Recent
events have conspired, one more time, to paint the Southern United
States in a bad light. People are so negative and instead of
lauding the fabulous cuisine (grits, cornbread, Smithfield ham), for
example, they always emphasize the same old negative stuff. You
know, racism, slavery, segregation, separate but unequal schools,
that sort of thing.
So
much for tolerance of cultural diversity.
But
I am here to testify to you that at least parts of the South has
changed in recent years and I have an example that is pretty amazing,
and very specific to Virginia.
A
few days ago, while throwing away my life while surfing the Internet,
I came across an article on the AAAS website (American Association
for the Advancement of Science) about science education that featured
Dr. Neil deGrasse Tyson who was a speaker at a conference on the
subject. You can find this article at the following URL and I have
provided some screengrabs of it at the end of the post.
Neil
deGrasse Tyson is, of course, the very eloquent spokesperson for
Astrophysics at the Hayden Planetarium of the American Museum of
Natural History. A PhD in astrophysics, a graduate of the Bronx
High School of Science, an author of many books, the star of the
recent Cosmos reboot, and so forth, Neil is very entertaining
and is very well known in the New York area and now because of Cosmos
is also well known nationally. I worked with Neil for a few years as a consultant on
the Hayden Planetarium rebuild and the NASA Digital Galaxy project
and Neil was very entertaining even when he was not in public. He is also, apparently, a nice guy. Or at least he was with me.
Here
is a picture of Neil.
I
don't know if you noticed, but Neil seems to be an African American.
Well I am not sure what the whole story is, but no doubt Neil is
definitely a person of color, we might say. Or maybe a scientist of
color. I dont know, whatever.
Now
we get to the point. I can prove to you that Virginia, at least,
has come a long, long way since the war, even if it may still
have a long way to go.
The
conference on science education (STEM) where Neil was a speaker was
held at the Virginia Military Institute (VMI) in Lexington, VA.
(pause
for reaction)
Well,
I can tell that you are not from Virginia, because if you had been
from Virginia and I had just told you that Dr. Tyson had spoken at
VMI and your jaw did not drop, or your eyes bug out, or you fell out
of your chair, then that is a pretty clear indication that indeed you
are not from the Old Dominion.
Its
a long story but it goes something like this. VMI is considered to
be a bastion of Virginian aristocracy. It was said for many years
that if you wanted to become Governor of the Commonwealth of
Virginia, that it was helpful to have attended VMI. Many famous
people have been alumni of VMI including Gen. George Marshall who was
the Chief of Staff of the US Army during WW 2, George Patton's
grandfather, who died in the War Between the States defending liberty
and grandson, the third George Patton, and the one they made the
movie about, attended VMI before he left to go to West Point.
There
are many other colorful stories one might tell about VMI that would
help to illustrate how tightly VMI is tied into the self-image of
Virginians. Here is the well-known story behind a famous Southern
nickname, not of a student, but of one of the early VMI professors.
It seems this professor of Philosophy from VMI got his nickname
during the very first battle of that destructive and stupid war
between the states when he refused to retreat from the field and the
commander of a Texas regiment, exhorting his troops, said “There
stands Jackson like a stone wall”, although some people think he
was saying that Prof. Jackson was dumb as a rock.
In
other words, no less than the Country Club of Virginia, and maybe
even more so, VMI is a part of the established order of the very
aristocratic would-be aristocracy of Virginia who are still pissed
off about the whole slavery thing.
That
a black man, however famous, spoke at VMI is not to be sniffed at.
At
the very least it surprised me and I grew up there.
Should
I want you to conclude that there is racism in Virginia? Of course
there is racism in Virginia and I wish it would go away. But things
do change slowly for the better. A few years ago there was actually
a black governor of Virginia which is a pretty amazing situation
right there.
At
least many Virginians realize there is racism present which is more
than I can say about most of my friends in Southern and Northern
California who seem to be in complete denial of the racism in their
own communities.
Here are some scans of the article and quotes from Neil that prompted this post.
Virginia
Military Institute
Cosmos
(2014) on IMDB
Bronx
High School of Science
Stonewall
Jackson on Wikipedia
Stonewall
Brigade on Wikipedia
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