Nathan Bedford Forrest honoured at a fundie wedding

[clarinetpower]

OK, yes, she is amazingly talented.

But holy whackadoo. Who would want a cannon that KILLED PEOPLE fired at their wedding? Were their antebellum gowns washable, in case of blood stains?

And I'm sorry, but those lace pennant streamers look like thong panties drying in the window.

[SunnyAndrsn]

A couple of observations:

1. It really is a beautiful log cabin. I'm impressed with the work that they did themselves

2. Wood stove--how much land do they have? Are they doing all the cutting themselves? Is this also how the home is heated?

3. Old fashioned ice box, oil lamps...but a kitchen aid? What's the status of electricity in that home?

4. Sink but, no running water....how does that work? She references how nice it is to have a sink to dump water.

5. Same question regarding bathing/toileting?

6. Laundry is done how?

Again, I really do love the rustic home, but couldn't do without electricity and modern conveniences.

[naatashamaru]

i live in Stone Mountain and 10 minutes away from Stone Mountain Park with the the 3 confederate officers etched into that big ole lump of granite. Anyways...i truly hate dealing with southerners and thier interpretation of the glorious South because im black and it usually becomes super awkward because i make them think outside their all white world. People who super love the Confederacy like that always get the side eye for obvious reasons. I looked on her website and saw the post on WWII reenacting and i fucking LOVE WWII with a passion but damn they ain't got no black folks in that town, was she not taking their pics, or were black folks scared of you know joining in for obvious reasons. It seems like when people talk about these times or reenact them they gloss over so much. Argh i hate being a lover of history sometimes cuz i can't gloss over stuff like if black people were in it did they have an area for black soldiers and stuff like the Tuskegee Airmen section or not? :angry-banghead: :angry-banghead: :angry-banghead: :angry-banghead: :angry-banghead: :angry-banghead: :angry-banghead: :angry-banghead:

[SunnyAndrsn]

i live in Stone Mountain and 10 minutes away from Stone Mountain Park with the the 3 confederate officers etched into that big ole lump of granite. Anyways...i truly hate dealing with southerners and thier interpretation of the glorious South because im black and it usually becomes super awkward because i make them think outside their all white world. People who super love the Confederacy like that always get the side eye for obvious reasons. I looked on her website and saw the post on WWII reenacting and i fucking LOVE WWII with a passion but damn they ain't got no black folks in that town, was she not taking their pics, or were black folks scared of you know joining in for obvious reasons. It seems like when people talk about these times or reenact them they gloss over so much. Argh i hate being a lover of history sometimes cuz i can't gloss over stuff like if black people were in it did they have an area for black soldiers and stuff like the Tuskegee Airmen section or not? :angry-banghead: :angry-banghead: :angry-banghead: :angry-banghead: :angry-banghead: :angry-banghead: :angry-banghead: :angry-banghead:

Yup, and among themselves, they'll say how wrong you are, because it's all about history, dontcha know, and of course, all about THEIR culture. It never occurs to them how horribly embarrassing it actually is that they glorify a world that enslaved and murdered other human beings for profit. They will say you're racist against white people--as if that's a real thing.

Re: WWII--I would be shocked if this crowd has even heard of the Tuskegee Airmen

[naatashamaru]

Yup, and among themselves, they'll say how wrong you are, because it's all about history, dontcha know, and of course, all about THEIR culture. It never occurs to them how horribly embarrassing it actually is that they glorify a world that enslaved and murdered other human beings for profit. They will say you're racist against white people--as if that's a real thing.

