From the News Journal: http://www.delawareonline.com/article/20131220/NEWS/312200041/Klan-group-gather-Cecil-County-tonight
By now, y'all know that I was feral child, who enjoyed the freedom and safety of rural childhood. I spent the first 10 years of my life living in the back woods of Cecil County, Maryland. Back then, our address was 301 Beggars Row Rd. (Street name has since been changed) the one and only conduit to Elkton's 5th Avenue - And yes, Elkton, MD has a 5th Avenue. 5th Avenue was a dirt lane that ended in large gravel cul-de-sac.
When you grow-up rural, you live by the sun and the moon. We could count on the nearby stream to nurse bullfrogs for catching and the old oak woods to leaf up each spring, always ripe for exploring. While our house had real plumbing, several of the home owners still relied on out-houses. A nearby farmer once brought my mother a just-slaughtered chicken to cook for Thanksgiving. (We weren't just rural, we were poor.)
I grew-up oblivious to our poverty, a childhood filled with mostly fond memories. But, there is one particular memory that I have never been able to shake - what happened on 5th Avenue. Beggar's Row Road was generally a quiet and peaceful place. But, at least once a month, as dusk settled across the farmland and forests, a caravan of cars and motorcycles sped down the lane and turned onto 5th Avenue destined for the gravel dead-end - for their regular KKK gathering. It was on these nights that my parents kept us - all five children - very close to home. In fact, all five of us were put on notice early on that we were to never go down 5th Avenue.
So, it is with a heavy heart that I read the NJ article. It's been more than 25 years since our family left Beggar's Row Road to call Delaware home. Yet, it seems that no matter how much things change, they tend to stay the same.
The Klan will march in Elkton, their right is guaranteed by the constitution. They will cloak their message of hate through their mastery of peaceful protest. But, there is something we can do about it - we can ignore them. Because negative attention is positive attention and no attention at all is even better than negative attention.
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1 comments:
This reminded me of the 90's. When Newark allowed a KKK parade.... From the News Journal report and pictures, it turned out to be 6 very scared little boys, 13-15 surrounded by a bevy of 50 NCC patrolmen, there for the parader's protection. as they walked down main street to the jeers of 60,000 who had come out to protest against the KKK.... At any point the crowd could have overwhelmed the policemen and torn the boys apart.... Fortunately that didn't happen, but... the KKK moved out of Cecil County.... No more cross burnings... it was over.
That was a valuable lesson of surprise for me. For I was one who argued against allowing the parade. Against allowing an act whose sole purpose was to anger, inflame, and cultivate hate and violence... I said such was not protected under the Constitution....
Had my side gotten their way,... the cross burnings would still be going on... the fear would be far bigger than us knowing that we are all afraid of only a handful of boys who's passions had been hijacked by one ring leader... Six people? We could handle that problem.
So, I encourage this to go forward, now wiser from that experience, and I encourage all those who hate, despise, and would chomp for the chance to embarass the KKK in front of the national media, to also mark their calenders. get busses of anti haters, and flood both streets in a show of force to prove that love, forgiveness, and compromise are the better human attributes, than killing, hating, and torture....
Anyone who has studied the natural world, knows that every year, no matter how well you weed your flower bed, weeds will grow... That is a given.. and we will have to pluck, de-root, and burn or dispose of the refuse in a place which limits its recontamination of the soil....
So... lets show this idiotic minions who the boss of them, really is....
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