Questions for people who were old enough to remember the civil rights movement

[Haole Girl]

Was there as much hatred, between people then as now? Or do you think, with the internet, the extremism is worse?

I find these photos particularly disturbing:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/worldnews/article-1266895/White-supremacists-rally-sparks-violent-clashes-Los-Angeles.html#ixzz0lSRE8cDH

[eleny]

1. I think the clan invoked disturbing feelings in people decades ago, too

[Haole Girl]

3. I know it did

This just feels... different than I remembered when I was young. I was born in '61. And I do remember bits & pieces. Though my parents tried to shelter me from a lot of it.

[eleny]

20. Well, nothing spells hate more than a lynching

[roguevalley]

41. I think it was worse. During the Civil Rights time, you could be killed

and no one would do anything about it, you could be attacked. You could be killed for just looking at a white woman. This is awful and stupid but it doesn't reach the level I think of those times, which I am glad I don't have to live through again. I hope.

[DeschutesRiver]

56. +1. The penalty for doing ordinary things reserved for whites was death

And we have nothing close to that today. It was institutionalized/state authorized oppression. It was everywhere and it encompassed all aspects of life for black folk.

When I was born, blacks in areas of our country couldn't even drink from the same faucet or sit on the same toilet seat as my little kid white butt. Couldn't stay in the same hotel, couldn't use the same silverware or plates to eat in the same cheap restaurant. Had to travel to visit relatives across country by finding places to stay with friends or relatives because they'd be denied access to hotels and diners because they were white only. Better keep out of schools were white kids got their education, too.

Enough of any of these "transgressions", ie making a fuss about getting some food or a place to stay on the road, or thinking your black kid should get the same education the stupidest of white kids got could turn into a death sentence, delivered at the end of a swinging rope. With NO penalty for the murderer.

And that is just a freaking highlight of those times. God, I too hope that none of us ever have to live through anything close to that again. One difference for me is that since I did grow up and live through that once, I will come out fighting and not back down an inch should things disintegrate. Hard fought battles and the new status that has been won can't always be kept by just kumbyaying and holding hands.

My vow, even as I grow older and more feeble, is that I will act fast should my radar sense anything like the Civil Rights era evils taking root in a meaningful way. These freaks can try, but I will fight hard. We'll see who wins, but I won't lose just because I can't imagine it could happen. It has happened before, and that insight makes all the difference to me.

[roguevalley]

63. My feelings too, my fellow Oregonian. I remember how Medford had

sun down laws. :(

[daleanime]

2. It's not hidden away like it once was.

But hate remains.:banghead:

[Haole Girl]

4. Just this weekend, because someone I thought was a friend revealed some things...

I realized how widespread the hatred is becoming. It seems to be getting worse instead of better. :-(

[daleanime]

42. It's always been widespread....

the only changes I've seen are;

1-The attention that any instance gets, what was once left un-talked about now gets national coverage.

2-Most(but no all)bigots are at least a little ashamed and try to cover-up their actions under some other name.


I understand about your 'friend', it's hard believe that the people we like/love can harbor such emotions. Sadly they can and do.

[marybourg]

5. It was more mainstream then. You didn't have to put on a uniform;

You could just stand in the street and scream:

http://fineartamerica.com/featured/elizabeth-eckford-making-her-way-to-little-rock-high-school-1958-lauren-luna.html

[Catshrink]

12. I remember how appalled I was when my BIL's sister told

us they'd sit on their porch (in the South) and when Black person walked by they'd say, "Hey, 'n-word', what time is it?" I was surprised but she said it's, "no big deal. 'n-words' know their place." Even as a child I knew that was very wrong.

I can't bring myself to type the n-word.

[peacebird]

6. in the early 70's a "Black Pride" group came to our high school..

These folks were trying to incite violence among young black students against "their oppressors" - I had one interaction with these people when the grabbed me and accused my family of 'oppression'. I told them my people came from Germany LONG after the civil war AND my grandfather immediately joined the Navy.

My art teacher grabbed me and pulled me into his office - told me to stay there.

I learned later that this mob of outsiders had taken the football quarterback and stuck his hands into the spinning wheels of his motorcycle - ripping his hands to bits.

[Haole Girl]

9. omg

Glad your art teacher protected you!

[peacebird]

18. he was a great teacher and a wonderful person.

I was five foot tall and about 90 pounds at the time.... but like most teens i was fearless and believed that being right was all that matttered. Thank goodness he was there.

