Ugly Scene In My Old Hood Last Night

[XNASA]

I guess it's true, you can never go home.

I got a call last night from an old friend, a friend who still lives in the same house he grew up in, to ask if I'd like to watch the Duke-Illinois game with him. So I said sure.

I drove over to his house around 8:30, and we walked down to the corner bar from there. His house, and the bar, are only 2 or 3 blocks from the house I grew up in.

What a nightmare. I can't believe what happened to my old neighborhood. I've never heard so much racist, sexist, homophobic bar talk in my life. I'm no prude. I grew up in a blue-collar environment, I served in the Navy.......hell, I even lived in Texas at one time.

At one point, some moran told back to back racist jokes, and everyone including my old friend laughed hilariously. It was sick. When the guy who told the jokes said to my friend, "Hey, Kenny, who's your friend?" and stuck out his paw to introduce himself, I gave my name but refused to shake his hand. The moran tried to bait me into an altercation, but I wouldn't go there. I stood my ground and he and his pals backed-off. It helps that my family actually still has some respect in my old hood. In fact, my cousin is the mayor.

Here's the kicker, my old pal, got on my case for not shaking the moran's hand. He said, "Well, you don't have to live around here but I do."

My old neighborhood used to be a great place at one time. Sure it wasn't an intellectual haven, but people, even the people in the blue-collar bars at night were reasonable folk. It's really gotten bad. The new regime in Washington has divided the country along these old deep-rooted hatreds and phobias. I witnessed it first hand last night.

I was shocked, and truly disappointed.

We got our work cut out for us.

[DarkPhenyx]

1. I have similar issues with the only two friends I have from that time.

We've grown apart in some very fundamental ways, buet we are still at the core friends. I know w/o a doubt I'd be there for them, and they there for me. In fact they have in the last few years. I jsut have to accept that if we discuss politics it's going to be a diagreement, and that K. isn't going to appreciate when I give her James Carville books for Christmas.

[xchrom]

2. are you straight? cause that's

how i feel -- there's been a sea change in american culture.
the experience you had mirrors my own experiences, thoughts and feelings.
and the thing i find most interesting is how this parallels the drop off in voter participation.
and i ask the ''straight'' question only because i don't often communicate ideas like this out side of my more rad gay friends.
and, as if i need to point out by now, i'm gay.

[XNASA]

8. How's the line go?

Paraphrasing Harold Ramis in 'Stripes': "I'm not gay. But I am willing to learn."

LOL!!

No. I'm a straight guy. I've been married nearly 20 years. But I was the only metrosexual in the bar last night. I was the only one drinking an imported beer. I was the only one with a clean shirt on. I wasn't wearing a baseball cap and chain-smoking. I did stick out like a sore thumb.

The irony is, all those meatheads in the bar had something very much in common with gay men. And that is, none of them (in all likelihood) were going home to a woman, either. ;-)

[xchrom]

16. oooh that's scary

i'm too old to rethink my life now -- but to think i even have some thing that close in common.... yikes.
congrats on the metrosexual self description -- i like to think of james bond as the ultimate metrosexual.

[zanana]

3. It's shocking when you see it close-up.

The description of your old neighborhood bar reminds me of a conversation I had with an old friend a few months ago. She informed me that black people have a high unemployment rate because they're lazy and won't take jobs they believe are "beneath" them. At first, all I could do was stare at her with my mouth open. How could I have known her all this time without realizing she was a racist? There was an argument, of course, and I haven't spoken to her since, but I'm realizing that people are showing their true colors now; and if racists are speaking openly without fear of criticism, we're in really big trouble.

[ChavezSpeakstheTruth]

4. The people at the bar-do they live there or is this a stop off after work?

That's the case at my neighborhood bar. The stupid people who crowd in on Thursday and Friday evenings aren't the locals.

[XNASA]

9. They live there.

Nobody would stop off in this place if they had a real job.

[greatauntoftriplets]

5. Truly an ugly scene, XNASA.

Did you discuss the situation any more with your friend?

Didn't know you were related to the mayor.

[XNASA]

12. Not "Hizzoner Da Mare"

The hood I speak of is around 144th & Western. It's outside the Chicago city limits, but it's still one of those older burbs that ring the city. It's definitely a 'hood though. Not one of those subdivisions.

My family was always very active there. My Dad was once Police Commissioner (got me out of trouble a couple of times) and my Mom was a member of the Park District Board...stuff like that.

Now, a cousin is the Mayor. Great guy too.

I've had that discussion with my friend, more times than I can remember. When he's around his wife and he's a big puppy dog, for example. But get him down to the corner and pour a couple of beers into him, and he turns into a giant asshole sometimes.

[greatauntoftriplets]

13. Ah, not dat mare.

Hope the cousin is a Democrat. Hope that some day you can educate your friend.

[XNASA]

19. I don't think that the local parties are divided along Dem/GOP lines.

I remember that the parties all had names like, "Peoples Reform Party" or "Workers Pride Party". Stuff like that.

My friend will never be educated. He's too old to change. My gawd, he still lives in the same house that he was brought home from the hospital to...and now he's pushin' 50.

Old friend, would do anything for me. Business partners with my own brother. Trusted family friend. But he missed the boat long ago, and feels compelled to defend his position at all costs.

[democrank]

6. You did the right thing....

and I`m proud of you for the position you took last night. I`m no prude either but there are times when I, like you, just have to take a stand.

There is a lot of talk about "breaking the cycle" with regards to family dysfunctions like alcoholism. Racism, sexism, homophobia and the like also need to be stopped in their tracks. I can tell you from experience that you CAN make a difference.

