12/11 Added asides on racism, on personal history. Revised title. Appended "Fight Son" and "Rammer Jammer"
12/9 A few unfair remarks cooled.
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History: I posted something about the SEC Championship from my brother, who is a big Bama fan. Did not generate many comments. It was, after all, mostly analysis.
Then I wrote a private message to one friend, and then to a lot of friends I knew to be Bama fans. In this private message, I shared thoughts from Philip Shirley, my old pal from T-town who now writes a very good column about Bama football at al.com called From Behind Enemy Lines.
My concern was the tone of some remarks Bama fans were beginning to repeat, and it looked like the mean-spirited stuff was gaining a kind of general acceptance. Like it was okay. It's not okay, and I didn't not like it. So far, no response to that message. No - the other day there was one (1) reply, from Mark.
So now, this.
Fair warning, it is over the edge. But I found out I had to raise the pitch to drive the point home - and I hope, to stimulate a lively conversation. A fair and balanced editorial wouldn't get it. I hope this rant merits an honest and productive discussion. [Dec 11: since it was first posted on Tuesday 8 December, this hope has been working out okay. It has probably peaked, so I'd be selling short from here. But it's had a good run.]
Now I enjoy talking smack as much as any fan - after all bragging rights are an Iron Bowl tradition, an art-form of the highest order! And this year - at last! - Bama fans really can enjoy our day in the sun! Yet some of the smack talk I was hearing more and more stopped being witty and seemed to just turn mean. It's not like yelling in traffic at all the idiots - we all do that. Nobody can hear you. But immature flame-wars and mean-spirited taunting? Not worthy of us Bama fans. This may be okay for the lowly Texas, Florida, or Auburn louts, but not for us Crimson elite. (: Do I need to say that this is smack-talk? See, wink-wink smiley face! -> ;)
A little history. My big brother, Frank "Trip" Powell, was Student Council president of Murphy in 1964, the year the first black student came, and he was assigned the task by the administration to "look after that colored boy" and try to keep the racial violence down. He saw how we white folks treated Henry Hobdy. Urine poured into his locker on a regular basis, bumps in hallways during class-change, books scattered, constant threats both subtle and outright, beatings. The South - and he rest of the country - has come a long way since then. Racism is no longer so obvious. And by racism, I do not refer only to whites against blacks, but the other way also. (And throw in browns, yellows, the whole spectrum while you're at it. Racism must have external markers to work right. How can you be racism agaist people with 0-positive blood? But you can if they ae old, or fat, or young, or poor, or if they have a funny dialect.)
A few guys on this list were on the first football team where a black student managed to make it through the summer two-a-days. I was one of those guys. That didn't happen till 1970. In 1971, the year my wife graduated, the anger finally erupted in blood and broken glass at Murphy. I showed up that day to visit my History teacher, Harriett Lillich, and that's what I found - blood and broken glass. The school empty. I tried to ask Ms Lillich what happened but she stopped me: "How did you get past the police cordon?" My wife is a graduate of Murphy, one of the few in the class of 1971 who did not move to Davidson High School or UMS - anywhere but Murphy.
I also taught for several years at Murphy, and aimed a lot of criticism in my Press-Register column at the black community. I'll tell them straight to their face that they are messing up what was given to them by those who came before. I am certainly no comfy liberal, far removed from what is happening. I still live in the South. And my wife still teaches, as she has for 25 years. We've both seen unbelievably bad behavior from the younger generation of black kids.
So don't give me this "Oh, Clark doesn't get it. Or dismiss it with what my high society friends whisper when they think I can't hear: "You know he's always been crazy. He's just an a-hole. He's not one of us." Damn right! I'd plead to those charges. But I still get this stuff from people who don't know a thing about me other than the guy the remember in high school, or college. It's the same for you, I'll bet. It is hard to be who you are among those who know who you were!
At age 58, I petty much know who I am and who I was - yes, I was at times an insufferable ass, and sometimes I was pretty crazy. So what? I'm pretty sure most people could find similar critics. Yet after 25 years based here in Mobile, I also I know some other things, some wonderful, some I do not like and never did. I am tired of keeping quiet: there is a special brand of racism in Mobile. We never had real riots here. We are too polite. You can find this in John Howard Griffin's visits to Mobile as a white soldier about to ship out in 1942, and again when he "passed" as a black man in 1959. He saw two very different Mobiles as he reported in Black Like Me. Or more recently, in an excellent documentary The Order of Myths by Margaret Brown, a Mobilian herself. This shows how the Mobile society is really quite complex, how you find the best and the worst of humanity mixed into the crazy gumbo of this very "inside" town. Mobile is quite different from the rest of the state of Alabama, and even different than the neighboring cities along the Louisiana, Missisiippi, Alabama "Cajun Coast," as I call this unique region - which is larger and older than just Louisiana. It is a strange realm, this Cajun Coast ...
