Althouse: "The Ugly Side of the Southern Belle."

January 16, 2013

"The Ugly Side of the Southern Belle."

An op-ed in the NYT on the occasion of... can you even think what?

122 comments:

Henry said...: Not Mr. Zamboni, I'm guessing. You've already covered that one.; 1/16/13, 9:18 PM
XRay said...: What a crock of shit article. Perfect though, for the Times, and its readers.; 1/16/13, 9:19 PM
SteveR said...: Still, we would do well to remember the troubling historical links between Southern beauty queens and racial politics

Oh good grief!; 1/16/13, 9:21 PM
Unknown said...: Thought it was interesting that the NYT offered to give me free email updates on the topics of "Blacks"...; 1/16/13, 9:26 PM
rcocean said...: I wish the writer could provide more about this "Conspiracy" among Southern Beauty queens to "cover up" for Segregation in the 1950s/1960s. It would imply that before then the Southern Belles wasn't really trying to win.

Funny how the NYT editors think. 2013 beauty queen born in south = Former southern beauty queens = civil rights = segregation.; 1/16/13, 9:29 PM
rcocean said...: Basically, if you're a lazy NYT writer and can't think of anything interesting to say throw in something about: Racism, Sexism, Gays, Segregation, Civil Rights, Jews or Nazis.

The editor will always give it a pass.; 1/16/13, 9:33 PM
Unknown said...: Mark Steyn had a phrase for stuff like the NYT article: "near-parodic thumbsucking pomposity".; 1/16/13, 9:34 PM
Dear corrupt left, go F yourselves said...: It ends with a "Still, we would do well to remember the troubling historical links between Southern beauty queens and racial politics, even when the winner lives in Brooklyn.

Thanks for the finger wagging. It's not tired or anything.; 1/16/13, 9:39 PM
McTriumph said...: Blaine Roberts is what passes in the 21st century as an intellectual or at least a qualified women's studies professor. She's also a fucking moron.; 1/16/13, 9:40 PM
Mary Beth said...: Brooklyn is the "epicenter of all things ironic and progressive"? Is that a good thing?; 1/16/13, 9:42 PM
YoungHegelian said...: Why don't Southern girls participate in group sex?

Because it is so tiresome to have to write all those thank you notes!

(best said in one's best Southern Sub Deb imitation accent); 1/16/13, 9:43 PM
McTriumph said...: If all these Southern Belles mentioned in the NYT piece were addicted to pussy they'd be celebrated.; 1/16/13, 9:43 PM
edutcher said...: The Gray Lady needs Prozac or something piped into its water coolers.; 1/16/13, 9:44 PM
YoungHegelian said...: You know, you read the Times and you would never, ever, know that when MLK tried to bring his push to end racism in all its forms from the South to Chicago, his experience with Chicagoans was so nasty that he said that "The people of Chicago could teach the good people of Mississippi how to hate."

And you remember those anti-bussing riots in Boston in the late 70's through 80's? Well, don't feel bad if you don't, because, even though it happened in a city just a couple of hours away from NYC, neither does the fucking NYT.!; 1/16/13, 9:49 PM
MadisonMan said...: Idol was in NYC tonight. I was not very good at predicting who would get through.; 1/16/13, 9:49 PM
Shouting Thomas said...: Pretty vile shit.

When you combine it with the Oil Production Oppresses Women bit earlier in the day, it's quite a combination.; 1/16/13, 9:57 PM
chickelit said...: The author, Blain Roberts, strikes me as a cross between bland and plain.; 1/16/13, 9:58 PM
chickelit said...: Why is the NYT suddenly ramping up the South-bashing?; 1/16/13, 10:01 PM
traditionalguy said...: The drums of war between the north and the south are being beaten loudly by Obama's paper of record; apparently for no reason except pumping up the old narrative the north loves to swallow about the good blacks and the bad whites down in the south.

The 10% black populations in southern states won what they marched for easily because MLK easily shamed the good whites into supporting desegregation. The KKK was run out of town and disgraced everywhere. Atlanta had the education for black men and many educated good whites to do the right thing

After WWII segregation made no sense to anyone any more. All MLK had to do was march and protest a few times and it crumbled.

Their has been integration for 50 years now. Interracial marriage is now normal. There is no fear of whites by blacks nor by blacks of whites anymore.