[ikojo]

7. If working class whites are divided against

working class blacks it serves the intereste of the wealthy elite in this country. It seems people, regardless of station in life, must have someone they look down upon.

Toward the end of his life, the Rev Martin Luther King, recognized the need to bring all of the working class together, black and white. IMHO, this is why he lost his life. He was talking about that great unspoken in the US....CLASS and its discontents.

[OldEurope]

11. So true. And if you mix this with homophobia and

and disappropriate worshipping of a god ( insert: nation or the Führer or anything else), add fear of the perception of science and a little bit misogyny: this is fascism.

[Bog Frog]

31. goodness... very well said.

[XNASA]

17. Exactly. Most of these people have huge self-esteem issues.

And they feel very threatened.

It's gotten to the point, with this particular friend, where I can't even bring up any of my life experiences as references in our discussion.

He spouts off about how bad kids are these days. Then when I remind him that I'm the one with two teenagers and that he has no children so how would he know, he accuses me of unfairly playing a trump card.

He complains that minorities are ruining his neighborhood, yet, I live in a town a few miles away that has the same proportions racially that his town does, yet I live in a thriving place. A place where race or creed is not used to divide people. Again, he accuses me of being 'elitist' for living in a progressive town.

Ya just can't win with these people. They won't accept anyones help or criticism. They're doomed to ignorance.

[OldEurope]

21. They are doomed? But they will doom your whole country if

you stop trying to convince them. Please, XNASA and all you other DUers, don´t give up! Try again and again.

[XNASA]

24. Oh, it make take some time, but......

You've got to let Darwin do the work.

If you can't adjust, if you don't progress, you and your kind (meaning the dolts in the bar last night) will eventually wither and cease to exist.

I truly believe that.

[OldEurope]

25. Darwinism is one of the rare scientific issues that the Nazis

liked, they thought they could use Darwin to confirm their cruel ideology. And I´m afraid, evolution is to slow-going in this things.
But I really really hope that there are enough Americans with a brain, so you need not follow the terrible way we in Germany had to learn how fascism works.
DU gives me hope.

[XNASA]

27. I only meant that hopefully......

the primitive ideals expressed by these neanderthals would eventually be proven wrong, because they don't work and not because anyone had to force them to change.

I only meant that I believe nature will take it's course.

[OldEurope]

28. And I only meant that hopefully ...

there are more Americans like you and our friends here at DU than there are like these primitive protofascistic idiots.

:toast:

[CO Liberal]

10. "Ugly Scene" - Was Linda Tripp There??

:-)

[GOPisEvil]

14. Buncha insecurity there, eh?

How sad. Hopefully they stay home on election day.

[XNASA]

20. Funny thing is......they're 90% union workers.

The kind of vote that we usually depend on. And many of them may well vote Dem just to keep their union strong.

But personally, and privately,.....well, they're a lot like Archie Bunker. The lot of them.

[GOPisEvil]

22. True...sounds like my dad's family.

They vote Democratic, but some of the most vile racist crap comes out of their mouths sometimes. It's no wonder my mom didn't want to move back there after he retired from the Air Force. Sure, she SAYS about not wanting to live where there's snow and a state income tax, but, I bet their ignorance had something to do with it.

[SOteric]

15. I'm sad to say I'm seeing more and more incidents like this, too.

:hug:

Thanks for standing on principles.

[BiggJawn]

18. We seem to be sliding backwards, don't we?

Is this new behavior, or just old behaviors that people now feel "safe" in bringing out into the open?

People feel that it's OK to say (about gay marriage) "They'll be wanting to marry their PETS next!" when what they want to say is "I hate FAGS!"

"The Left" is demonized daily on AM Hate Radio. The Democratic Party is constantly depicted as a bunch of poor, misguided fools who want a "Nanny State" (then why do we have all these new laws restricting our freedoms being shoved in by GOP congressmen?)

People see and hear Gush Pfleghmball, Michael "Savage" Weiner, Joe "Lori-killer" Scarborough and all the regional and local wannabes, then on Shortwave, you find the REALLY out-here crackpots...All giving the signal that it's 1950 again, and we're gonna push those uppity blacks, women and homos back to where they belong. Witness the Rise of The White Guy again!

At least you still get invites to go to the bar.
I'm all alone up here in Cornfield Country.

[XNASA]

23. I think it's old behavior, that they now feel is 'safe' to express.

Especially in the safe haven of the local corner bar.

On Sunday morning, they're all at Mass, with their families, acting like altar boys.

[underpants]

26. I guess Howard Zinn was right about pitting 'poor' whites against blacks

in order to divert attention from their common beliefs and wants.

One of my best friends (one of 4 from little league football days) lives among the same kind of thing. I mean REALLY bad stuff-watching a football game there is to endure comparisons of Warren Sapp to a silverback gorilla. He knows that I don't like that crap and they know that I am the "liberal" so they say it but don't expect me to join in, unfortuneately though not physically intimidating I just know that I don't want to get into it with them.

One of my other best friends WORKS with a lot of blacks (as I do) but in recent years he has become more and more racist. This is the guy that we used to laughingly call "Benjamin Hooks" due to his strong objections to racist talk and stereotypes. I think he has just lost the energy to fight the good fight.

I haven't.

[UrbScotty]

29. WHAT?! Call the police.

Maybe they can do something.

[NightTrain]

30. Sounds exactly like the atmosphere in which I grew up.

Not only were my late father and his friends racist, sexist and homophobic as hell, but certain other members of my family were that way as well. In fact, having grown up around those attitudes instilled demons in me that I'm still attempting to exorcise! :(