BY PHIL MCCAUSLAND
pjmccaus@go.olemiss.edu
My friend told me that his girlfriend tried to renew her driver’s license yesterday but couldn’t because the DMV was closed for a holiday. I asked what holiday, and he explained that the state of Mississippi was celebrating Confederate Memorial Day.
Really guys?
Is the state of Mississippi trying to be a target? Celebrating this holiday, as well as allowing people to decide whether they would rather celebrate Robert E. Lee Day or Martin Luther King Jr. Day, is like Mississippi putting a huge “kick me” sign on it’s own back.
I moved here from Pennsylvania, so you may call me a carpetbagger or whathaveyou, but I have a very real love for this state. It has afforded me a greater feeling of home than anywhere else, and it really hurts me when I see another thing that feeds into the stereotype of Mississippi that the world has created.
Yeah, I said world.
It’s another reason for people to dismiss this rich state as just a geographic region filled with backcountry folks that don’t know anything worth considering, which is untrue.
This is a very culturally rich area and deserves much more attention than it receives. I know people that are afraid to visit Mississippi because of the outside perception of this state. That boggles my mind because their fear is based on a very different Mississippi than the one I know.
I’m not saying it’s right, but I am saying that there are things that can be done to help stop this perception of Mississippi from continuing.
The first thing that would help is to get rid of holidays like this or, at the very least, not close the DMV or schools for it.
I know how important tradition is to the South. I know how important history is to the South. But some of the traditions and history that are celebrated here do not allow this state to achieve any sort of progress. It is as if we are, at times, allowing or even electing to let our traditions paralyze us. Colonel Reb, Dixie, the heavy presence of the Confederate flag and these holidays are all examples of this.
It’s not wrong to have traditions, but we cannot allow them to consume Mississippi’s identity and exclude entire groups of people.
The kind of reactions I saw to the removal of the Colonel Reb title and the mere proposal that we think about removing Dixie from being played at games often bordered the line of offensive and did cross the line more than once.
All that I am proposing to you is that we think about these traditions and discuss what they are adding to the atmosphere of this state and its flagship school.
If we continue to think of it as all or nothing, then we will continue to be nothing more than the aforementioned stereotype.
I just want others to feel the same love and joy that I, a white middle-class male, have felt since I’ve lived here. I think we can offer that same feeling to everybody.
Phil McCausland is an English senior from Carlisle, Pa.
