So AKL's choice was to admit Kennard, be fired, and have to move out of the South to get another job (keeping in mind that there was and is rampant racism in the North as well) OR refuse to admit Kennard. Again, would AKL have been able to override McCain's veto? What's the value of a moral victory that corresponds to a real defeat? I never implied it was an easy choice or a low cost choice. As far as your question of the moral value, I cannot answer that. You will have to ask it of someone who really sacrificed to help rid us of segregation. I cannot tell you now what choice I would have made given what AKL faced. Maybe you know what you would have done. All I know if I had made that choice that was made by AKL, it would haunt me until I died.

Cossack: I'm often with you but on this one not so much. It might haunt you til you died . . . but would you walk around telling people that? I doubt it. Classy people hide their pain and don't wallow in their guilt. You want to take a language trope ("we") which IS often used to diffuse personal guilt onto others and assume that it is the case here. I think, given Aubrey's life, I'd credit him for living an interior life that is a good deal more complicated than that.

Let's just agree to take the man at his word: he feels sorry, he was part of a culture of racism and did not understand at that point in his life how to separate himself from it. It's just as easy an alternative translation in my book . . . .

Date: Mar 30, 2006

Professor Judd,

I respect your opinion and I shall not pursue this any more. My only response to you is that I have many faults, but even I do not confuse "we" with "I". I am responsible for what I have done both good and bad. I made those decisons, there is no we there.

Date: Mar 30, 2006

Cossack wrote:

Professor Judd, I respect your opinion and I shall not pursue this any more. My only response to you is that I have many faults, but even I do not confuse "we" with "I". I am responsible for what I have done both good and bad. I made those decisons, there is no we there.

Well, not to nitpick, but I think he used "I" several times, but not in a straightforward fashion, to indicate his own culpability -- it's pretty self damning to say "

"I know there was a part of me that did not think it was right," said Lucas,..."

because the further implication is that there was also a part of him that did accept it . . . . that's a pretty tough admission to me. I think the rest is explanatory --

I know it is more satisfying to hear someone say "I'm guilty." It is certainly clearer. But I think it isn't always easy to read why people might not do that -- again, for me part of the solution is to look at the arc of a life and weigh the words against the arc. It isn't too hard for me to accept that his life speaks as eloquently of his role in that sad event as anything he could say. Since I don't hear the black community rushing out to force him to say it, I'm just going to assume he's said what he has to say privately to those who need to hear.

But I respect you as well. I know I tend to be distrustful of people who say "I'm sorry," too easily and too publically. I tend to trust the subtext, body language and actions more these days . . . . so I might be more easily satisfied with less . . .

Date: Mar 31, 2006

And AKL did not help at all when Fleming was beseiged by USM's enemies, some within.

Date: Mar 31, 2006

I call on all you fair-minded folks who are outraged and dismayed at AKL's supposed indifference to racism to step up to the plate. There's an equally dastardly law in effect nowadays. Under this law, unnmarried girls are allowed to repeatedly have children with no means of support. Not only can they have these children,but the people who have jobs and pay taxes must continually fund their medical bills,food supply,and housing. I know most of you will want to join with me in protesting this injustice,. I know it is the law of the land,but then at one time so was segregation. Let's take to the streets!

Date: Mar 31, 2006

Well, not to nitpick, but I think he used "I" several times, but not in a straightforward fashion, to indicate his own culpability -- it's pretty self damning to say "

Professor Judd, I intended not to carry this any furhter, but since we are now open nitpicking, I would ask you to use the "George Bush" test. Tell me what liberals would be saying about George Bush if he had been involved in anything close to the activity in which AKL participated. What would you personally say about George Bush if he had been involved in anything remotely resembling this activity?

Date: Mar 31, 2006

Man th barricades wrote:

I call on all you fair-minded folks who are outraged and dismayed at AKL's supposed indifference to racism to step up to the plate. There's an equally dastardly law in effect nowadays. Under this law, unnmarried girls are allowed to repeatedly have children with no means of support. Not only can they have these children,but the people who have jobs and pay taxes must continually fund their medical bills,food supply,and housing. I know most of you will want to join with me in protesting this injustice,. I know it is the law of the land,but then at one time so was segregation. Let's take to the streets!

