Not My Heritage

I've lived most of my life in "the South." After moving in 1954 with my family to Anderson, SC, I lived in Virginia, more of SC (including 4 college years), then NC and then SC again. In 1979 I moved to California returning to SC in 1987. In 1990 Seminary took me to Tennessee until 1993 and I've been a resident of Georgia ever since. I'm 71 and have lived in the South 63+ years.

There was plenty of Confederate memorabilia in all the communities of my childhood and teens but I NEVER understood the history of this region's rebellion to be my heritage to preserve or promote. 

I made a mistake once that I can remember when during my second Boston Marathon ('84) I wore shorts with the pattern of the "Confederate flag." [Quotes used to avoid the details about the flags of the CSA.] I'm embarrassed now but back then things weren't so edgy. I was proclaiming my "southern-ness," not still fightin' or mourning for the lost cause. 

That's it. Any other moments -- triggered mostly by my accent -- were for "the South" as a somewhat contemporary distinction about culture. Our recipes, climate, geography and lifestyle were better to me than any others I experienced in my (mostly) brief exposures.

That culture is fading and giving way to another version of "southern heritage" that much less so shares the same recipes, climate, geography or lifestyle. Instead it celebrates a rebel flag, guns, college football, performative church attendance and wasteful uses of gasoline.

The fading was at first fairly benign and for me gained momentum with air conditioning and interstate highways. There were plenty of other influences but those two have homogenizing effects that reduced our isolation from the rest of "America." Air-conditioning changes the pacing and assembling of our lives. Interstate highways--with gas stations galore--allow us to come and go from our homes for business and vacations with an ease we'd not known before. 

But there's so much more. I'll write about it in another post. It's that thing called heritage I want to look at and through. Maybe because of those using it most these days, I'll call them the 2nd Amendment crowd. 

That use is a conflation in weaponized dissembling about security and 'Murika all without any reference to the necessity of regulated militias. "It's my right!" they proclaim while life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness are mostly forfeited by pacifists and non-whites so as to navigate without incident through WalMart and those other spaces preferred for displays of bravado and bullying.

It most often comes out in conversation that these public displays of firearms are because of "my heritage." So not only is "their" amendment exercised but an allegiance is boasted. As a southerner I've needed neither of these. For me, First Amendment exercises are more vital and much more allied to the nation and commonwealth I am choosing. 

Like many citizens in the South, my heritage is a "becoming."  I am part of a movement toward, not a resistance against sharing and cooperation with those others not benefitting from my past but with just as much "right" to that "more perfect union" that can't simply be brandished. Citizenship benefits from the volume of one's bravado much less than it does from respect, discretion and accommodation. 

Bravado is too often a substitute for self confidence and it is more tiring for everyone else. Like halitosis it leaves too much of the work to the "listener." As well it deters repair and spiritual growth.  Just "getting along" becomes an awkward dance done by half the couple.

But hear me, I love the accents of the south, our recipes,* climate, geography and lifestyles. I am from the South! As well, I firmly believe that our best expressions are not confrontative or belligerent. So whatever these rebel flag waving, gun brandishing, gas guzzling, obesity swelling neighbors claim as their heritage it will not be mine. No need even to raise my voice when I can say "bless your heart."

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