[NOLALady]

7. I don't think it's worse.

Many people were attacked on the street by law enforcement. Dogs and hoses were turned on children. Activists were shot while asleep. Churches were burned and bombed. Many were beaten and killed, black and white.

I don't believe it is worse. I was very afraid during the sixties.

[Haole Girl]

11. I hope it doesn't happen again

I really do. Thanks.

[madrchsod]

8. yup , nope, and the.....

progressives are the new hippies

[Lint Head]

10. I was there. The hatred was less overt . I think it was worse because

racism was a way of life. MLK and his followers were heroes of mine and they endured so much. Klan rallies were mostly ignored in the South because almost all whites went and it was like a picnic.

[Haole Girl]

13. Almost all the whites went?

Please tell me you are kidding.

:scared:

[boppers]

19. A bit of history about the Democratic Party and the KKK:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1924_Democratic_National_Convention

A Washington march, 4 years later:

[Jakes Progress]

53. As recently as the sevenites

the Klan activities were carried on the society pages of some East Texas newspapers. The Kappa Alpha fraternities would have old south week where their pledges dressed in blackface.

I still remember the first television commercial I saw with a black person. In the small Texas town where i first taught, the city filled in a buried the brand new city swimming pool when they were told the gummint would make them integrate it.

The hate was more pervasive and more a part of official policy. Today if I someone says something racist to me, I ask them what makes them think I look like I was stupid enough to be a racist. Back then, your racism was assumed.

[defendandprotect]

58. Right -- we've made a little dent in "official policy" . . .. but rights keep taking us backwards ..

[boppers]

14. "were" old enough? Past tense?

Some of us forced bussing (in my case) kids are still breathing, ya know. ;)

The hatred has definitely dropped a few more notches in my life, in my experience.

[Haole Girl]

15. I realized that wasn't proper tense, but then thought...

"Well, they will know what I meant." When you say, "dropped a few more notches" do you mean that in a positive way? Sorry, being the dyslexic I am, I can turn around things twice! :blush:

[marybourg]

17. I don't see anything wrong with "were old enough".You had to be not just

alive then, but "old enough" to be aware of social behavior and news events.

[Lost4words]

52. very good point indeed. As I know older types that are unaware.

:hi:

[boppers]

31. Dropped in the positive sense, in that there's less racism now.

A bit about my personal experience and time frame: When I entered school, there was still a "white" elementary school, and "everyone else" elementary school, a few hundred yards from each other. Starting in the 1st grade, me and my brothers were part of the desegregation program, placed into the "everyone else" programs. This was, if you can believe it, in.... 1977 (Tucson, Arizona, still had segregated schools well into the 70's). The civil rights movement was *still* ticking along, as it was (and still is) needed.

So, with that frame of reference, some major cultural changes/memories since then (in no particular order):
- A TV show about the African American, professional class, "Huxtable" family became the most viewed show in the 80's. Unthinkable a mere 10-20 years before, as AA roles were often limited to ghetto caricatures, or "the angry black man".
- Urban music from minority neighborhoods went from being underground fringe music, to a dominant radio style (Rap and Hip Hop). (See also the similar transitions and mainstreaming of Rock, Blues, and Jazz in years prior)
- A series of AA personalities changed TV and moviemaking, breaking out of the "magic" and "token" and "ghetto badass" roles, became leading characters in their own right and considered equal to their peers (Sidney Potier, Eddie Murphy, Will Smith, Morgan Freeman, etc.)
- The mantle of "most trusted woman on Television" was entrusted to (and in many ways, created by,) a woman named Oprah.
- Golf was changed, almost single-handedly, from a "white man's sport" by Tiger Woods.
- MLK day became a national holiday
- Travelling across the south, I sat in segregated bus terminals (They had taken the signs down, but it was still obvious, down to seats vs. benches)
- Rodney King's beating caused a national dialog, and rioting in the streets, over police behavior.
- Similarly, OJ's trial was widely televised, discussed everywhere, and caused a great deal of reflection on the US justice system, and how minorities were treated.
- A wiry AA kid with a squeaky voice and great dance moves became the most successful entertainer of all time (Michael Jackson)
- Second AA supreme court justice was nominated and seated (the first was in 1967) in 1991 (Thomas)
- Penalties for Hate Crimes increased in 1994
- BET founded in 1980, creating an AA television channel
- Sponsorship of, and advertising about, AA sports figures made them household names (Jordan, Shaq, OJ, Magic Johnson)
- The "n-word" became... the "n-word"
- A cultural phenomenon of being "politically correct" swept across the nation, changing the limits of socially acceptable discourse

Oh, and of course, there's the whole "AA finally elected president" milestone.