I believe that is what the NYT is angry about today. So the NYT just says let's pretend its 50 years ago and re-fight the war.; 1/16/13, 10:01 PM
Phil 314 said...: Reminds of a conversation with an old friend of mine. When discussing NPR ( we're both right of center but regular listeners). We hit on the topic of the periodic piece on something 60`s civil rights related, usually an anniversary of _______ (fill in the blank). We agreed that such stories are the "old time religion" of the typical NPR listener.; 1/16/13, 10:01 PM
Michael said...: Well, bless her heart, Blain is an assistant professor in Fresno, Ca.; 1/16/13, 10:04 PM
Freeman Hunt said...: The NYT is just jealous that Mississippi's population has a much higher percentage of black people than NYC.; 1/16/13, 10:09 PM
Shouting Thomas said...: Speaking of southern belle beauty queens... Remember Katherine Webb? She's the girlfriend of the Alabama QB who Brent Musberger ogled during the national championship game.

Sports writers across America rose up in indignation at the dirty old man who dared to compliment a pretty girl.

Surprisingly, Webb's life has not been destroyed by her struggle with sexism.; 1/16/13, 10:10 PM
kentuckyliz said...: If you can't stand the heat, get out from under the stage lights.; 1/16/13, 10:14 PM
Freeman Hunt said...: I bet it annoys this woman that most black people live in the South.; 1/16/13, 10:14 PM
Astro said...: Such fucking hypocrisy.
There was a hell of a lot of racism in the North, too. Race riots in Harlem, in Detroit, in Boston, out West in LA (Remember Watts?) - all of the major cities had their own brand of racial troubles due to prejudice and segration. What about the black entertainers who had trouble getting jobs performing in NY night clubs, or couldn't sleep in the same hotels as the whites in their bands? I grew up in Ohio in the 60s and every large town had a 'black' elementary and a 'black' high school, and no one thought twice about it.; 1/16/13, 10:16 PM
Guildofcannonballs said...: Those prone toward bitch-boyedness do entertain.

You do do that.

Heh.

Do do, that, is what you and I are known for proscribing.

Hench I if not hence.; 1/16/13, 10:20 PM
Shouting Thomas said...: Brooklyn is the "epicenter of all things ironic and progressive"? Is that a good thing?

It's a lie.

Two or three neighborhoods in Brooklyn fit that description. The rest of Brooklyn is composed of hard core ethnic neighborhoods, each surrounded by a DMZ. Each ethnic group patrols its own neighborhood and guards it from intrusion by every other ethnic group. Wander into the DMZ and you're likely to get a very stern warning, and you'd be well advised to take heed.

Black violence is the source of constant, nagging fear in Brooklyn, particularly in the Jewish communities. I suggest that you be very careful, if you are white, about entering some black neighborhoods in Brooklyn, even at high noon.; 1/16/13, 10:23 PM
Gene said...: Still, we would do well to remember the troubling historical links between Southern beauty queens and racial politics

Still we would do well to remember the troubling historical links between inner city youths raised on welfare without fathers and the rape of college girls on nearby campuses.; 1/16/13, 10:25 PM
Shouting Thomas said...: The gentrified, hipster neighborhoods of Brooklyn are comprised entirely of Williamsburg, Ft. Greene Park and Park Slope.

These neighborhoods are quite small, and comprise a tiny part of the borough.

The hipsters do not venture out of these neighborhoods if they have any sense.; 1/16/13, 10:26 PM
Unknown said...: Ah, the weird places you can go when you start with a nonsensical premise.; 1/16/13, 10:32 PM
rcocean said...: Wow, people love to discuss who loves black folks more, the North or the South.

Guess the NYT really does have it pulse on America.

And here I thought they were out of touch.; 1/16/13, 10:34 PM
Anonymous said...: Face it, New Yorkers are the most parochial and bigoted contemporary Americans. It's hard to understand why citizens of what was once considered one of the greatest international cities now feel compelled to act out with short-man syndrome.; 1/16/13, 10:40 PM
Shouting Thomas said...: Race riots in Harlem, in Detroit, in Boston, out West in LA (Remember Watts?)...

You might want to add Newark to the list.

Those race riots, if they were intended to redress the grievances of "prejudice and segregation," fell rather wide of the mark.

Each of the communities where blacks conducted those riots were their homes. I'm not so familiar with the other locals, but Newark and Detroit have never recovered from the violence and destruction of property... and it's black who have paid the price.

Blacks burned their own neighborhoods.; 1/16/13, 10:46 PM
James said...: Still, we would do well to remember the troubling historical links between Southern beauty queens and racial politics

No racial politics in New York City? Really? Wasn't NYC the most racially divided place in the US through the 70s?; 1/16/13, 10:49 PM
CWJ said...: "...I am the daughter of the 1961 Soil Conservation Queen of Marion and Cass Counties, Tex.".