Man the barricades, I'm not understanding your post. Please try again, explaining the, "Not only can they have these children, but the people who have jobs and pay taxes must continually fund their medical bills,food supply,and housing."

Are you saying the state should require abortion? Human Services only support people for a short limited time and not continually.

Date: Mar 31, 2006

Confused wrote:

Man th barricades wrote:
I call on all you fair-minded folks who are outraged and dismayed at AKL's supposed indifference to racism to step up to the plate. There's an equally dastardly law in effect nowadays. Under this law, unnmarried girls are allowed to repeatedly have children with no means of support. Not only can they have these children,but the people who have jobs and pay taxes must continually fund their medical bills,food supply,and housing. I know most of you will want to join with me in protesting this injustice,. I know it is the law of the land,but then at one time so was segregation. Let's take to the streets!

Man the barricades, I'm not understanding your post. Please try again, explaining the, "Not only can they have these children, but the people who have jobs and pay taxes must continually fund their medical bills,food supply,and housing."
Are you saying the state should require abortion? Human Services only support people for a short limited time and not continually.

First question,no.Second question,yes.

Date: Mar 31, 2006

I misread your second statement as a question, Sorry. There is no restriction at all on support for multiple pregnancies. I work at a hospital and commonly see women with their 8thor 9th or more medacaid pregnancy. Perhaps two or three free pregnancies and then birth control.

Date: Mar 31, 2006

Cossack wrote:

Well, not to nitpick, but I think he used "I" several times, but not in a straightforward fashion, to indicate his own culpability -- it's pretty self damning to say " Professor Judd, I intended not to carry this any furhter, but since we are now open nitpicking, I would ask you to use the "George Bush" test. Tell me what liberals would be saying about George Bush if he had been involved in anything close to the activity in which AKL participated. What would you personally say about George Bush if he had been involved in anything remotely resembling this activity?

Personal context is all.

I don't know what a liberal would say. There are liberals of all stripes. I get your point, but I think the comparison shifts the emphasis from the subject (AKL) and speculation about the motivation behind the language of the interview to another subject altogether (what motivation underlies those who either might or might not see AKL as shifting the blame away from himself by his use of the word "we."

It is a subtle piece of argumentum ad hominum, Cossack -- which I know isn't intended in the way that it could be taken (undermining the arguer rather than the argument).

Your discussion points are usually pretty rigorous about sticking to the argument, so I think this one isn't something I care to take up as it seems other than the point you were making.

Date: Mar 31, 2006

Man the Barricades wrote:

I work at a hospital and commonly see women with their 8thor 9th or more medacaid pregnancy.

Damn, you'd think somebody that worked in a frickin' hospital would know how to spell Medicaid.

Date: Mar 31, 2006

Man the Barricades wrote:

...Under this law, unnmarried girls are allowed to repeatedly have children with no means of support. Not only can they have these children,but the people who have jobs and pay taxes must continually fund their medical bills,food supply,and housing.

And then wrote:

. There is no restriction at all on support for multiple pregnancies. I work at a hospital and commonly see women with their 8thor 9th or more medacaid pregnancy. Perhaps two or three free pregnancies and then birth control.

First let's get the facts straight. A unmarried women with no means of supports can get welfare for up to 60 months (5 years). Another pregency does not increase their welfare support. That takes care of the "food and housing" question on continually support. As far as the medical support for new pregencies, the state pays because we can't punish the baby for the parents mistakes. In addition it would cost much more in the long run to deny medical support to the child.

So it appears that you want help to get the state to pass a law that mandates birth control (sterilization?) for these women because of what you see at the hospital. I'm not sure how the state can make sure a women takes birth control measures. For some reason (maybe because I lived through WWII) I don't feel comfortable with the state mandating sterilization.

