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It wasn't particularly hard to keep poor Whites and poor Blacks from banding together. There were already tensions going around. There were some fears that a slave rebellion could happen (nevermind the fact that slave rebellions had taken place in the USA before). When the way of life has been based on slavery and a racial hierarchy, this made it very easy to get people to fight for a cause they shouldn't fight for. The idea was to strive for prestige. Owning slaves meant being better than another race. It meant being somewhat wealthy. It wasn't just an economic way of life. It was a social hierarchy of the South.
I remember a quote from the movie Mississippi Burning. Detective Thornton talked about his life and mentioned that his father told him this quote "If you're not better than an 'n word' then who are you better than"? Thornton would go on to say that his father was a man so full of hate that he didn't realize that being poor was the thing killing him.
There is more. When the whole idea is to keep from being at the bottom, the message from some politicians consists of "those people are your inferiors" or "those people are going to cause a problem for you". Now, this kind of message isn't going to be overt, or in those words. Rather, some politicians will just use dog whistle language. Today, you don't need much to keep people apart. Just give the other party something to lose and that does its job.
The southern way of life was set up alot like the plantation way of life in the Caribbean. There was a strong hierarchy and there were those committed to protecting it. If you could keep convincing people that they should strive for it, keeping people from banding together is easy. This is why many poor Whites were made overseers.
For the youngsters out there who missed the whole 70s thing, here's Lynyrd Skynyrd performing for an audience of over 100,000 in the UK in the summer of 1976.
I could never understand their Sweet Home Alabama when they were from Jacksonville, Florida. Lived in Florida for a time, and I know Northern Florida is more Southern than South Florida, but still......
Back then I had a boyfriend who worked as their, and the Allman Brothers, Roadie. Still, I did not get it, although from a musical standpoint as a Northerner, I still loved their MUSIC, lyrics aside. ROCK ON!
For the youngsters out there who missed the whole 70s thing, here's Lynyrd Skynyrd performing for an audience of over 100,000 in the UK in the summer of 1976.
Lynyrd skynyrd, one of my favorite groups in my youth. I last heard them play live in manhattan, sponsored by heart radio, with Ronnie's brother as lead singer......brought back lots of youthful memories. great music, great songs.
Nope. LS got their start in the 70s. It wa another 40 years before leftists rewrote history and declared the rebel flag to be wacist. Back then-it was a sign of rebelliousness, not racism. Hell, kids in my high school in New York State had them on their cars-and shirts.
Sorry but I was a teen in the early 70s and everyone I knew at the time understood the confederate flag to be racist. Yeah, a lot of folks who liked to think of themselves as “rebels” had one in the back of their pick up truck but we all understood it to be racist. Of course folks were also more willing to openly admit to being racist in the 70s. That was a time before most democrats and republicans viewed each other as the enemy but more folks thought it acceptable to be openly racist and homophobic.
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