Sorry folks,

All the racial aspects are just academic window dressing and NYT boilerplate to make the piece editorially publishable. I suspect Ms. Roberts is still working through her Mommy issues.; 1/16/13, 10:57 PM
William said...: Could it possibly be that among those girls willing to compete in beauty pageants southern girls were the prettiest.....In the north, pretty girls of means would consider the competition demeaning, but southern debs might have considered it fun. Grace Kelly had her eyes on other prizes, but Ms. Mobley thought a sash and a tiara were sufficiently royal. In this sense, one can say that Ms. Mobley was more democcratic than Princess Grace and a harbringer of the civil rights movement. .; 1/16/13, 10:59 PM
Nathan Alexander said...: 1) See, the south didn't send enough electoral votes for President Obama.

So they must be racist.

2) Any topic is okay that gives the "news" industry and excuse to not talk about the utter failure of liberal/Democrat economics.

3) Since Democrats really don't have policies that a majority of US citizens support, they must stir up race/sex/class/orientation resentment to the point that these people become single issue voters for the Democrat Nanny State.

Expect to see much, much more of this over the next 4 years.

Liberals,
Expect to see one hell of a back lash when your control of the Overton Window collapses under the weight the ridiculousness of your preferred echo chamber narrative.; 1/16/13, 11:01 PM
As my whimsy leads me.. said...: Lyda Lewis, a black woman from my hometown, was selected Miss Kentucky in 1973. She was born while Jim Crow laws were still in effect, and went to school in the early years of desegration.

...

Interesting that the author did not elaborate on why Vanessa Williams was stripped (poor choice of word) of her crown in 1983. Unfortunately, a co-worker stuck the reason under my nose one day.

Toy; 1/16/13, 11:06 PM
Revenant said...: Still, we would do well to remember the troubling historical links between Southern beauty queens and racial politics, even when the winner lives in Brooklyn.

Our black President is too young to remember when racism was a problem in the Miss America pageant.

It just might, maybe, be time to move on. :); 1/16/13, 11:08 PM
Marcopohlo said...: Never met a white man more in need of a ...; 1/16/13, 11:09 PM
Marcopohlo said...: Never met a white man more in need of a ...; 1/16/13, 11:09 PM
chickelit said...: Why would anyone break a Southern butterfly on the wheels of Northern grievance politics?; 1/16/13, 11:10 PM
Shouting Thomas said...: I won't draw any conclusions from what I'm about to say, because it is impossible...

The civil rights movement of the 1960s played out entirely under the direction of the New York City based media, led by the NYT and the three major TV networks. That media hated and reviled the South back in the 60s, just as it does now.

An alternative media, like the internet, did not exist.

So the point of the view of the South was simply never voiced and never allowed to be heard.

The story has, as those progressives so often like to say, only been told from the side of the victors. There is another side that has never been told, and probably never will be told.; 1/16/13, 11:11 PM
Bob said...: John Derbyshire wrote an article in Taki's Magazine on sectionalism that is germane.; 1/16/13, 11:11 PM
Rabel said...: Blain is trying to sell a book.

The most offensive part of the article to this Southerner is that Blain put Baltimore in the South. I know that it's below the Mason-Dixon Line but, really, haven't we been punished enough?

And if all of you females could be just like Mary Ann Mobley, the world would be a wonderful place.; 1/16/13, 11:15 PM
Rabel said...: Or Faith Hill. That would work too.; 1/16/13, 11:20 PM
Anonymous said...: Blain Roberts teaches at the same school as Victor Davis Hanson. Maybe he could explain to her that correlation is not causation.; 1/16/13, 11:27 PM
Quaestor said...: When the United States fractures, as it must do when Obama tries to buoy up failed blue state economies (bankrupt CA, bankrupt IL, near-bankrupt NY, et alia) at the expense of the better managed economies among the red states, will blacks migrate North or South?; 1/16/13, 11:27 PM
As my whimsy leads me.. said...: I'm not so sure about that, Shouting Thomas. Even though there was no internet, local newspapers were much more important than they are now. In my very small hometown, there were two dailies.

I think some of the animosity increased with the purge of Southern and rural TV shows, such as Petticoat Junction and Green Acres. In shows such as Andy Griffith and The Beverly HIllbillies, the characters were still portrayed with respect, and the snooty city people were made fun of as much or more than the country people. In addition, there were southerners, such as Billy Graham, who were respected all over the country.