Mobile now has its first black Mayor, and we like to use that to prove we are not the steroeptype, though few of my white friends actually voted for Sam Jones (Ijust to be testy, I put a Sam Jones sign up at my place on Riviere du Chien! The new racism is not substantially different than the Jim Crow it replaced, it has only changed the words it uses. It is more subtle, but just as real. From both sides, mind you, who like to pretend racism does not exist, or at least it's not so bad, not here, not in Mobile! But it does, here and just as it does everywhere. Just take a look at the most racial and segregated hour in America - ten to eleven on Sunday mornings. You know what I'm talking about.
I have seen this stuff all my life. Seen the colored and white only bathrooms downtown, seen those signs go away, seen the troubles of the 1960s, seen those pass, seen what's happening now, seen how the latest generation is as different from us as we were from our parents, and (dare I say this?), I've seen what is to come, though exactly when I'm not so sure. Man, I drove cabs into Orange Grove and Happy Hill in the middle of the night. I've worked on river towboats, on ships, drove trucks, done hard labor, taught school kids from grade 6 through Sophomores in college. I've been places most haven't dreamed of visiting, seen things most can't imagine. White Mobilians, for example, know more about Spring Hill or Russia than they do about whole sections of their own city. Same, but in a different way, for Black Mobilians. I am tired of this polite-but-separate New South. I won't, I can't keep quiet any longer. Not now, not at my age. Soon I'll be dead. Then I'll keep quiet. But now, if I don't speak my heart, I'm already dead. That's how it feels.
Okay, sermon's done, history class is over. Now for some football. (Wait. Do I need to bring up the fact that Mobilian Winston Groom pointed out in Forrest Gump - or do I? Think of the Alabama teams of the 1960's, George Wallace's infamous pre-staged psychodrama at the steps of Foster Auditorium on June 11, 1963. Notice with me the color of the first string this year. Wonder when we will mark the first black quarterback, the first black Head Coach? It may come sooner than you think! O the demographics, they are a-changin')
Trip, who has lived overseas for the past 20 years, just sent me an email. It's an email, so he rares back and really speaks his mind. I didn't ask his permission to post this, since he isn't on Facebook, but I will. Remember, he himself says "Sorry, just felt the need to vent a bit." Me too. As I said, the point is to stimulate some discussion - even provoke it - and I never expected everyone to agree. How to express differing but deeply held views, maybe crossing the line a little with some smack-talk, (you gotta laugh but show some class)
So here's my brother Trip, and remember, friends, he is as he himselfe= admits venting (slightly different than ranting but that's quibblie. I leave it as it is:
You know, after a whole season of reading about Bama on the Internet ... and reading at least portions of many comments on most articles, I find myself totally shocked and embarrassed/ashamed and pissed off at the vast majority of Bama supporters. They have almost universally trashed Tebow for crying and no one, not one single comment, has yet commended Tebow for his class in congratulating Alabama, wishing them well, and saying he was "proud" of the Bama team. They frequently are really violent in their comments and often want to kill or maim one or more members of the opposing team. They trash other fans and constantly say rude, mean, and hurtful things to people they don't even know. I know one thing - I couldn't live my life with so much anger and hate inside me. I don't know how they do it. They must live really miserable lives with Bama football being the only good thing in life for them. And none of them can spell at all - I think almost all of them are functionally illiterate. How did they ever graduate from Bama or any other university if they don't know the difference between their and there or how to spell definite (if I see definate one more time, I'll scream). They never give another team credit for anything and even trash FIU and UTC. Even after all the bad years Bama suffered, they have no humility at all - or empathy or sympathy. I like what Saban tells his players - when you score a touchdown, have some class and act like you've been there before. Too bad Bama fans don't listen to what Saban says like his players do. Bama fans just don't have any class. And Rammer Jammer, for me, goes into that category of "no class" too. Why not have a cheer for your team instead of one that trashes the other team? Celebrate your own team; don't trash and embarrass the other team.
