quote:
As a black male how do I honestly defend Ole Miss if there is a public heated debate about saving Dixie, a song that starts off with I wish I was in the land of Cotton???

This can be taken as I wish I was in Mississippi just as much as the negative connotation that you're implying though.

I understand what it is you are saying and most the time I would 100% agree with you even if I myself might not like what's happening; i.e. From Dixie With Love ~ pissed me off so much that it was being taken away, but if the idiots couldn't stop saying TSWRA, even though my perception of this was different than others, then I was okay with it being taken away.

Here's somewhat my problem with this whole love affair with stripping Ole Miss from its history. In many cases its correct that we should disassociate ourselves from certain negative images like the Confederate Flag & Colonel Reb, but where do we draw the line? Should we tear down the confederate memorial to the University Greys to which our school derives its nickname?? Should we desecrate and destroy the Confederate Graveyard??? All because these things have association and ties to the Civil War and the Confederacy????

Look this is where I have the problem OUR school is different in many ways because of the connection to the old south as you say. IMO this makes us special because it itself is a case study on progression, but does this progression have to come by forsaking all that is Ole Miss. To me I feel the University is more than that and shows how people today can honor those like the University Greys and Southern Heritage yet strive to make things better for today. We are a bridge from the past into the future. So why should we get rid of something like Dixie, to us this truly embodies our attitude of life and love for the place we call home. I wish I was in the Land of Cotton is a line I always think of we I'm very far away from home. NO NOT BECAUSE I WISH I HAD SLAVES AND ALL THAT bullshite, but because I miss the fall days of being in Oxford and the slight rolling hills of Lafayette County, the flatlands of the delta, beautiful blondes of Ole Miss, the drunken debauchery of the square, in all I miss my real home, my university, my family, Rebelnation!

Okay here's the thing OUR University is complex it's not just black & white, there are grey areas and it this case this is a grey area to me. Should we forsake Dixie for what you deem progress, IMO if we do we might as well tear down the memorial, change our name and colors. Or instead, we can find true progress and find a way to coexist in the world where we don't have to sacrifice everything we hold dear for another. This university had ties to the Civil War and yes that war had so much wrong in so many ways but it is OUR history and its is apart of us, if you can see why it would be a shame to separate Ole Miss from some parts of its past and act like it never happen then I really don't know what to say to you.

I am all for progression, understanding and equality but somewhere I/we have to draw a line. I/we never did anything for the ridicule and criticism we receive as a whole for the actions of the past, should I as a white male become a slave to make up for the things my ancestors, that have ABSOLUTELY NOTHING TO DO WITH ME, did. Because in away I feel its one of these things that if you don't agree with what I want you are a RACIST and that's just NOT TRUE.

I know I have been on a rant but I hope you might understand what I am trying to convey. It's my hope that OUR university can bring people to understand these things without their negative connotations by bringing them into the light and showing what they truly mean to the people of the south.

It's my wish that we can make TSWRA a new meaning and that meaning be that we will move past all the negative connotations that are associated with us and we will move the ignorance and bigotry into a new golden age for Southern Peoples, not where we rebel but where we are no longer looked down upon but instead looked up at and it is my belief that Ole Miss and many southern universities can bring us to this point is we can find a way to not only embrace our past but our future together as well.

/rant

This post was edited on 4/24/13 at 9:39 am