Taken as a bigger picture, the changes didn't happen all at once, and I've left (I'm sure) millions of other changes out, but the little changes along the way added up to huge social and cultural changes from what I remember of my childhood. I'm sure others who have been kicking around longer can no doubt add to my list.

[montieg]

16. I was born in 1947, so I was an early-teen

at the height of the struggle in the early 60's. I lived just outside a small, west Texas agricultural community with a small black population (3%) and somewhat larger Latino pop. (15%). Some Latino kids went to school with us, with NO dispute over their being there. Fact is, though, most of them went to work (boys) or got married (girls) and dropped out by around sixth grade. My story, though, is about a black kid my age.

Since I lived outside town, if I wanted to play with another kid, I had to ride my bike into town. Just at the edge of town was the "flats", where all the minority community--black and brown-- lived. I would bike in to town and for years, my playmate was a black kid my age. We destroyed Nazi machine-gun nests all over that area---in our minds'eyes.

Fast forward to graduation from high school--freshman year in college 100 miles from home. Late sixties and Dr. King, the Movement, and Vietnam were the only issues discussed anywhere. Walking across campus one morning I got hit in the face by the proverbial dirty diaper: why didn't James go to school with me? Where did he go? Why did I NEVER think to ask him?

Next time I went home I asked my parents and they told me about the Black kids being bussed 8 miles to the next town over that had a black school-- in a hand-down bus that our local school had already worn out.

I was pulverized. I went out to see James and found out he had moved to California with an uncle. I never saw him again.

[Haole Girl]

21. How sad

Thank you for sharing that. :hug:

[stevedeshazer]

22. It was much worse back then. These people are idiot fringe types.

Back in the day, they were mainstream and there was actual debate in the news about whether they were right or not. Today, their children are just fools.

[Haole Girl]

23. Thanks

:hi:

[babsbunny]

24. I was attending an all black school when Martin was killed

They took it out on the white kids. I totally get it now!

[notadmblnd]

25. My husband did. He told about segregation and how the black people

all had to sit in the balcony at the movie theater. He also told me when they were kids, they would pee over the balcony onto the white people as they watched the movie.

[patrice]

26. I don't know. I was in Catholic school and the nuns told us that Black people were martyrs.

We went to the east side high school just for weekly home-economics classes and there were plenty of Black people there but, though we did not speak to one another, I didn't notice any tension between us.

[NOLALady]

35. Martyrs?

I also attended Catholic schools. The nuns (Blessed Sacrament) never told us that we were martyrs.

What was that all about?

[patrice]

49. They suffered for what was Right, i.e. the truth that all of us are equal in God's eyes, so no one

has the right to oppress anyone else.

I think the idea was made more real for us because our Dad, a pipefitting foreman on BIG construction jobs, used to come home from work and tell stories at the dinner table about the crap that went on against Black workers, at those big construction sites, a fact which eventually turned him toward Unionizing because the Union gave him a way of dealing with the race problems amongst his workers which his employers ignored.

[patrice]

50. Maybe some orders are/were different from others: ours were Sisters of Charity.

There were some nuts in their order, but, even with all of the very real criticism I CAN bring against them, I have to say that the good and decent by far outweighed the bad.

I also have to admit that messages about Social Justice fell on fertile ground in our family, not just because my Dad was solid pro-Labor, but also because there were 14 of us kids, so matters having to do with in-equities (which are almost unavoidable in any big system) were a great deal of interest to me. The size of our family and the "Family FIRST" attitude that my parents instilled in us put us on the outside around our peer groups at school and elsewhere, that probably had no small part in viewing their Prejudice and Bigotry with a more objective eye.

[NOLALady]

61. Your Dad was a good man.

My Father was also a strong Union person.

Fourteen kids, huh. Very good Catholics. I live in an area that's solidly Catholic. Most of the adults in my age group have at least ten siblings.

The Sisters of Charity ran our "Charity" Hospital at one time. When my Mother was ill, my Grandmother's co workers went to the hospital to offer blood for my Mother. The Sisters would not take their blood because they were white. My Grandmother never forgave the Sisters of Charity.

[Aristus]

27. I was born in 1968, six months after MLK Jr. was murdered.

I don't remember the convulsions in this country caused by resistance to the civil rights movement. But I do remember growing up around things that made skin color immaterial to me re: how I viewed other people.