Date: Mar 31, 2006

Man the Barricades wrote: Perhaps two or three free pregnancies and then birth control.

"Three generations of idiots is enough." Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr., in Buck v. Bell.

Yep, that's what we need. More power to the government. I want Big Brother to decide who gets sterilized and who doesn't.

Now, is that the liberal position or the conservative?

Date: Mar 31, 2006

As long as we're getting facts straight about the "umarried girls," I'd like to note that outside of 1-2 cases of immaculate conception (depending if one is Protestant or Catholic) or cases of artificial insemination, a procedure that is probably beyond the means of the "unmarried girls" being decried, there is ALWAYS a man involved in making a baby. I'm surprised that the poster doesn't seem interested in holding "the boys" equally responsible.

Man Th Barricades, I could be wrong, but I suspect from the tone of your attack that you are indeed male rather than female. If so, do you, uh, think it right to be quite so righteously indignant about a sin you are incapable of commiting?

JL

Date: Mar 31, 2006

It is relatively easy now to identify the father of a newborn by checking DNA. Many females do not push the issue. I do not know why, maybe someone out there does. Individuals respond to societal pressures, which include public disapproval of some behaviors, shame, and the costs of their actions. The cost for unwed mothers having children is lower than in the past. The stigma is less than in the past. One poster states As far as the medical support for new pregencies, the state pays because we can't punish the baby for the parents mistakes. In addition it would cost much more in the long run to deny medical support to the child. That policy is humane, but it reduces the disincentives to repeat the behavior and I suspect the cost issue raised is supposition rather than fact. Professor Lares is correct about the male issue. Males are given a pass by the rest of society and, in some of the subcultures, a male producing children by two or three different females is a positive among his peer group. If you want to change the behavior, change the incentives. If males who father children were forced to provide support, shamed by the community, and rejected by their friends and family, males would change. None of these social costs I mention will be imposed because of political correctness and the quaint concept that we should not be judgmental about the culture of various groups.

Date: Mar 31, 2006

Cossack wrote:

It is relatively easy now to identify the father of a newborn by checking DNA. Many females do not push the issue. I do not know why, maybe someone out there does. Individuals respond to societal pressures, which include public disapproval of some behaviors, shame, and the costs of their actions. The cost for unwed mothers having children is lower than in the past. The stigma is less than in the past. One poster states As far as the medical support for new pregencies, the state pays because we can't punish the baby for the parents mistakes. In addition it would cost much more in the long run to deny medical support to the child. That policy is humane, but it reduces the disincentives to repeat the behavior and I suspect the cost issue raised is supposition rather than fact. Professor Lares is correct about the male issue. Males are given a pass by the rest of society and, in some of the subcultures, a male producing children by two or three different females is a positive among his peer group. If you want to change the behavior, change the incentives. If males who father children were forced to provide support, shamed by the community, and rejected by their friends and family, males would change. None of these social costs I mention will be imposed because of political correctness and the quaint concept that we should not be judgmental about the culture of various groups.

Gosh Cossack -- I was following you (some agreement, some ambivilance) until you got to the "political correctness" part. I mean I think you can say what you want to say w/o using that term which really isn't meaningful and is used often by the right to bait liberals.

I think that you can't organize "shame" or it becomes something else. What you can do -- as you rightly note -- is use the legal system to gain accountability. Many states are currently doing just that -- and it will take some time before we learn whether this results inany bavorial change.

You also rightly note that many women do not (for many reasons) go after the father. Unless the law mandates that the father is equally accountable for the child's physical welfare whether or not the woman chooses to pursue him then we will probably continue to see that in the future -- human feeling being what is, a thing marvelous, complex and paradoxical.

It is a difficult road to go down -- when does anyone actually know he/she is in the financial or emotional position to have a child? Many of us, if our parents has waited until they had the "resources" to raise us according so some ambiguous social standard would never have been born. I'm not happy that there are people who do seem to abuse the kindness of the state (meaning us taxpayers) by knowingly continuing to have children they can't afford to keep. On the other hand, I'm not comfortable with the state setting standards about what level of resources an individual has to have in order to be considered eligible to have a child.

