In which we discuss the cultural acceptability of the South, re: Orthodoxy

[hurrrah]

one region of a nation seceding, attacking, and fighting federal/national troops in a bloody civil war out of fear that the federal government would outlaw racial slavery.

Is this a generally accepted point of view in the USA?

 

[Stinky]

Is this a generally accepted point of view in the USA?

No

 

[Ainnir]

It’s more or less what I was taught in school.

 

[Stinky]

No

Sorry, misunderstood the question.
Anyway, I was taught in school ( California) that the civil war was an economic war, not specifically to free the slaves for the humanitarian effort.

 

[rakovsky]

" one region of a nation seceding, attacking, and fighting federal/national troops in a bloody civil war out of fear that the federal government would outlaw racial slavery."
Is this a generally accepted point of view in the USA?

Some version of this, or else major elements of it, seems to be the most common POV.

A major "economic" aspect of the Civil War was that cotton, rice, and tobacco were staple cash crops of the "South", and they used Slave Labor. Banning or restricting slave labor would create a major impact. Some "Slave States" even had a majority of the population being African Americans. In the years leading up to the Civil War, there was even a federal ban on further importation of African slaves into the US. So the political history of the US seemed to be going in at least a long term trajectory in the direction of severely restricting or abolishing slavery.

A key lead up to the Confederate Secession was that there was a growing Abolitionist movement in the North, involving for example John Brown's raid on Harper's Ferry, in which he tried to start a Slave Revolt. Another example of the Abolitionist movement was the Underground Railroad. One of the leading specific policy questions in the Lead Up to the Civil War was whether the newly-opening states of the West, like Missouri and Kansas would become "Slave States" or "Free States." There was a temporary settlement called the Missouri Compromise. The Republicans, with Abraham Lincoln, were considered more anti-slavery, and so the Slave States had fears about Abraham Lincoln getting into office, which is what happened.

The "Confederate" states officially claimed "secession" from the Union in 1861.

Confederate forces attacked the federal fort of Fort Sumter in Charleston Harbor, which is commonly considered the start of the Civil War.

The Civil War was quite bloody, leading to many thousands of deaths, and was one of the bloodiest in US history, alongside the two World Wars against Germany.

 

[rakovsky]

To add to what I wrote above, Lincoln was not proposing at the start of the Civil War to abolish Slavery. Rather, the Confederate States seceded because they were worried that he and the Republican Party would do so. Then, in the course of the War, Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation that abolished Slavery in the Confederate States, which was almost every Slave State. The Proclamation fit the desires of the Abolitionists who made up a major portion of the Republican Party, and it also had the effect of weakening the Confederacy, because the Confederacy relied economically on Slavery. The Union armies liberated slaves in the territory that they covered.

As a side note, when Russia fought Turkey in the Crimea War, England and France sided with Turkey and fought in Crimea. Looking for Allies, Russia had good relations with the US. The Tsar Alexander II freed the serfs in Russia and had good relations with Lincoln, who freed US Slaves. During the Civil War, this matrix of relations internationally carried over into North America. The British Crown and France began warming relations with the Confederacy, the British built up forces on the Canadian-US border, considering an invasion of the US several decades after the War of 1812, whereas the Russians sent a naval fleet into New York Harbor for protection of their friend, the US.

For more pictures and information, see:
FROM RUSSIA, WITH LOVE
October 29, 2019 by Jeff Richman

From Russia, With Love – Green-Wood

www.green-wood.com

On September 24, 1863, the Alexander Nevsky, a screw frigate of 51 guns, and the Perseviet, a frigate armed with 48 cannon, arrived in New York Harbor. Within weeks, five other Russian ships, including the Oslyabya (carrying 33 8-inch guns and 450 sailors and marines) had arrived. Lincoln’s Secretary of the Navy, Gideon Welles, wrote enthusiastically in reaction:

• The Department is so much gratified to learn that a squadron of Russian war vessels is at present off the harbor of New York, with the intention, it is supposed, of visiting that city. The presence in our waters of a squadron belonging to His Imperial Majesty’s Navy cannot but be a source of pleasure and happiness to our countrymen. I beg that you will make known to the Admiral in command that the facilities of the Brooklyn navy yard are at his disposal for any repairs that the vessels of his squadron need, and that any other required assistance will be gladly extended. I avail myself of this occasion to extend through you to the officers of His Majesty’s squadron a cordial invitation to visit that navy yard. I do not hesitate to say that it will give Rear Admiral Paulding very great pleasure to show them the vessels and other objects of interest at the naval station under his command.

