Momnesia

Mud Pies and Baked Crow

Listen, I don't have a degree in journalism and I don't have a masters degree (yet). But I do know that when you write a story, and you place it in a context that skews the reader's perception from one that is realistic to one that is not representational, you have done your public a disservice. With that, I open myself up to gobs, heaps and mountains of criticism with some criticism of my own: I have grown very dissatisfied with "The New York Times."

There. I said it. Sort of. What I really wanted to say is "I hate that frickin' paper," but that's simply not true. I revere it, and I read it, and I follow its decisions with rapt attention, as does anyone who works in journalism, no matter what they say.

However.

The Grey Lady's coverage of all things Southern leaves a lot to be desired. Case in point: this story on a town near the one in which I grew up. I don't know where the writer got his census figures, but once you get inside the perimeter in Atlanta, there are apartment complexes with more than the 7,100 that this writer claims lives in Clarkston, Ga. He calls it a "small town by the railroad tracks," which makes it sound like something out of "Steel Magnolias" or "Fried Green Tomatoes." Some place that time forgot with ladies in white gloves all dolled up on their verandahs drinking sweet tea and lamenting the state of things with all the darkies moving into town. It's ridiculous. The truth is that the population seems small because the according to the United States Census Bureau, the city has a total area of 2.7 km² (1.1 mi²).

I don't know what they teach at Columbia but at Augusta State University they teach that a city 1.1 square miles large, inside a heavily populated county (in this case, Dekalb County) that has been noted for decades for its arts, culture, and diversity, is not one on which to base a story about a small-town immigration "crisis." Talk about the one ignorant mayor, but not the city as a whole. There are 675,000 people in that county alone and driving those roads and one cannot tell where the city and county diverge. Oh, and trust me when I say that none of those roads have diverged in a wood in several decades.

I grew up in Atlanta, and Clarkston is not a town of 7,100. It has been a diverse area since the 1960s, when the whole "white flight" thing began. Here's an area that hasn't been "mostly white," as the Times put it, since before I was born, but their whole story hinged on the contrast between race and culture changing the face of the suburban landscape. The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, if the truth be known, is probably looked upon by members of the national press corp with some bemusement. "Look at these guys," they nudge each other in the ribs while sitting on their behinds waiting for their Pulitzers to arrive. "What is there to report on in Atlanta?" But my beloved AJC wouldn't have gotten it wrong. Of course, they can probably look out their office windows and count the population of Clarkston, but anyway...

Well, how about the fact that despite the prevailing stereotype of Southerners as a bunch of overall-wearing, tobakky chawing, barefoot racists, Atlanta is one of the few cities that experienced Caucasian residential growth within its urban areas? So don't believe the Times' portrayal of the South as some embattled area still coming to terms with Reconstruction, grumbling about the Emacipation Proclamation and wondering how, how, how on earth we are going to get all this cotton picked by harvest time. This is the same paper that writes stories about every 5 years or so about how Southerners eat dirt. But they'd better be careful. Soon, many of their subscribers, despite the paper's northern appellation, will be in the South.

And we don't eat dirt. If you're looking for Hollywood stereotypes upon which to hang your lead, look to Julia Sugarbaker who said: "I have been a Southerner all my life, and I can vouch for the fact the we do eat a lot of things down here... and we've certainly all had our share of grits and biscuits and gravy, and I myself have probably eaten enough fried chicken to feed a third world country - not to mention barbecue, cornbread, watermelon, fried pies, okra, and... yes... if I were being perfectly candid, I would have to admit we have also eaten our share of crow, and for all I know - during the darkest, leanest years of the Civil War, some of us may have had a Yankee or two for breakfast. But... speaking for myself and hundreds of thousands of my Southern ancestors who have evolved through many decades of poverty, strife, and turmoil, I would like for Mr. Weaks to know that we have surely eaten many things in the past, and we will surely eat many things in the future, but - God as my witness - we have never, I repeat, never eaten dirt!"

Or chitlins, mountain oysters, moon pies, moonshine, opossum, squirrel, rabbit, salt pork, oxtails, pigs feet, or pickled eggs.

UPDATE:
There is a reason that there is no such thing as "Northern food." Here's a list of Southern foods to eat, and love: fried okra, sweet potatoes any way you want to cook them, field peas, boiled peanuts plain and Cajun, black-eyed peas, gumbo, etouffe, hoppin' john, grits, burgoo, crawfish, pecan pie, Brunswick stew, mess o' greens (turnip, collard, or mustard greens), country ham, catfish, red-eye gravy, Krispy Kreme doughnuts, benne wafers, cornbread or hoe cakes, andouille and boudin sausage, and most important of all: biscuits. Because when you're eating any of the above, they go perfectly with them. And when you're done, they're good to sop up your leftovers. And if you're still hungry, they're good by themselves.