Re: WWII--I would be shocked if this crowd has even heard of the Tuskegee Airmen

The sad part is you are absolutely right...and that is what sucks the most that some "history buffs" don't understand history at all

[FaustianSlip]

For whatever it's worth, I know there are black guys who reenact the 54th Massachusetts (the U.S. Colored Troops regiment from the movie Glory) and some other USCT units, and I've seen black folks reenacting civilian (and occasionally military) roles on the Confederate side of things, as well. Reenacting tends to be really whitebread, though, and I'm not sure why. I suspect some of it is just a vicious circle- people of color see almost all white faces at a reenactment, assume that reenacting isn't for them and decide not to participate, which means that the hobby stays overwhelmingly white (and male), which discourages people of color (and women, for that matter) from participating. Personally, I'd love to see more diversity in the ranks of historical reenactors, because our history wasn't exclusively old, white men marching around in military uniforms. Our history belongs to everyone, regardless of your color or your gender, and if you have a passion for it and think you'd like reenacting, I say go for it, and screw anyone who tells you differently.

If you really are interested in trying reenacting, you could try talking to this blogger. He's a transman who has been reenacting for ages in a bunch of different historical periods, and his site has a lot of thoughtful discussion of how to get more people involved with the hobby generally and more people of color and women involved in particular. He's written an article about ethnicity in reenacting, and he also has a write-up seeking welcoming reenacting units, which would be a good place to get started.

Seriously, don't let stupid people like those farbs having their wedding at the Forrest place keep you out of the hobby if you want to try it out. The only way it's going to get better is if more people who break that white, male stereotype join in. I'll also say that by and large, the more invested a group is in being historically accurate (as opposed to acting out weird, neo-Confederate fantasies), the less likely it is that they're going to be harboring weird, racist sympathies, at least in my experience. That applies across the board- WWII, Civil War, whatever. It took me fifteen years to finally decide to take the plunge into reenacting, and I've had a blast and met a lot of really great people- I wish I'd done it way sooner. But there are people in the living history community who are aware of and concerned about the issues you raise and genuinely want to make the hobby more welcoming to people who don't necessarily conform to the straight, white male setting that seems to have become the (historically inaccurate) default.

[naatashamaru]

Thanks...i am really not a lover of the Civil War just cuz i don't have an intense deep love for history before the 1939 for some weird reason...i think its because i love international politics so much and for me that's the start off point where things began and still has an effect today. I don't mind reenacting im just not 100% sure its for me weird cuz i wanna do dieselfunk (dieselpunk). I love museums and my ultimate retirement job is to become a museum eductor.

[DGayle]

Yup, and among themselves, they'll say how wrong you are, because it's all about history, dontcha know, and of course, all about THEIR culture. It never occurs to them how horribly embarrassing it actually is that they glorify a world that enslaved and murdered other human beings for profit. They will say you're racist against white people--as if that's a real thing.

Re: WWII--I would be shocked if this crowd has even heard of the Tuskegee Airmen

I'd love to see a reenactment that had a Tuskegee Airmen section just because it might make some people stop and think for a minute about thinks like segregation in military units.

[RosyDaisy]

I'm a white southerner, and I am disgusted by what I see around me: Stupid, ignorant, racists who worship the Rebel Flag and tell blacks to get over it already. Fuck them!

[DGayle]

I'm a white southerner, and I am disgusted by what I see around me: Stupid, ignorant, racists who worship the Rebel Flag and tell blacks to get over it already. Fuck them!

A friend of mine was in Alabama a few weeks ago, and she can't get over what happened when she went to a gas station bathroom, a black woman with a small son were ahead of her, and the black boy ran into the stall since he had to go really bad. And he was ahead of her, so it was his turn. The mom turned to my friend and was really embarrassed and apologized that his son went ahead of her. My friend said she told the woman it's all right, he's a kid, and they were there first, and the woman looked at her like she grew a few heads. That was just the 1st time she described about how it really hit her how much non-whites are treated like 3rd class animals. She's still upset by how much it's accepted by them since it means they've been raised to think of themselves as lower beings.

It kills me that I have family who chose to move there to raise kids. Including a teen cousin of mine who isn't white and has to hide that she's a lesbian from everyone except me and the other cousin who accept LGBT people.

The south is pretty awful.