Bama fans were so impressed with the class of the Virginia Tech fans and a couple of other fan bases. Why can't they take a cue or two from them? Why doesn't the class of another fan base cause Bama fans to self-reflect on their own 'classlessness'? I hate to say it, but I think it's because they don't have the self-reflective capacity it would require - or the self-consciousness to even be aware of their own lack of class.
In short, illiterate rednecks to the core. I know that reveals my own discriminatory tendency, but it's not the way I started this year. I started by assuming there was some good with the bad like everywhere else. But now, unfortunately, I think the good and enlightened Bama fan is a minuscule percentage if not a complete oxymoron.
I guess I have romanticized my past a lot - I don't remember everyone in Bama or who follows Bama being so, so redneck. In short, I'm so turned off I don't even come close to having words to describe how turned off I am. I have realized I have absolutely not a thing in common with them except loving Bama football. That's it. I don't think I would socialize with any of them. If I ever fleetingly entertained thoughts of ever returning to Alabama to live, those ideas are dead and gone forever. Makes me wonder how you manage to continue living in Mobile all these years. Sorry, just felt the need to vent a bit.
Sorry, folks, but he has a point. Though my brother has been overseas for a long time, I've had reasons to stay in Mobile. I love it down here in L.A. (Lower Alabama) on the Redneck Riviera and I'll go to the mat for my sweet home Alabama. But I do not bigots and srupidity and just plain hatefulness. And I don't like what we are becoming down here. We're better than that. Unlike most Bama fans, I actually graduated from the University. (I scuttle to say that you don't have to attend or graduate from any school to qualify as a fan! But you do get some bragging rights.) We didn't see fans acting this way when Coach Bryant was around. I too am embarrassed for the state of our State. And I am too old to keep quiet, like a polite Mobilian always does. To hell with that!
It's time for all of us to stop being proud of being stupid. And it's time for someone to say this. Maybe this one will generate a conversation!
Roll Tide!
This Note is set to be public to "Everyone" so if you object or agree or if you want to pass it on to someone, feel free.
Fight Song
Yea, Alabama! Drown 'em Tide!
Every 'Bama man's behind you,
Hit your stride.
Go teach the Bulldogs [how] to behave,
Send the Yellow Jackets to a watery grave.
And if a man starts to weaken,
That’s a shame!
[here's where the rhythms get wobbly]
For Bama's pluck and grit have
Writ her name in Crimson Flame.
Fight on, fight on, fight on men!
Remember the Rose Bowl, we’ll win then.
So roll on to victory,
Hit your stride,
You're Dixie’s football pride,
Crimson Tide, Roll Tide, Roll Tide!
"Rammer Jammer"
Hey Gators!
Hey Gators!
Hey Gators!
We just beat the hell out of you!
Rammer Jammer, Yellow Hammer. Give 'em hell, Alabama!
Posts
Clark,
ReplyDeleteYou didn't get too many comments here on the blog about this post, and granted, I'm coming to the game late. But I have to add 2cents to the kitty. Living here in Utah, I've heard it all about the BCS, and more than my share as a Bama fan about the drubbing by Utah down in New Orleans. They still smile at me, in that knowing way, when they find out I'm a Bama fan. But universally, what fans who attended the game have made a point to tell me was how gracious and congratulatory the Bama fans were about the loss. How complimentary to the team, how honest, they were about getting a whupping. I think part of being a TRUE fan of a school, and a representative, is how you handle being down. Anyone can be a fan, and a jackass, when you're winning. I think winning brings out those who see a bandwagon they can jump on for a free ride. Maybe those who can afford bowl tickets have better manners? Maybe there's a subtle class/financial issue going on here? I don't have evidence to back any case. But what I know about racism, I learned from my father. I asked him what it was like, in the 60's, in New Hope, Alabama. He said he didn't really notice color. He said when you're poor, you're poor, and that's about all you see. I've always thought that those who lower themselves to comparisons based on race did so because they simply had nothing else to be proud of, and it reflects more on the 'status' of the racist than of the victim. I pity racists. I pity those who have no other way of looking up at themselves than to try to look down on someone else. That includes fair weather fans, and fair weather friends. I realize I've Rambled a bit, but what else is an engineer from Atlanta to do? In my head there's always a lot of ground to cover, as the good ideas are spread out a fair piece.