I ponder on this from time to time. I haven't figured it all out. No doubt some of the national media contributed to the attitudes, as you say, but there's more to it.

Toy; 1/16/13, 11:27 PM
David R. Graham said...: "Why is the NYT suddenly ramping up the South-bashing?"

Rush did an hour and more on this Monday. It's a left agenda item, he said, Lincoln didn't get the job one of extirpating the USA South, now finish it/them. Meaning, finish life by internal necessity, to use Kandinsky's phrase. "The South" is the USA reservoir of that danger, in left-tyranny view. Rush was expansive and right on this, quoting several articles to support the observation. This article is another validation of his point.

All just misdirection - along with "gun control" - to divert attention from rampant, victorious Afro/Mohammedan Imperialism inside and outside USA.; 1/16/13, 11:31 PM
chickelit said...: Well fuck the Obama concept of the South forthwith...bring on Duane Allman.; 1/16/13, 11:36 PM
coketown said...: My guess was the fortieth anniversary of the release of Mr. Waylon Jennings's "Honky Tonk Heroes," but I see I gave the author of the op-ed too much credit. The truth was even dumber and more inconsequential.; 1/16/13, 11:37 PM
rcocean said...: Progressives have controlled the media for a long time and the image of South presented depended on how 'useful' the South was to the Left.

During the New Deal and WWII, the "solid South" was essential to electing FDR and advancing progressive politics. Look at old Hollywood movies and its very pro-Southern. GWTW, Jeb Stuart as a 'hero',etc. The image was mixed in the 50s and early 60s but got very negative with the rise of George Wallace.

And once the South started going Solid Republican with Reagan its image got worse and worse.; 1/16/13, 11:40 PM
Methadras said...: So the op-ed is about how democrats are racists while Miss America is a carpet bagger?; 1/16/13, 11:40 PM
mrkwong said...: Quaestor - that question already has a pretty solid hypothesis, with (unlike, say, 'climate change') real observational data behind it.

After all, the Democrats have been performing that experiment on the city of Detroit for most of the past thirty years, so you really just need to evaluate where its population went.; 1/16/13, 11:44 PM
chickelit said...: This comment has been removed by the author.; 1/16/13, 11:54 PM
chickelit said...: Here is the ugly side of the South that the NYT doesn't want you to see: link; 1/16/13, 11:57 PM
Tim said...: People usually masturbate behind closed doors, don't they?

So why does the NY Times see fit to publish this liberal masturbatory fantasy?

To ask the question is to answer it.; 1/16/13, 11:59 PM
Xmas said...: Yes, I remember this iconic image from the end of school segregation. It says all you need to know about the South...

http://www.boston.com/bostonglobe/editorial_opinion/oped/articles/2009/01/31/its_time_to_end_busing_in_boston/

...Boston.; 1/17/13, 12:18 AM
Biff said...: Since the column was written by a history professor who seems focused on race, I imagined what the final paragraph of her article might have looked like had she chosen gun control to be the subject of her racial rumination. (There have been numerous gun control initiatives dating back at least to the Reconstruction aimed at limiting ownership of firearms by non-whites.)

Perhaps Professor Roberts' closing paragraph might have looked like this:

"Of course, the racial overtones of gun control, so obvious at the time, have faded. Barack Obama, an African-American from Hawaii, was re-elected as President in 2012...Still, we would do well to remember the troubling historical links between gun control initiatives and racial politics, even when it is an African-American President who proposes sweeping new gun control laws and regulations."; 1/17/13, 12:27 AM
がんこもん said...: Good lord. This woman is a tenured history professor? What a sad come-down for my alma mater. When I was matriculating at Fresno State, we had Victor Davis Hanson (yes, THAT Victor Davis Hanson - I actually took courses from him) teaching Classics, and on the main History faculty, we had Warren Gade (military history), John Kendall (British empire), David Jones (Russia/USSR), Sidney Chang (Asia) and several other formidable intellects.

Needless to say, based on this mindless pap, the current faculty is not worthy to carry their predecessors' books. *sigh* One more reason why I would not recommend anyone to study History at a US university. You're better off studying on your own - you'll learn a lot more.; 1/17/13, 12:37 AM
がんこもん said...: myiq2xu said...
Blain Roberts teaches at the same school as Victor Davis Hanson. Maybe he could explain to her that correlation is not causation.