There are many institutions in our culture and in the various communities that compose our culture that are working very hard to teach responsibility, a virtue which begins with a strong sense that we are all individual parts of a larger whol to which we owe some debt, some allegience, and some loyalty. Unfortunately, we also live in a culture that has invested in the fiction of unfettered personal freedom to such an extent that the messages children get often radically contradict what these institutions, organizations, teachers, familes or parents are trying to teach. This vision of "freedom" is not simply a product of rampant and unrestricted liberalism -- it is also an advertiser's dream, used to sell products.

If the truth be known, the greatest perverters of young americans isn't the free love left (most of whom have quietly retired to much more conventional lives) but the buying and selling of product . . . it is our steady, red blooded american capitalists who are contributing to this breakdown far more than an liberal ever could.

This isn't a diatribe against capitalism. Once you become a society as wealthy as we are, the product you sell is no longer just that which is intended to provide a basic function of living. Instead, products are designed not just for (or n some places not even for) utility but for pure pleasure. And what condition is more necessary for the exploitation of individual and personal pleasure in its fullest than freedom from responsbility? Look closely at the advertising images and its pretty clear:

FREEDOM = PLEASURE

PLEASURE=FREEDOM

Capitalists are doing exactly what capitalists do -- they sell things. And they both exploit, and the create, a market in which things can be sold. Our problem is that we haven't discovered an antidote to the immediately of the pleasure of the senses . . . . the appeal of advertising is so powerful that it overwhelms our under developed intellectual resources: the resources that are inteded to put a break on intense, short term pleasure at the expense of long term deferred pleasure.

I'm not putting this very well. So I'm going to get a toddy (and this proving my own case).

Ciao all! Especially to you Cossack . . . . !

Date: Apr 1, 2006

Professor Judd,

It is difficult to know where to start in response to your shower of assertions. I am not sure where the economic system entered into this discussion. But without a tiring debate about failed versus viable economic systems, I see the problem as more tribal and family than national when discussing the incentives behind actions taken by young (and old) people. Tribes learn long ago that certain actions threatened their existence and developed mores back up by actions that guided individual behavior. It has been the development of science and economic trade that has led to the standard of living we now have. We can afford to be more compassionate and to allow greater latitude in actions. We have greater economic freedom and individual freedom than would have been possible in the past. In previous centuries, individuals did not have surpluses of resources that they could share without threatening their own existence. Hence, slackers and deviates either died or conformed. Today, surpluses above subsistence allow us to tax ourselves to share with the misfortunate, which we do. However, if you subsidize a behavior, you get more of it. Unless you are willing to shut off the funds, you will have to find another way to stop deviate behavior. One way is to make the message clear that the behavior will be met with condemnation. Another way is for compassionate people such as your self to lower the standard of living for you and your family by voluntarily giving money to those who make bad choices. Right now, I am thinking that your solution is to coerce me, and others, through government to share involuntarily so that the those who make bad choices can continue to feel good about themselves.

Date: Apr 1, 2006

Cossack wrote:

... If you want to change the behavior, change the incentives. If males who father children were forced to provide support, shamed by the community, and rejected by their friends and family, males would change. ...

Just a little info for Cossack, Jameela and Stephen. The state does hold the fathers responsible for child support when and if they can be identified. My wife works for the Child Support Division of the State Dept. of Human Services. Until recently a father could avoid child support by leaving the state, but that has been corrected by the states exchanging data base information on these fathers. Just some information about these cases: 1. Often the mother can't identify the father. A list of possible fathers is obtained and a judge must order DNA test. 2. Many times drugs are involved and the father is either in prison or unable to hold a job until they are clean. 3. The biggest improvement in the system is the cooperation of the states to find "run away" fathers.

Finally, my contribution to the "liberal" - "conservative" debate, the majority of unwed mothers (and fathers) are white (really no surprise since the majority of the population is white).