Ga. High School Holds Segregated Proms

[CShine]

LYONS, Ga. — Decades after the Supreme Court ended school segregation, high school students in rural Lyons, Ga., are still separated from their peers of other races — at the prom.

At Toombs County High School, there are three separate dances: one for blacks, one for whites and this year for the first time, one for Hispanics.

The idea of separate proms was first introduced by some white parents in the 1970s in response to integration and has remained a tradition ever since.

But high school Principal Ralph Hardy said it now has nothing to do with race — it has to do with diverse cultural traditions and different tastes in food and music.

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,120020,00.html

[BattyDem]

1. What year are we living in?

My calendar says 2004, but I'm starting to think it's in dog years! :shrug:

[0007]

6. All that High School needs now is an influx of Chinese and Arab students

Welcome to Zell Miller High School.

:wtf:

[grytpype]

2. deleted

[The Backlash Cometh]

3. What state is the most pathetic? Georgia or Texas?

?

[bluestateguy]

5. I know of no segregated proms in Texas

One thing I will say for Texas, a state I bash on a lot, is that it seems to be a little farther ahead than other southern states when it comes to matters of race.

[The Backlash Cometh]

12. What about Tulia, Texas?

How quickly they forget.

[AspenRose]

19. Or Vidor, TX

:scared:

If you go to the Texas State Library Vertical File Index and look up "Vidor," you will see "see Ku Klux Klan."

http://www.tsl.state.tx.us/ref/abouttx/verticalfile/vfilev.html

[last_texas_dem]

24. Vidor couldn't have segregated proms if they wanted to...

I live about fifteen miles away from that hellhole, and I can say one thing about the Klan Kapitol of Texas: there will be no segregated proms. For that to occur Vidor would have to actually have blacks living in the city and going to the school and, last I checked, there were absolutely none. But Vidor is certainly an anomaly and not typical of Texas from what I have seen. While they may not exactly be progressive, the majority of towns/schools in Texas, at least in my area, are integrated. Sure, I've come into contact with a lot of rednecks in my time, but I don't see something like segregated proms playing in even the area of the state of Texas that I live in (Southeast), which has the unfortunate reputation of being one of the most racist.

[0007]

7. Texas drags 'em around while Georgia give 'em a special dance

[Moloch]

14. Georgia

Outside of Atlanta, Georgia is the most redneck, backward state I have ever had the misfortune to visit.

I'm not the least bit suprised that the state that elected Saxby Chambliss and Zell Miller has segregated proms.

[The Backlash Cometh]

23. I think that for every mile you drive outside of Atlanta, Georgia, you

regress a year or so.

[TroglodyteScholar]

26. And you're in Louisiana?

I've lived in both Louisiana and Georgia, and I have to say that both states have ridiculously backwards areas that you can't really tell apart. Actually, Monroe, Louisiana (where I lived as a youngster), is waaaaaay more racist that Macon (where I reside currently), from what I can tell.

But yea, this is ridiculous. It shouldn't really be in LBN, though, because this has been going on for quite a while.

Btw, forgive us, but Miller presented himself as a Dem (albeit a moderate one) when he ran for office...and Chambliss...well, I doubt he would have won if not for Diebold glitches and a very very shameful smear campaign against Cleland. Georgia, however backwards, is a historically Democratic state. When Sonny Purdue got "voted" in as governor, we had had 150 years of Democratic governors before him.

[bluestateguy]

4. Ah the Red States!

I respect that these are private events, but that means the schools should have NOTHING to do with these events. Everything having anything to do with these proms should be done off school grounds. If I was a parent I'd say to my kid, go ahead and go to the Jim Crow Prom, but you can pay for your limo and tux/dress/corsage with your own money.

[alarimer]

8. Different tastes??

"But high school Principal Ralph Hardy said it now has nothing to do with race — it has to do with diverse cultural traditions and different tastes in food and music"

To this I say so what? Shouldn't everyone be expanding their horizons anyway? A lot of racism would end if people just took the time to experience other cultures. But people in this country (and particularly in GA I guess) are so damn provincial and closed-minded. It is really very sad and depressing to me. Texas has been actually ahead of the curve in some respects (except maybe in Jasper). It was Mexican before it belonged to the US so I think that helps a little.

[GarySeven]

9. These are NOT school sponsored events

This story is utterly misleading. The "proms" are not sponsored by the schools, they are organized off campus by the students themselves. They are more like large parties for friends. The story is one of those "look what those hillbillies are up to now" kinds of stories that Northerners feed off of. But do you Northerners know WHY you are being fed such bullshit? It is to make sure that the Democratic Party remains divided. Why do you suppose this is on FOX news? It causes Democrats up North to squirm and point their fingers at us Southerners, and makes the Democrats who are trying to organize down here go into hiding. If you folks would STOP letting stories like this feed your stereotype then we might start winning some elections. This story and stories like this are worth millions in campaign contributions to the Repugs and you folks just lap it up. Stop being manipulated and stop letting Karl Rove run the Democratic Party.

[alarimer]

11. okay

But it is racist to hold parties (or whatever you want to call them) where people of other races are not invited. Why are we still afraid to experience other cultures, other music or food? I have lived in Georgia and Alabama and believe me, segregation is alive and well in both those places. People make no effort to get to know one another even if they are attending the same school or college. I do not understand the narrow-mindedness of these people.

[TroglodyteScholar]

27. Segregation is..

...indeed still alive and well. I lived in Birmingham for about 7 years (during my highschool years + a few) and there are completely separate parts of town for white & black populations. I've never lived outside of the south, so this is fairly common to me. Not that I think it's acceptable at all.