[gustava]

A friend of mine was in Alabama a few weeks ago, and she can't get over what happened when she went to a gas station bathroom, a black woman with a small son were ahead of her, and the black boy ran into the stall since he had to go really bad. And he was ahead of her, so it was his turn. The mom turned to my friend and was really embarrassed and apologized that his son went ahead of her. My friend said she told the woman it's all right, he's a kid, and they were there first, and the woman looked at her like she grew a few heads. That was just the 1st time she described about how it really hit her how much non-whites are treated like 3rd class animals. She's still upset by how much it's accepted by them since it means they've been raised to think of themselves as lower beings.

It kills me that I have family who chose to move there to raise kids. Including a teen cousin of mine who isn't white and has to hide that she's a lesbian from everyone except me and the other cousin who accept LGBT people.

The south is pretty awful.

The south can be pretty awful, but please don't generalize.

[StellaMarie]

The south can be pretty awful, but please don't generalize.

Yeah, I suspect you and your friend misunderstood what was going on. The South has a lot of issues, and I wouldn't choose to live there again, but black people aren't generally expected to wait for white people to pee first.

[Soulhuntress]

The south can be pretty awful, but please don't generalize.

sounds to me like the mom was looking to teach her son a lesson in manners to me. Back OT, the invoking of NBF is far more disturbing than the imagery and inaccurate costuming. And the World War 2 group riding the German motorcycles was.......just no words. :angry-banghead:

[GeoBQn]

From her entry on Remembering WWII:

The battles were quite impressive. They both started with the Germans occupying the town, then the Americans and British taking over. All the military vehicles were very impressive! The battles ended with a couple of American soldiers cutting down the huge German flag hanging up on the courthouse and replacing it with the stars and stripes!

WTF. Were they pretending that the town was a real European town that was liberated by American troops, or acting out an alternate-history fantasy about the Nazis taking over America? Actually, she never once uses the word "Nazi." She always refers to the enemy as the "Germans." Check out the "German motorcycle" that was "quite popular with the girls."

keepandshare.com/userpics/a/v/i/c/torian/2014-10/sb/dsc_0962-76198717.jpg

The only way that riding around in that would be popular is if not a single person there cared about the Holocaust.

[sparkles]

From her entry on Remembering WWII:

WTF. Were they pretending that the town was a real European town that was liberated by American troops, or acting out an alternate-history fantasy about the Nazis taking over America? Actually, she never once uses the word "Nazi." She always refers to the enemy as the "Germans." Check out the "German motorcycle" that was "quite popular with the girls."

keepandshare.com/userpics/a/v/i/c/torian/2014-10/sb/dsc_0962-76198717.jpg

The only way that riding around in that would be popular is if not a single person there cared about the Holocaust.

Well, given that this was an event put on by the same group of people who think the sinking of the Titanic was nothing more than a grand display of manly-man chivalry, it shouldn't be surprising that they think World War Two was a big ol' hoot.

[HereticHick]

Yeah, I suspect you and your friend misunderstood what was going on. The South has a lot of issues, and I wouldn't choose to live there again, but black people aren't generally expected to wait for white people to pee first.

Yeah-- I think this sounds like a big misunderstanding. If I (a mixed raced person from the South) let my kid cut in line anywhere, from Alabama to Alberta to Avignon, I'd apologize to the person being cut in front of. It isn't a matter of skin color, its a matter of manners.

And you know what, people who toss off generalizations such as "The south is pretty awful" often come off as narrow minded bigots who find it convenient to see the word as black and white.

Yes, "the South" has a wagon load of issues.

But there are a lot of good people of all colors, races, ethnicities, religious and sexual persuasions who chose to live in the South and are working to make it a better place.

Its our South too.

Next time you want to say something like "The South is Pretty Awful" or "All Southerners are Racists" or "I condemn those who choose to live in the South," why not think of a few of these Southerners for a change:

Jimmy Carter

John Lewis

Tennessee Williams

Armistead Maupin

Tina Turner

We are more, and always have been more, than Nathan Bedford Forrest.