1/16/13, 11:27 PM

I wish Professor Hanson still taught there (the students might receive an antidote to the garbage that 'teachers' like Roberts are spewing). But I regret to say that he retired to focus full-time on his other interests several years ago.; 1/17/13, 12:43 AM
kimsch said...: After Vanessa Williams won the Miss America title (and even though it was later taken from her because of some racy pics) the Miss Black America pageant quietly went away. Did anyone notice?; 1/17/13, 12:54 AM
Anonymous said...: It ends with a "Still, we would do well to remember the troubling historical links between Southern beauty queens and racial politics, even when the winner lives in Brooklyn.

...And has been in a sexual relationship with her BLACK boyfriend for a year and a half.

I didn't/won't read the article but did the White female author mention that?

How is that not some kind of progress in the world of the Good White People like Ms Roberts?

When they get married and have lots of black children will that be salvation enough?; 1/17/13, 1:04 AM
ampersand said...: Emmett Till wasn't done in by a lynch mob. He was murdered by the husband of a woman who claimed till laid hands on her. David Halberstam covered this well in one of his books.; 1/17/13, 1:29 AM
Anonymous said...: Interesting that the author got her masters and PHD from University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill.

Same school Eve Carson attended. Eve was pretty, blond and White. A true Southern Belle. don't know if she participated in any ugly beauty pageants but I do know she was disqualified from graduating from college due to the "Ugly Side of Southern Culture".

There was an unfortunate "racial incident" that interfered with her graduation.; 1/17/13, 1:33 AM
Lyle said...: What a bigoted article.; 1/17/13, 1:33 AM
JAL said...: will blacks migrate North or South?

As above (drkwong) already settled.

And living in the South (as a Yankee, sigh) I see regularly more black & white couples -- usually with kids -- than I think you could find in Ms. Blain's tolerant neck of the woods.

Wal-Mart shoppers and Wendy's diners, the quintessential rednecks, could give a hoot.

(But don't corrupt the narrative.)

More and more it reminds me of The Hunger Games.; 1/17/13, 2:14 AM
Chip Ahoy said...: A friend relates this true story he heard about southern belles. The modern kind, not the antebellum type. They're sitting around having tea and toasted crumpet cakes and their conversation drifted to their husbands. The first southern belle said,

"Mah husband is so sweet he bought me this dahmund bracelet fo-ah ow-wah anniversary."

"Oooooh Aaaaah said the other ladies."

Here my friend pretends to lift the edges of his skirt as if to billow it and allow it to drop back into place. He says that Annabelle says,

"Well maaaaaaah goodness, Isn't that nice."

Declarative not interrogative.

So the second southern belle was reminded how wonderful and generous her own husband is.

"Well, to my surprise, mah husband, David, bought me that Mercedes Benz over there for ow-wah anniversary."

"Oooooh Aaaaah wentthe other ladies all at once."

Annabelle lifts the edges of her skirt as if to billow, allows it to drop back into place, says,

"Well maaaaaaah goodness, Isn't that nice."

Without a break the third southern belle spoke up. For ow-wah anniversary my husband took me to Maui for two weeks.

"Oooooh Aaaaah said the other ladies."

Annabelle lifts the edges of her skirt, billows, drops back into place, says,

"Well maaaaaaah goodness, Isn't that nice."

And that was that.

But tell us Annabelle, what did your husband get you? They all wanted to know. So annabelle answered.

"Boris sent me to finishing school. No. Yes. He sure did."

They all laughed and giggled, now that was funny. That Annabelle, always coming up with the zingers. They never knew what to expect. One of ladies goes,

"So, Annabelle, for goodness sake whatever did you learn there?"

And they all cracked up.

When the laughter abated Annabelle said,

"Whereas I used to say very crude things like FINE! FUCK YOU then I have replaced those coarse sayings with *fluffs dress* Well maaaaaaah goodness, Isn't that nice."; 1/17/13, 3:04 AM
AlanKH said...: I hope Blaine Roberts will remember
A Southern belle don't need her around, anyhow; 1/17/13, 4:38 AM
test said...: More evidence progressive education consists of discovering new methods of calling your opponents racist.; 1/17/13, 5:58 AM
TANSTAAFL said...: "These were, of course, the years when black Southerners opened a full-scale campaign against Jim Crow, prompting a bitter backlash by white Democrats."

TFTFY; 1/17/13, 6:14 AM
ErnieG said...: So I went to the link and read the article. My reaction? "Well maaaaaaah goodness, Isn't that nice."; 1/17/13, 6:28 AM
Anonymous said...: Ah the glory days of the civil rights movement.

