Dead Confederates, A Civil War Era Blog

As many of you know, Corey Meyer took down his blog, The Blood of My Kindred, last week after an incident in which a Confederate flag and a sack of coal, directed at him, were left near his place of work. Kevin Levin sees this as an act of intimidation, and I do, as well. Although several of us have been the targets of threats, violent rhetoric or efforts to make trouble at our jobs, Corey has been a particular favorite of folks employing such tactics; in the last few moths he’s been the target of both a Facebook group and an online petition set up explicitly to cause problems for him at work.

One of the first folks to respond to Corey’s announcement was Dave Tatum, who immediately adopted a “no true Scotsman” refutation, saying that “who ever pulled the stunt with the flag and coal ‘Does Not’ represent The Southern Heritage Community!” I’m not sure why Dave is so certain of this, given that fairly prominent online defenders of Southron Honour™ have repeatedly engaged in threats and endorsements of violence directed against bloggers they dislike. Perhaps Dave has a short memory, and forgot this gem from Carl Roden, posing as a young woman named “Amanda”:

It goes on like that for another 1,650 words.

Or this, just over a year ago, from Josephine Bass:

Bass thinks it’s my “due” to be shot in the face. And she posted that comment about “gone to your kids school and shot up the place” four days after a gunman slaughtered 20 six- and seven-year-olds at an elementary school in Connecticut. Neither Roden nor Bass have suffered any repercussions from Tatum’s revered “Southern Heritage Community” for this sort of foul behavior. There are other examples, but these will suffice.

There’s no reason whatever to doubt that the sort of person who would write something like this — or condone it — would hesitate leaving an anonymous “message” directed at Corey of the type he describes, if that person thought he could get away with it. Furthermore, I’m quite certain that if the person or persons behind this flag business at Corey’s school are found, they will will suffer no repercussions or sincere denunciations from the “Southern Heritage Community.” Because the reality is, they’re just fine with this sort thing, so long as it’s directed at someone they dislike.

The reverse is not true, of course; when I carelessly suggested that the SCV should “stomp” Clint Lacy, who was at the time in the habit of doing lots of really ugly race-baiting on a blog he advertised as being “your voice in the Sons of Confederate Veterans,” Lacy immediately shrieked that I was calling “for a non-for-profit fraternal organization to bring violence to my doorstep.” It was a stupid and careless thing for me to write, but I doubt that anyone — least of all Clint “No Apologies” Lacy himself — believed that was genuinely intended as incitement to physical violence. Nonetheless, I publicly retracted what I’d written and learned a lesson: be careful what you say and do, because it will always be turned back on you if it can be.

Yet, in the meantime, the True Defenders of Southron Honour™ continue to toss violent rhetoric like so much confetti. The day after Corey’s announcement, a foolish young man from Tennessee announced publicly his homicidal intentions to “wipe the yankee scum from the face of the earth.” Fantasy? Undoubtedly, but it’s completely typical of the mindset. It’s just who they are, and they have no compunction about it. The need to fantasize about killing “yankees,” to threaten, to intimidate, to skulk around and try and make trouble for people they dislike, is all part of the same toxic mixture of bile and resentment. It is a mark of their frustration at their own impotence to carry out their agenda through conventional and honorable means, on a level playing field. They seek to silence those they disagree with, by intimidation or threats of violence, if need be. Skulking around an empty school ground over the holiday break to leave an anonymous “message” for someone they dislike? It’s as predictable as it is shameful.

Know them. It’s who they are.

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