[bluehydrangea]

And these people insist upon pretending that it's 1862 why????

[FaustianSlip]

Thanks...i am really not a lover of the Civil War just cuz i don't have an intense deep love for history before the 1939 for some weird reason...i think its because i love international politics so much and for me that's the start off point where things began and still has an effect today. I don't mind reenacting im just not 100% sure its for me weird cuz i wanna do dieselfunk (dieselpunk). I love museums and my ultimate retirement job is to become a museum eductor.

Well, if you ever want to try WWII or some other historical period of reenacting, feel free to PM me. I just do Civil War right now, but I know a lot of people that do other historical eras, and I could put you in touch with them.

Reenacting is a touch issue for some people, especially with more modern conflicts. I'm really torn about WWII reenacting, personally- on the one hand, I'd love to try WWII Soviet because they had women openly serving in combat roles, which is pretty badass, and I'm fascinated with the period, anyway. On the other hand, if I heard people trying to justify or minimize atrocities the Nazis committed the way I've heard some people try to downplay the fact that the Confederacy was literally founded to protect slavery (it's right in their Constitution and founding documents, even!), I'm pretty sure I would lose my shit. I don't have any patience for the neo-Confederate garbage, either, but I can maintain my composure while I'm shutting that stuff down. The Nazis? Probably not- it's too soon and too close for me. Although if you find a group that's serious and historically-minded, you don't get a lot of that. It's the yahoos who just want to wear "cool outfits" and play around with guns that are usually the ones spouting historically incorrect, apologist nonsense.

As far as the South, historically speaking, places down South actually tended to be more integrated, in many ways, than places up north. Just to take one example, Boston has a long and horrible history of racism and is still heavily segregated. The Red Sox were the last team in major league baseball to integrate, and I've heard friends from New Hampshire relate really awful stories about their encounters with blatant, shameless racism. In spite of the history of Jim Crow and slavery, the South doesn't have the market cornered on racism at all. For a Civil War example, look up the New York draft riots and/or the reaction of Union troops to the Emancipation Proclamation. Plenty of ugly, ugly stuff there to keep you busy.

[FaustianSlip]

And these people insist upon pretending that it's 1862 why????

Probably for the same reason people might have a 1920s themed wedding, or a Regency themed wedding, or whatever- presumably, they like the aesthetic and are passionate about history. Or about their whitewashed, romanticized version of history, to be accurate about it. I find the whole thing to be in pretty poor taste, and I personally would never opt to have a Civil War-themed wedding, even a Union one for a variety of reasons, the biggest being that I reenact to remember and educate people (and myself, for that matter) about an important but horrific, traumatic time in our country's history. The Civil War wasn't fun and games. What these guys are doing at this wedding is the kind of thing that the boys and young men who enlisted thought they would be getting, the whole idea of the glamour of war, et cetera. What they actually found on the battlefield were horrible sights, sounds and smells, rampant disease, twenty- and thirty-mile marches and people going home maimed or in coffins, if they went home at all. It minimizes and cheapens what those people went through, IMHO, to basically turn it into a dress-up party and use it to accent their silly wedding. And of course, all of that is just icing on the racist shit sundae of holding the whole shindig at Nathan Bedford Forrest's home.

I don't really have any issues with having a historically-themed wedding, necessarily, but to inject the whole military angle into it by having the menfolk dress up in uniform crosses a major line for me. I mean, I don't think we'd be having this conversation if they had decided to have a '40s-themed wedding with everyone dressed in civilian clothes and held a reception featuring a swing band. But do the same thing with the guys dressed up either as Nazis or as American soldiers, for no reason other than to look cool? Totally different deal and wildly inappropriate.

[StellaMarie]

Yeah-- I think this sounds like a big misunderstanding. If I (a mixed raced person from the South) let my kid cut in line anywhere, from Alabama to Alberta to Avignon, I'd apologize to the person being cut in front of. It isn't a matter of skin color, its a matter of manners.