When you're feeling tired and old and passed-by and played out, it's nice to reach in your pocket and finger that old championship ring to remind yourself of how good you really once were.; 1/17/13, 7:13 AM
SDN said...: "The Gray Lady needs Prozac or something piped into its water coolers."

Edutcher, they can't do that; it would dilute the LSD!; 1/17/13, 7:13 AM
Anonymous said...: You can even vicariously relive those days by remembering how it probably was, even though you weren't even born back then.

But your professors tought you how to transport yourself to share in the glory.; 1/17/13, 7:17 AM
Anonymous said...: The author is a professor at Fresno State. I'm seeing a TRO (Tuition Reduction Opportunity); 1/17/13, 7:26 AM
Larry J said...: ErnieG said...
So I went to the link and read the article. My reaction? "Well maaaaaaah goodness, Isn't that nice."

I read the article, looked at the author's name and said, "Well, bless her heart."

If you know anything about the South, you know what that means.; 1/17/13, 7:34 AM
gerry said...: Well, that was six mimutes wasted I'll never get back.

Wait - I think I think it feels good to remember the horrible things my Germanic ancestors did to the Romans every time the Romans crossed the Rhine.

Yes- yes- ooooo.

Now I feel better and superior and all.; 1/17/13, 7:35 AM
Anonymous said...: HORSESHIT.; 1/17/13, 7:43 AM
Tank said...: What would it be like to have a "conversation" (the answer to everything) with this author about race relations today?

Hmmm.

Beer summit? No.

Beer is not strong enough.; 1/17/13, 7:49 AM
ErnieG said...: If you go to the article and click on the link to her bio, you will learn that the NYT piece is not a one-shot deal. She has made a career of writing stuff like that, as well as teaching it. Teaching a student to think like that is like teaching a kid to walk funny.; 1/17/13, 7:55 AM
Hammond X. Gritzkofe said...: Sheesh! The entire article is rife with prejudice. (Prejudice = pre-judgement.)

Writer Blain Roberts again and again divides and categorizes people, assigning attitudes and beliefs to the groupings he creates. No respect for the individual.

Everyone must be judged by the group they were born into by accident of dermal hue or geography.

Filter out that, and there's nothing left in the entire article.

But then it an article about the Miss America contest - same genre as sportswriting.; 1/17/13, 7:57 AM
ESM said...: "It is impossible to overstate the effect of the positive press both Miss Americas from Mississippi, Mary Ann Mobley and Lynda Mead, garnered for their state." (emphasis added)

Yet, the author manages to do the impossible...

Surely the author at some time in her life had a teacher who warned that it's impossible to overstate the importance of refraining from such rhetorical excess?; 1/17/13, 7:57 AM
Eric the Fruit Bat said...: National Lampoon had a bit entitled "An Apology to Our Black Readers."

It had no words. It was a series of maybe six photographs taken from the perspective of a black man aiming a handgun at a white Southern Belle, disrobing in anticipation of being raped.; 1/17/13, 8:13 AM
test said...: Quayle said...
You can even vicariously relive those days by remembering how it probably was, even though you weren't even born back then.

But your professors tought you how to transport yourself to share in the glory.

This is like a great grandparent telling the younguns about the Football Championship his high school won 60 years ago.

"What position did you play Great-Grandpa?"

"Third trumpet."; 1/17/13, 8:16 AM
peacelovewoodstock said...: So this birdbrain Blain uses Baltimore to illustrate his theory of Southern racism. 'nuff said.; 1/17/13, 8:23 AM
a psychiatrist who learned from veterans said...: ""The Ugly Side of the Southern Belle.""

NYT, give it a break.; 1/17/13, 8:39 AM
ndspinelli said...: Freeman Hunt makes a good point. There is a good book "The Warmth of Other Suns." It covers several black people after WW2 migrating north and west away from the Jim Crow south. However, although the book is fairly recent, it is way late. Because, the children and grandchildren of these folks who migrated to the "Promised Land" in the 40's and 50's are now migrating south.; 1/17/13, 8:40 AM
Fernandinande said...: Some NTY twit is biased against southerners. Details at 11.; 1/17/13, 8:42 AM
marvel said...: I'm surprised anyone at the NYT would admit the possibility that Southern Belles would have anything OTHER than an "ugly" side.; 1/17/13, 8:48 AM
RebeccaH said...: Still, we would do well to remember the troubling historical links between Southern beauty queens and racial politics, even when the winner lives in Brooklyn.