Welles also would write in his diary, “In sending them to this country there is something significant. What will be its effect on France and the French policy we shall learn in due time. It may be moderate; it may exasperate. God bless the Russians.”

"Circa 1865-1870, the American Bank Note Company produced the graphic design below, showing the pantheon of American leaders: Abraham Lincoln, U.S. Grant, Benjamin Franklin, and George Washington (the last two, a bit more removed in time, got only small corner images). But the central figure in this design was Alexander II, who had freed the serfs of Russia–and had supported the Union by directing the visit of the Russian fleet to New York City (and another fleet to San Francisco):"

 

[Ainnir]

And yet the South is more than its history, much like all of us.

 

[Stinky]

A ball for the 1st Black mayor of St. Petersburg, Fla., is canceled over circus theme

The city's Junior League scrapped the 2022 event after Mayor-elect Ken Welch declined to attend. Critics say the theme was disrespectful and inappropriate in the majority-white, once-segregated city.

www.npr.org

Some southern places are still struggling. These are humans who inhabit the space - prejudice areas- and use these spaces to call their homes where these homes, schools, businesses, and church institutions gather to collaborate and vote and use alterior means to persecute those different than themselves.
We see this is still an issue today. How does the church in America address this today?

 

[rakovsky]

Is this a generally accepted point of view in the USA?

Nota Bene:
On another thread on the forum, maybe in the Politics section, I recall a debate about 10 years ago in which I and Marc (another forum user) were advocating the Union POV and the other forum users, maybe 5 to 7 of them, were arguing for what seemed to me to be a ProConfederate POV. I would have to dig it up.

There has been an argument that the Civil War was really about Northern or NYC bankers like Salomon Chase conflicting with the South or wanting to war-profiteer, as well as the Union placing tariffs or taxes on the South or Southern trade. I don't recall the details.

But I don't agree with those arguments, because for example it would be as much if not more profitable to get rich off of fighting foreign weaker countries like Latin American ones than fighting about half of your own country. I can give many more reasons. At most, these are aspects of the Civil War, eg. War profiteering, but not the main cause or explanation of why the war took the form it did, ie Southern Secession, abolition of slavery, etc.

 

[rakovsky]

And yet the South is more than its history, much like all of us.

It can depend also on how you define "The South." For example, do you include the majority society's victims in the definition of "the South?" Can we say that the South is more than its history, because the South is also the victims of ongoing discrimination?
Compartmentalization works too, but only goes so far.
The South" seems to be Progressing regarding the aspects that it is more infamous for.
And there is also "Confederate" sympathy in swathes or pockets of the North that should be faced like @Stinky is talking about.

To give an analogy, can we say, the Turkish Republic or Modern Turkey is much more than its history? The answer would be Yes, but this really needs more explanation. They still seem to want to deny the Armenian Genocide, and do Christians really feel welcome there? Certainly EOs would feel much more comfortable or at least capable of opening a seminary in the ex Confederacy than in much of Modern secular Turkey.

 

[MalpanaGiwargis]

Southron is the way self-consciously proud southerners describe themselves. It’s not a social media fad.

I have lived almost my entire life in the Deep South and have never heard anyone use this term, and I'm from a historically "racist even for Alabama" part of Alabama. What is the age of the people you know who use this term?

 

[rakovsky]

What is the age of the people you know who use this term?

"Dissident Momma" looks 40-50 in her website's Stonewall Jackson photo:

"Apologetics practitioner for Orthodox Christianity, the Southern tradition, homeschooling, and freedom. Virginian by birth, Carolinian by choice".
More Photos here:

About

Truth warrior, Jesus follower, wife, boymom, and lifelong learner. Apologetics practitioner for Orthodox Christianity, the Southern tradition, homeschooling, and freedom. Virginian by birth, Caroli…

www.dissidentmama.net

 

[Ainnir]

It can depend also on how you define "The South." For example, do you include the majority society's victims in the definition of "the South?" Can we say that the South is more than its history, because the South is also the victims of ongoing discrimination?
Compartmentalization works too, but only goes so far.
The South" seems to be Progressing regarding the aspects that it is more infamous for.
And there is also "Confederate" sympathy in swathes or pockets of the North that should be faced like @Stinky is talking about.

