The Ku Klux Klan will be among the masses descending on Oxford this Saturday when the Tigers play the Rebels.
Shane Tate, the North Mississippi great titan for the Mississippi White Knights of the Ku Klux Klan, confirmed via e-mail the KKK will rally on Ole Miss’ campus in protest of the Ole Miss Chancellor Dan Jones’ decision to remove “From Dixie with Love” from the Ole Miss band’s song selection.
“From Dixie with Love” is one of Ole Miss’ traditional songs on game day, and the student section has chanted “the South will rise again” during the song for years, said Brian Ferguson, alumni chairman of the Colonel Reb foundation.
The controversy began last month when the Ole Miss Associated Student Body passed a resolution in favor of discontinuing chanting “the South will rise again” to replace it with “to hell with LSU.” The resolution was never fully enacted because it was not signed by the proper officials after passing the senate, said Peyton Beard, Ole Miss Associated Student Body director of athletics.
The student section largely ignored the resolution and other attempts to stop the chant, continuing the chant during “From Dixie with Love,” said Ole Miss English junior Dean Julius.
After a written warning by the Ole Miss chancellor, the student section’s continued chanting resulted in Jones banning “From Dixie with Love” last week, said Barbara Lago, Ole Miss director of media and public relations.
“We cannot even appear to support those outside our community who advocate a revival of segregation,” Jones said in a written address to the Ole Miss student body. “Consequently, I have asked the band not to play ‘From Dixie with Love’ at upcoming athletics events. The absence of this song will send a clear message that the university is neither facilitating nor indirectly condoning the chant.”
This decision to ban the song has drawn the attention of the KKK, which plans to protest the ban in full robes Saturday from 10 a.m. to 11 p.m, Tate said.
“We are coming to Ole Miss to say enough is enough on attacking our Christian, southern heritage and culture, and it’s time for every person to have a right to freedom of speech,” Tate said.
Lago confirmed Ole Miss has been contacted by the KKK and said the group has the right to voice its opinions as long as it doesn’t interfere with university activity or the personal rights of others.
“We aren’t coming there to cause problems or cause trouble,” Tate said. “Trouble has already been caused by a handful at Ole Miss, including the black student body president, who wants to shape Ole Miss into yet another liberal sodomite college.”
Julius said he continued the chant despite the resolution because he felt he was carrying on a tradition.
Christopher Cox, a black student at Ole Miss, said he agrees with the chancellor that the chant is offensive, but he doesn’t think the students chanting it are racist.
“I don’t see it necessarily as racist,” Cox said. “There is a disconnect between the people who are chanting it and the people who are hearing it and taking it into a different context. The students who do want the chant feel its tradition, while others who want it removed feel the chant is a support for a past we have moved far from.”
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Contact Xerxes A. Wilson at xwilson@lsureveille.com
KKK planning rally in Miss.
Published: Thursday, November 19, 2009
Updated: Thursday, November 19, 2009
56 comments
if you Take away the song at least you can give them beer and they will be ok... because that's all they want to do is get drunk anyways...
Second, How can anyone who thoroughly thinks this through say that it is not okay for students to chant but it is okay for the KKK to march? Freedom of speech is not selective. Just because one finds something offensive doesn’t give them the right to bully it away from someone who may have a different view of things. The irony here is just ludicrous. Such is the way of the “liberals” (defn: a political or social philosophy advocating the freedom of the individual). They are so afraid of offending people that they have forgotten their cause. The KKK is so uneducated that they don’t realize that being liberal actually means giving them the right to their beliefs. Sigh.
The students should be allowed to chant what they want and the KKK should be allowed to march as they please (with a permit, of course). If I were a student there I would organize a chant without music just to send a message to the chancellor. American by birth, Southern by the grace of God.
I wonder how Les Miles is going to explain what happens to our beloved TIGERS Saturday afternoon. If Gary Crowtan's "SWINE FLU" offense will stumble then bumble and fumble another totally embarrassing loss to Ole Miss. ? You know they will. Or maybe this will be THE game of the year. LSU will totally reverse the way they have been playing and suddenly start playing with confidence ? Most likely Houston Nutt will humiliate Les Miles AGAIN this year. I hope the TIGERS prove me wrong, make me eat my words.