Why? What possible reason could there be, beyond perpetuating the divisiveness that is the hallmark of "progressive" liberal politics?; 1/17/13, 8:52 AM
Sam L. said...: So it was a raaaaaacist conspiracy, national in scope, to elect southerners as beauty queens? Written by "Blain Roberts, an assistant professor of history at California State University, Fresno, is the author of the forthcoming book “Pretty Women: Female Beauty in the Jim Crow and Civil Rights South.” "

Disinterested observer? Seems not so.; 1/17/13, 8:56 AM
Anonymous said...: It's time someone investigates the link between barbecue and racism.; 1/17/13, 9:00 AM
ricpic said...: Turns out all those retrograde whites who tried to hold off school integration were right about the dangers to white children, boys and girls, since it has become something of a right of passage for white children to be put upon by black children and beaten, sometimes to the point of broken bones. Of course it's ugly, extremely ugly to acknowledge that FACT, nevertheless it is a fact, beautiful Althousians.; 1/17/13, 9:00 AM
Tari said...: What a waste of oxygen! Women like Ms. Roberts are one of the reasons why my children will not have anything to do with "liberal arts" curriculum in college. Finance, engineering, science, or nothing: you read the Iliad on your own, boys.

Oh, and they do: the 7th grader is on his 3rd or 4th read through it, thankyouverymuch.; 1/17/13, 9:15 AM
furious_a said...: Still, we would do well to remember the troubling historical links between Southern beauty queens and racial politics...

Other than a rough contemporaneous-ness between beauty pageants and Jim Crow, what link, much less "...troubling historical..." ones, does the Asst. Professoress demonstrate?; 1/17/13, 9:15 AM
carrie said...: You can always make something out of nothing if your audience is willing to believe whatever you say.; 1/17/13, 9:15 AM
DADvocate said...: Like any good paranoid schizophrenic, you can make a connection between any two things if you try hard enough.

One of those Southern Belle Miss Americas, Heather Renee French, comes from my neck of the wooods. I was attending the same church as she when she won.

Her father is a handicapped Vietnam vet. Heather has worked tirelessly, despite now having MS herself, to help Vietnam vets. She's an intelligent, caring person. She also once gave my son a kiss on the cheek so he could always say that he had been kissed by Miss America.

The biggest local beuaty contest is the Miss Germantown Fair pagent. The winner qualifies to be in the Miss Kentucky pagent. The inside joke locally is that the best Heather ever did in the Germantown Fair pagent was third place.

The year she won Miss America, she had to enter another pagent, Miss Louisville I believe, won it and then went on to win Miss America. (A lesson in perseverance.) But, she's good enough for Miss America, but not good enough for Miss Germantown Fair.; 1/17/13, 9:17 AM
Erik said...: Interesting that the author did not elaborate on why Vanessa Williams was stripped (poor choice of word) of her crown in 1983.

A joke after Walter Mondale selected a woman (Geraldine Ferraro) for his running mate against Ronald Reagan and (the elder) George Bush in 1984 was that he should have selected Vanessa Williams instead.

Why?

Because it is a proven fact that she can lick Bush.; 1/17/13, 9:18 AM
Aridog said...: ... Vanessa Williams was stripped (poor choice of word) of her crown in 1983 ...

Which is wrong on all counts. First, she resigned her title, it was not removed from her. Next, it was 1984, not 1983 (that'd be Debra Sue Maffett of California). Finally, The Miss America organization still cites Vanessa Williams as "Miss America 1984." Runner Up Suzette Charles is listed with a footnote as the contestant fulfilling the role after William's resignation.

Pssst: Google, Bing and Wiki r ur friends.; 1/17/13, 9:49 AM
paul a'barge said...: I like to look at photos of the people who write this kind of treacly crap (see: NYTimes), don't you? Well, if so, click here

Ringing all the bells
* university professor
* journalist
* published in the NYTimes
* used to be from the south but got out as soon as possible and now
* likes to write articles making fun of other people to make herself feel better than others.; 1/17/13, 10:11 AM
James Graham said...: Try finding an African-American doorman in upscale Manhattan apartment buildings where many influential liberals and their families live.

Most of those apartments are co-ops meaning the residents (not some management company) make hiring decisions.

We live in the Golden Age of hypocrisy.; 1/17/13, 11:00 AM
Comanche Voter said...: Well one of the Southern belle expressions is that you can say the worst things about someone--so long as you follow up with "Bless her heart".

