What makes me tick…

Loath as I do these little blurbs about who you are, your interest, ect. ect, I feel compelled to give a bit of background on what drives my thoughts, actions, and commentary.

I grew up in the deep south of Georgia in the early sixties, experienced the woes and struggles of de-segregation of the school systems and the reluctant death of Jim Crow, and while I experienced it from the point of view of a white child, it was no less painful than from the other side.  While my family didn’t have to worry about lynch mobs, or the Klan, we as children in a suddenly non-segregated school, found ourselves in the middle of a sea of long suppressed anger and a new flood of retaliation, both from the children of color as well as our new teachers of color.

The sudden immersion into what had long been just a passing aquaintance with a different culture, colored so to speak, my whole perspective of who I was, and what the world around me thought of it. 

Perhaps the most lasting thing from all this, or at least the good aspect, was I gained a love of rich colorful expressive language, which while English, was far surpassed in flavor.  Some stories can only be expressed in the older Southern black dialects which are sadly disappearing to be replaced with the vulgar and hateful “Ebonics” of the new gangsta generation.  The older generation had a subtle humor, very often dry and sardonic, that could express opinion and chastisement at the same time, without being in your face as is the case now.

As our nation has become more and more homogenized, we’ve transformed into a raw, uglier and most unpleasant society. For some reason, it has become the accepted norm to be as nasty and vulgar as possible in our language and personal dealing with one another.  Allow me to cite some examples which will illustrate what I’m trying to say.

My father, could with a simple expression call you a horse’s ass, a liar, or a bastard, and never use any of those terms, and do it is a soft voice, yet the contempt was still there.

One of his favorite expressions was, “Be that end of the horse, I’ll be the head.” Think on that one.

He once described a fellow, who to be honest was a prick, as such, “he can’t help his mama never married.”

Today, in our more modern society, it would be expressed much more direct and crude. Subtle comment and humor have been replaced with the more modern, “Fuck you!”

I fail to see how we have progressed, if indeed we have, seems more of a regression to me.