I grew up on Army bases around the country. From the time I was 5 until about 7 or so, we lived on Ft. Huachuca, AZ. My dad was an Army captain. On one side of us, our neighbors were Lt. Perry and his family. His son, Winfield, was my best friend. Lt. Perry was of a rank subordinate to my father. On the other side lived Major Powell and his family. His daughter, Rhonda, was my sister's best friend. Major Powell was of a rank superior to my father. Rank meant nothing to me, and although it meant a lot to my father, the skin color of his colleagues meant nothing to him. I was never taught that the Perrys and the Powells were any different than my family. So I grew up thinking racism and bigotry were pretty stupid things. I still think that, of course, because they are.

Despite being white, I benefitted from the civil rights movement by not being denied good friends with skin color different from mine.

[handmade34]

28. I was in Michigan

and saw the riots in Detroit and was victim of rock throwing during mini riots in Lansing...

It was different then. I can't say which is worse, more was taken for granted or assumptions were different in the 60's... Of course I was young and my perspective is much changed now. I thought maybe we had grown up some??? It all terribly saddens me.

[PSzymeczek]

40. I think it was more institutionalized

up into the '60s. The civil authorities were supporting it then. Now, it's more on an individual/private marginal level.

[Turbineguy]

29. I recall it was scary.

It was obvious what the right thing to do was but how could you know how things would turn out?

As I white person, I'm a lot more comfortable with those scary looking Black Panthers than those fucking Nazi assholes.

[lunatica]

30. More hatred then. And people who marched put their lives on the line

The only people who are angry and hateful now are those who want to stuff the genie back into the lamp in some sick yearning for 'their America'. I wish we could give them a state so they could have 'their America' to their hearts' content.

[EFerrari]

32. Negrophobia: Race Riot in Atlanta

http://www.c-spanvideo.org/program/165421-1

Video, transcript at link. The event happened in 1906.

[jwirr]

33. Born in 1941. I think that things were much worse back then. That

does not say that we can't get that bad if this continues.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

34. The very idea of integrating schools was so controversial that

Eisenhower had to call out the National Guard to protect the students. I remember them--including elementary school children-- walking a gauntlet of screaming, jeering middle-class white people. I remember seeing a news clip in which a woman was teaching her son (about four years old) to say "We don't want to integrate."

[DainBramaged]

36. It was MUCH MUCH worse in the 50's 60's, and even most of the 70's

[jpak]

37. Much more - lynching, murder and assassinations galore

far more shocking and violent racial hatred than today's wannabe teabaggers have mustered (so far).

assholes that they be

[pengillian101]

38. I was born in 1951 and here's my recollection.

I was raised in an all-white small town in WI and never even saw a non-white person until I met some folks in a town next-over that had a college.

I met a nice black guy and he asked me to his school dance. I mentioned to my folks that I met him and asked permission to go to the dance (I think I was 17). Answer was "no".

I had given him my address and he and his friends drove over a few days later and used a flashlight - looking for the house numbers.

Well flashlights flashing in the windows absolutely freaked my parents out big time.

Cops were called and that was the end of that.

It was a very bad atmosphere. My father talked in a very racist language about anyone who was not like him.

And yet...he told me how he was discriminated against when his family moved here, and all he could speak was Norwegian and he was teased mercilessly.

Imagine that.

[Number23]

43. You were born the same year as my mother.

She has stories that I'll never forget, being born black and in Atlanta.

[boppers]

46. "he told me how he was discriminated against"....

I had the fortunate experience of growing up near my Grandparents on my Father's side, who were among the first generation of Americans from Polish/Ukrainian immigrant parents, and they grew up and lived in the New York of the 20's-70's. Immigrants, masses of them, just trying to make it in NYC. Lessons of the experiences, and cultures, are heavily woven into the family narrative on that side.

In contrast, my mother was a member of the "Daughters of the American Revolution", about as puritanical as can be possible.

The lily-white, mono-culture, side was a tad more racist. Come to think of it though (and reflecting on modern Polsih politics), what seems to drive racism seems to include a mono-cultural, homogenized, society.

[mmonk]

39. There was a lot of hatred then. The problem as I see it is we are

seeing it starting to return. Maybe the hatred never went away, but it became unacceptable to be expressed. Seeing it slithering back bit by bit is what is bothersome.