And you know what, people who toss off generalizations such as "The south is pretty awful" often come off as narrow minded bigots who find it convenient to see the word as black and white.

Yes, "the South" has a wagon load of issues.

But there are a lot of good people of all colors, races, ethnicities, religious and sexual persuasions who chose to live in the South and are working to make it a better place.

Its our South too.

Next time you want to say something like "The South is Pretty Awful" or "All Southerners are Racists" or "I condemn those who choose to live in the South," why not think of a few of these Southerners for a change:

Jimmy Carter

John Lewis

Tennessee Williams

Armistead Maupin

Tina Turner

We are more, and always have been more, than Nathan Bedford Forrest.

Great, great post, HereticHick.

The more I think about it (as this post, which probably was well-intentioned, really bothered me), the more I think it was a manners thing. A lot of Southern parents (including my own family members) put a big emphasis on children having good manners -- and I suspect that's what the woman was apologizing for.

Really, it's very offensive to assume that people think of themselves as "3rd class animals." I imagine that attitude is what the woman in the bathroom was reacting to when she looked at your friend like she had three heads.

[ILoveJellybeans]

I know loads of people who do historical reinactments-I have two friends who do WWII and loads of people on my dads side of the family do Viking reinactments.

I don't think it is weird for a couple who is really into history having a historically themed wedding, but there are some things that cross the line from an interesting theme wedding that shows off their personalities, to something tasteless and wrong....I think things like honouring a KKK leader or having everyone dress in Nazi uniform is well over that line.

[GeoBQn]

cracked.com/article_20584_the-5-most-absurdly-offensive-theme-weddings-ever-planned.html

[FaustianSlip]

cracked.com/article_20584_the-5-most-absurdly-offensive-theme-weddings-ever-planned.html

The stupid in that article is just overpowering. What the hell is wrong with people? That colonial wedding in South Africa seems right up the Vision Forum's alley, though.

[browncoatslytherin]

cracked.com/article_20584_the-5-most-absurdly-offensive-theme-weddings-ever-planned.html

i LOVE cracked. they do a great job of documenting the absurd while calling it out on its shit.

[naatashamaru]

Well, if you ever want to try WWII or some other historical period of reenacting, feel free to PM me. I just do Civil War right now, but I know a lot of people that do other historical eras, and I could put you in touch with them.

Reenacting is a touch issue for some people, especially with more modern conflicts. I'm really torn about WWII reenacting, personally- on the one hand, I'd love to try WWII Soviet because they had women openly serving in combat roles, which is pretty badass, and I'm fascinated with the period, anyway. On the other hand, if I heard people trying to justify or minimize atrocities the Nazis committed the way I've heard some people try to downplay the fact that the Confederacy was literally founded to protect slavery (it's right in their Constitution and founding documents, even!), I'm pretty sure I would lose my shit. I don't have any patience for the neo-Confederate garbage, either, but I can maintain my composure while I'm shutting that stuff down. The Nazis? Probably not- it's too soon and too close for me. Although if you find a group that's serious and historically-minded, you don't get a lot of that. It's the yahoos who just want to wear "cool outfits" and play around with guns that are usually the ones spouting historically incorrect, apologist nonsense.

As far as the South, historically speaking, places down South actually tended to be more integrated, in many ways, than places up north. Just to take one example, Boston has a long and horrible history of racism and is still heavily segregated. The Red Sox were the last team in major league baseball to integrate, and I've heard friends from New Hampshire relate really awful stories about their encounters with blatant, shameless racism. In spite of the history of Jim Crow and slavery, the South doesn't have the market cornered on racism at all. For a Civil War example, look up the New York draft riots and/or the reaction of Union troops to the Emancipation Proclamation. Plenty of ugly, ugly stuff there to keep you busy.

thanks so much if i ever change my mind and want to start reennacting i will definitely PM u :)