But the people I associated in B'ham seemed a pretty open bunch. I never witnessed or heard of any racist happenings at my school, and race was never an issue among my group of friends. I guess I just really hate to see people generalize (ie "people make no effort to get to know one another....")...it's a bit offensive to me, really. You know, I've heard bigots speak in similar a similar manner...."these people"..

[NC_Nurse]

13. I'm from Georgia

and this is BULLSHIT! We didn't have segregated proms in the 70's and they shouldn't have them now. So what if the students organize them, it's still a school-linked event.
I'm Southern and I don't care about who organized it, it's just plain wrong. They should be ashamed of themselves.:spank:

It's not about where you're from, it's about integrity, tolerance and even acceptance. Unfortunately, there are idiots everywhere. I don't think people are trying to divide the Dems by reporting this, I'm glad they are. This sort of thing needs to be shown the light of day.

Are you saying it would be different if it happened in the North or the West?

[Moloch]

15. Well...

even if it not school sponsored, it is still incredibly racist and ignorant to hold a prom for a particular race. The South deserves its reputation.

[tabasco]

10. Disgusting.

We're all Americans.

[GarySeven]

16. You folks are missing the point

You folks are missing the entire point!!

This kind of stuff happens all over the country. There are private parties where kids exclude kids. They are happening in your neighborhood RIGHT NOW.

You folks are being encouraged by this story to attack the South because this story confirms a stereotype you have. The Republican-controlled MEDIA wants you to be divided from the Democrats who live down here. The Republican MEDIA wants to shame us into silence and to encourage the liberal wing to condemn us. You are being played for FOOLS. These things happen EVERYWHERE, but they NEVER get covered unless it happens down South -- because everyone "expects" it. So, whenever something like this happens they rush down here with their cameras and their microphones to look and peer at us as if we were some sort of animals in a zoo. Where have the most vicious race incidents occurred in the past 30 years? Try New York City, the center of liberalism.

This is a ploy by the Repugs to divide and conquer the nation. You NEED the South to win National elections and they know it, but they encourage divisions in the Democratic party like some puppetmaster, and you PLAY ALONG. YOU are being played for SAPS and the consequences is going to be a fascist police state in which only one power has dominance.

[Gildor Inglorion]

21. You're right, Gary, this is NOT the Georgia I remember...

and I've only been gone since 1998. I'm just bewildered about what has happened to my native state, though. It used to be the most Democratic state in the union; the only one that had NEVER elected a Repuke governor until the last election, and now it turns out that Sonny & Saxby may have been "elected" by dishonest Diebold machines. (Ol' Zell Miller has apparently had some kind of stroke or something; what else could possibly explain the loss of his mind, self-respect, and dignity?) While the rest of the south was undergoing convulsions during the civil rights era, Georgia remained calm thanks to good Democratic governors & outstanding black leaders like King, Lewis, Young, and Abernathy, and Maynard Jackson, the greatest of all IMHO. Georgia has produced TWO Nobel Peace Prize winners in the last 50 years; what other state, north or south, can say that? And yet, stories like these silly proms keep coming out. Your point about the Repuke media is very well taken. Naturally, they want to divide and conquer Democrats. I hope there's a solution, I really do. I want to be PROUD of Georgia once again.

[GarySeven]

22. Zell just wants to be part of a winning team

Nixon's Southern Strategy was to divide the Southern Democrats from the liberal wing and it has worked so well the evidence is seen on this board tonight. The liberal wing sneers at us and calls us racists while ignoring the racism in their own backyards. This attitude did not develop overnight. Once the Democratic Party was a strong bloc consisting of Southerners, Unionists and Northern Liberals. The Repugs have sought for decades to split this powerful region from the rest of the country and, unfortunately, they did so by taking advantage of the stereotypes that persist among Northern liberals. In other words, the Liberals played right into their hands, all the time thinking what the Republicans WANTED them to think.

If you hold your nose and read Zell's book, he is at least right about the contempt that national Democrats and others treat Southerners. Zell is like many, many other Georgians who are tired of being shut out of the federal government and the power to determine the course of the region. They, like he, join the Republicans because that is the ONLY avenue of power open to them. If Democrats would start using some SENSE they could recognize what is going on, then there would be ANOTHER PARTY down here, one that most of us are still sympathetic with. Zell may be a lost cause, but there are MILLIONS of us down here who are not. We need to build a national party and the way to do begin doing that is to ignore these obvious ploys by the Republicans and to STOP LETTING OUR PARTY BE STEERED FROM K STREET.

[TroglodyteScholar]

28. Thanks for that...

...you articulated a few good points that I was a bit too flustered to put into words myself.

The rethugs want all you kindhearted dems to see us (the south) as nothing but inbred, fundamentalist, racist-as-hell bumpkins. It really does work to their advantage.

I'm really a little ashamed at how quickly so many of you condemn the entire south as though a) you're morally superior to the very best of us, and b) you wish we weren't a part of your country at all. With non-southerners behaving like that, it doesn't exactly encourage us to look up to you guys. Look at yourselves stereotyping -- is this what you stand for?

[Wabbajack]

17. Even my repuke realatives down in GA are upset about this

Even Bull O'Reilly is against this!!

[bleedingheart]

18. This is exactly why I am not shocked to see how Zell Miller acts

there is something really wrong in our country...

[AspenRose]

20. But what would Strom Thurmond say?

eom

[saracat]

25. Hmmmm, But it seems in

New York last year some schools had segregated gay and straight proms! And for the record, I thought that was wrong too. The gay kids have to live with straight society just as blacks and whites must live together! In either case seperate but equal doesn't cut it! But I just thought the comparison was apt as people were dumping on the south as if segregation was exclusive to the south!