re: How do you feel about Mississippi's "Confederate Heritage Month"?

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I respect that, I don't think that would be fair to them either. They were doing their best with the information that they had in the time that they were living.

That being said, you can respect those who died without celebrating the "Confederate Heritage". That's really my POV.

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This is a complicated subject for me that I’ve tried to just let go. With influence from a lot of family members growing up I was fascinated by the civil war. It was basically the only thing Mississippi had been a part of that was relevant.

I got told tales of glory and valor that were embellished, and the bad parts were not mentioned. I loved to read when I was a kid and had several pro confederate books, including ones with battlefield maps and the like. I owned confederate flags and never once thought anything was wrong with them.

I was still pretty young when Ole Miss banned the flags but I remember it well. My grandmother kept mine for me and would always hand it to me when we got to our seats. It was a confusing time for me because I didn’t understand what people wanted them banned.

Growing up an Ole Miss fan and being old enough so see it come full circle is just difficult on your psyche in general. I’ll always think of Ole Miss football seeing the battle flag and hearing Dixie. It is just something I can’t beat out of my brain. I fully understand now of course why things had to change, but it was tough as a kid seeing the things I cherished gradually being taken and not fully understanding why.


Fast forward to now and I am nearly 30. The blinders of the infallible lost cause are off. I have read countless material from both sides and feel strongly I can be as close to as impartial on this topic as possible. I no longer own any confederate memorabilia, and I am very cautious on who I even speak to about the war and very careful with my words.

Long story short is I got too old to blindly believe the old fairytales, but at the same time the run of the mill confederate soldier is a fascinating piece of history. The odds they faced, the brutal conditions, as many have mentioned the vast majority weren’t personally fighting for slavery, etc., no matter what I do those men will always have my admiration and a soft spot in my heart.

I’ll tell you what I am infinitely more ashamed of as a Mississippian: the century that followed the war. That is when truly evil men did truly evil things.

So I’ll close with this. This is a topic that will always be near and dear but I keep it private. I live, work, and have companionships with black people and that is important to me. I live in a town that is 80% black and it warms my heart how well we all get along. I think most of rural Mississippi is like this today. Ignorant people can say what they want about us, but we walk the walk more than anywhere else in this country when it comes to peacefully coexisting, and although many don’t know and don’t care I am personally proud about it and how far we’ve come.