[bemildred]

44. This is nothing. nt

[old mark]

45. HG: Racism was the LAW in those days. Public places like restaurants,

bus and train stations, schools were segregated by law. People could not vote by law because of poll taxes or "literacy tests" for voters. People who tried to help change these laws were kidnapped, beaten, sometimes murdered.I remember very well a series of bombings of black churches, one especially involving the murder of several little girls, carried out by the KKK. There were MANY shootings, beatings, hangings. Local/regional law enforcement ignored much of it, was probably involved in committing some of it. After much pressure on J. Edgar Hoover, the FBI finally became involved investigating some of these crimes, but dragged its feet and investigated the blacks for "communist agitators" instead. There were illegal films and voice tapes of black leaders including MLK, and much of this persisted as law till the 1970's.
I remember much of the violence was at the hands of various state police agencies and sheriff's deputies. Some states had black police who had no authority over whites, and I recall one in Florida was murdered...his kiler was finally found around 30 years later because no one had been looking for him for most of that time.
The situation now is really mild compared to what it was. Compared to many other nations we have had very little political violence in the US, but most of what we had was and is racial at least in part.

mark

[DailyGrind51]

47. Civil Rights workers were murdered and beaten, African-American churches were bombed!

It is not THAT bad, yet!

[trof]

48. I grew up in Birmingham in the 40s and 50s.

As a child I lived in the Jim Crow world of "Colored" and "White" drinking fountains and seating on city buses.
Whites in front, of course, and blacks on the back of the bus.

The L&N train station had "White" and "Colored" waiting rooms and separate eating facilities.

A black woman came to our home Monday through Friday (and a half day on Saturday) to cook and clean.
A black man mowed our lawn.
We were solid middle class, and it was common for folks of our station to have such servants.

I went to all white schools, segregated by law.
"Separate, but equal"
Yeah, right.

What we now call racism was just a given, at least it was in the Deep South, and as far as I could see pretty much accepted by all.
It was just the way life was.

The only black folks I knew were our servants mentioned above, and those who worked in the homes of friends and family. They liked me and I liked them as near as I could tell. And our maid had the same authority over me as my mom, as far as I was concerned.

At the time I wasn't aware of any racial or political/ideological 'hatred'.
Now I know that the klan was very active and that White Citizens' Councils were common, especially following Brown v. Board of Education.
And many blacks lived in fear and there must have been a lot of anger and resentment seething just under the surface of everyday life.

The whole tea party/LimBeck, et al/Fox 'News' rage against liberals and Obama is new to me. I remember the times when Democratic and Republican members of congress would get together over drinks at day's end and more-or-less good naturdely hash out their differences.
Enough to come up with some pretty useful pieces of legislation.

It's just nuts now.
:-(

[Lost4words]

51. OMG, anytime one group believes another is less than human,....

be disturbed, be very disturbed.

[olegramps]

54. Being as old as dirt, I lived through those horrible times.

It was sad that my father was a racist, but great that he finally came to his senses because of my mother. I consider the Limbaughs, Becks, Hannities, etc. to be cut out of the same cloth as the die-hard Southern racists. I saw it first hand as I was raised in the South until my parents got positions teaching in the North. They are daily stirring the pot of sedition, division and class hatred. I hope the bastards rot in hell.

[On the Road]

55. This is an Appropriate Subject for Karl Marx's Observation:

"History repeats itself, first time as tragedy, the second time as farce."

Segregation and other forms of racial oppression were a tragedy. The tea party movement is a farce.

[HughMoran]

57. They threw rocks at my bus in Boston

Funny thing, I was always bussed to a mixed school - even before busing was mandated - lol. I think it was worse then.

[Brewman_Jax]

59. Faulkner was right

"The past isn't dead. It isn't even past."

The hatred isn't as overt, but coded and still present.

Black people have higher rates of unemployment, under-employment, poverty, and other economic indicators, suffer greater penalties by law enforcement for similar crimes. The list goes on.

I heard stories of the night riders from my great-grandparents and how 1 or 2 cousins never came home (this was many years before the Civil Rights Movement.) I remember the days of white flight. None of the white kids that started high school with me graduated with me.

The signs came down off of America's walls, not America's hearts.

[deaniac21]

60. It's mostly just talk and arguement now. Back then people

were violently killed, beaten and intimidated in public. The world was a very much scary place.

[Old Troop]

62. There was hate, but also hope

So many diverse people left their segregated neighborhoods and schools in the North to fight for the rights of African Americans in the South.