Blaine Roberts---the author of this piece of trash--is a bigoted, ignorant, pompouse little princess of prevaricatoin---bless her heart.; 1/17/13, 11:04 AM
Known Unknown said...: Racism would never happen in enlightened Brooklyn.; 1/17/13, 11:35 AM
Cinderellastory said...: Blain Roberts, an assistant professor of history at California State University, Fresno, is the author of the forthcoming book “Pretty Women: Female Beauty in the Jim Crow and Civil Rights South.”

Sounds like Mr. Robert's has a best seller just waiting to happen...; 1/17/13, 11:50 AM
Michael K said...: They gave the writer a nice book plug at the end. I doubt it will help. I expect he will sell as many copies as there are Afro-American Studies departments.; 1/17/13, 11:57 AM
Anonymous said...: That's Mz. Roberts to you. She's busy telling HERstory.

I guarantee no matter how progressive, morally relative, or simply far Left the mainstream seems to get under Obama, there will always be a Blain Roberts out there to offer hilariously loony columns like this one.; 1/17/13, 12:03 PM
Portia said...: "Brooklyn is the "epicenter of all things ironic and progressive"? Is that a good thing? "

Must be why the Dodgers left.; 1/17/13, 12:21 PM
Anonymous said...: Folks at the Times and NPR need market and cultural incentives to resist this mainstreaming, because they won't do it otherwise. They're too busy following moral relativism, environmentalism, hippie to hipster trends and their cherished secular humanism to logical conclusions.

"All my European friends are comfortable with Obama"

I just heard that the other day spoken without a trace of irony. Many mainstream liberalish types are going along with the culture under Obama, as such is politics, and with the narrative of racial expiation, they get culture, high-brow book reviews and the latest neuroscience and Gladwellian claptrap.

Toss in Krugman and the circle is closed; 1/17/13, 12:24 PM
Chuck66 said...: Don't forget that 60% of all African-American children in New York City die through abortion. That is 3 deaths for every 2 live Black births.

Mayor Bloomberg loves this so much that he gave $2,000,000 of his own wealth to Planned Parenthood last year. To keep his city as white as possible.; 1/17/13, 12:25 PM
Anonymous said...: I lived through that era. This fraud-peddling huckster did not, she was too young.
She is not teaching history, she is instilling myth.; 1/17/13, 12:45 PM
Anonymous said...: I lived through that era. This fraud-peddling huckster did not, she was too young.
She is not teaching history, she is instilling myth.; 1/17/13, 12:46 PM
McTriumph said...: Mick Havoc
I grew up in the deep South in the 50s and 60s, liberals have a fantasy of how the majority white southerners dealt with southern blacks. There is also a myth that great northern black migration was because of mistreatment, not jobs. In the liberal mind only Mexicans migrate for jobs.; 1/17/13, 1:23 PM
Beldar said...: This comment has been removed by the author.; 1/17/13, 2:25 PM
Beldar said...: There's a good reason that Donald Trump is associated not with the Miss America pageant, but with its younger and deliberately more vulgar and plastic competitor, the Miss USA pageant.; 1/17/13, 2:26 PM
Amartel said...: The Ugly Side of the Academic Belle.; 1/17/13, 3:35 PM
MarkD said...: " It's hard to understand why citizens of what was once considered one of the greatest international cities now feel compelled to act out with short-man syndrome."

Perhaps that little gun control law enacted in the middle of the night by our legislature behind close doors with no input from the subjects is a clue.

There is no connection between the way I'm treated and my pension and 401K being collected outside NY state. That's a coincidence, King Andrew.; 1/17/13, 5:36 PM
furious_a said...: used to be from the south but got out as soon as possible and now

No dis to Fresno, but NE Texas ("Cass/Marion County") does not suffer by comparison. Jefferson, TX, in Marion Co. has Civil-War era restored homes to die for.; 1/17/13, 5:45 PM
Penny said...: Miss America 2013 is from Brooklyn!

First loser or first runner-up if you prefer? Miss South Carolina

It's all in the stars, I tells ya!

Ha ha; 1/17/13, 6:03 PM
Matthew said...: The Deacons for Defense and Justice and other armed, grassroots black groups of the day broke the back of the Klan in the Deep South. It has been admitted that "non-violence" was specifically chosen by the national civil rights groups so as not to scare the Northern white liberals.

They wanted equal rights for the blacks of course, but feared militancy in their own cities lest their own chickens come home to roost. Cowards and hypocrites all.; 1/17/13, 7:22 PM