Let me put it this way... if "Southern" only means white (presumably racist) descendants of the Confederate South, you're going to have to tell all the black people here they aren't white enough to be Southern, no matter if their ancestors were here before most of the white people that live in the South today. Are you volunteering to do that? You'd also have to tell all the people (white or otherwise) who grew up here or are only a generation deep that they don't count, either. I find that both unfair and arrogant.

This is enlightening, by the way.
Population density of white people, black people, Hispanic people, and Asian people, by state

Diversity Index (notice the 3 Southern states in the top 10 and Texas outranks New York).

Feel free to compare all of that with the numbers for the U.S. in general and see which states beat the national percentages. Not that this should be a numbers game (which in itself cheapens people, imo), but since it's so God forsakenly important to everyone, have at it.

In saying all of this, I am not excusing the past (or present), and I'm not saying everyone plays nicely or that tensions don't exist today. What I am saying is that the weird broad-brushed view of the South is ridiculously off, and to narrowly define the term effectively disenfranchises a whole lot of who either aren't white or don't have deep roots here. And why is it so important to persist in the view that the South is still exactly what it was nearly 175 years ago? What purpose does that serve when it's patently untrue?

 

[mcarmichael]

What's Southern supposed to mean? Aligator is ok to eat?
I feel like they've been very tolerant of my sort of peculiarities, fwiw.

 

[rakovsky]

Let me put it this way... if "Southern" only means white (presumably racist) descendants of the Confederate South, you're going to have to tell all the black people here they aren't white enough to be Southern, no matter if their ancestors were here before most of the white people that live in the South today. Are you volunteering to do that? You'd also have to tell all the people (white or otherwise) who grew up here or are only a generation deep that they don't count, either. I find that both unfair and arrogant.

Here you are getting into the issue of how to define the US "South". I had a little question in my own mind how to define this years ago when trying to explain it to people in a far away country, for whom South and North sound like simple compass directions.

Kansas is apparently in the geographic center of the continental US:

So if the "South" simply meant Geography, then wouldn't one consider Los Angeles, Nevada, southern Illinois, and southern Ohio, "Southern"?

Instead, it seems that "Southern" implies the former US Slaves States or Confederacy, with MD, WV, KY, DE, etc. being borderline areas due to their mixed status on those issues. For example, WV was environmentally inhospitable to plantations, and thus to slavery, and WV seceded from Virginia during the Civil War, seeing no practical point in fighting the Union to preserve slavery.

So we seem to be talking about some kind of distinguishable Slave State or ex-Slave State identity, rather than a simple issue of geography.

To get back to the OP, I am fine with St. Vladimir's if it wanted to relocate to Texas, principally because no EO seminaries come to my mind in the US South. But my point in the OP is that The South has certain aspects that EOs moving there should be aware of.

Supposing that ethnic minorities, particularly African Americans, are no less "Southern" or have no less "Southern" identity than a Confederate heritage family, it is still one thing to belong to a society or region and another thing to feel welcome in it. I recall one lady from another country (like a Palestinian woman in the the Israeli State) saying that despite being born in her society, she never really felt welcome in it. Would African Americans watching ROCOR'S Ortho Dixie documentary feel welcome in SC ROCOR churches from watching it? I would not if I were African American and were learning about ROCOR for the first time.

I would want St. Vladimir's to make itself be especially welcoming to Ethnic minorities if it moved to the South, and to avoid the pro-Confederate theme in the ROCOR documentary:
youtube.com/watch?v=lb6ZLx0qPNY&ab_channel=EasternAmericanDioceseROCOR

 

[Stinky]

http://www.holytrinitycathedral.org/history.html

https://orthodoxhistory.org/2020/06/05/greek-orthodox-opposition-to-slavery-in-1862/

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Memory Eternal Martin Luther King! God grant us love for all and humility!

 

[Ainnir]

Memory eternal.