Writing Contest News & The Parable of the Prodigal Confederate
I’m a Writing Contest Winner!
Though I don’t enter writing contests as often as I should, I do try to enter as many as possible. Though I didn’t win money with this one for the New Millennium Contest, I did win Honorable Mention in the short-short fiction category and future publication. Here’s the letter notifying me:
Dear Rickey Pittman: Congratulations on your Honorable Mention Award for your story, “Little Rose and the Confederate Cipher” in the New Millennium Writings competition that closed July 31, 2008. Your name will be included on the Awards page of our next issue of New Millennium Writings, 2009-10, due out in one year, and will soon appear at www.newmillenniumwritings.com, along with other winners of our 26th Consecutive Awards. The winners and runners-up, including your entry, were selected from about 1,400 total submissions in four categories. The quality was high, and you should be proud of your accomplishment.
Issues and Views: So you still believe all blacks think alike? . . . Reporting from the frontline of dissent since 1985. http://www.issues-views.com/
In my college classes, I often use articles from the above site to teach my students on various topics related to black Americans. This site is written by black intellectuals, some of the sharpest minds you’ll find anywhere. If you’re a teacher, you should consult the articles often and present the information to your students. After reading just a few articles you will see how not only has Southern history been rewritten, but black America’s history has also suffered from the hands of revisionists with a destructive agenda. There is a whole page of articles on the subject of reparations here:
Sometime ago, I wrote a piece that touches the subject of reparations. It’s called the “Parable of the Prodigal Confederate.”
THE PARABLE OF THE PRODIGAL CONFEDERATE
After reading the one chapter in his college textbook about the Civil War, a young son once said to his father, ‘Father, I no longer want to live in Dixie. I am ashamed of my Confederate ancestor. I will not live in a house that flies and honors the Rebel Flag. It is a symbol of racial hatred and is not politically correct.
13 “Not long after that, the young son got together all he had, set off for Yankeeland and there squandered his Southern legacy. He lost his accent, and though his own ancestor had owned no slaves, he demanded that white America, especially those in the South, make reparations for the evils Southerners had committed against black Americans. He decided that even thousands of black Americans whose ancestors had never been slaves, and descendants of those blacks who had been slave traders, would be entitled to this “slavery tax.” These reparations would be paid by all states and the funds divided among black Americans everywhere.
He ridiculed those in the South who talked of honoring dead Confederates. “You lost the war!” he would cry. “Get over it!” He demanded that statues and plaques that honored Confederate leaders be hidden or taken down and replaced with statues of honorable men like Saint Lincoln or Saint Sherman. He campaigned for racial quotas in hiring.
14 After he had spent everything Southern within himself, there was a severe intellectual famine in that whole country, and he began to be in need.
15 So he went and hired himself out to the NAACP and the ACLU, who sent him into the fields to sue Americans. Before long, his Lords discovered that he too was a Southerner and they decided he must be punished, so he also had to pay reparations. 16 He lost his good paying job because of the quota system, grew hungry, and longed to fill his stomach with the pods (food stamps) that he saw the pigs were eating, but no one gave him anything because he was from the South, and therefore, he was evil. No one cared that he felt guilty for his evil ancestors.
17 “When he came to his senses, he said, People in Dixie have manners and food to spare, and here I am being insulted and starving to death! No matter what I give up, they are never satisfied. 18 I will set out and go back to my father and say to him: Father, I have sinned against Dixie, against heaven and against you. 19 I am no longer worthy to be called a Southerner.
“But while he was still a long way off, his father saw him and was filled with compassion for him; he ran to his son, threw his arms around him and kissed him.
21 “The son said to him, ‘Father, I have sinned against Dixie and against you. I am no longer worthy to be called a son of the South.
22 “But the father said to his servants, ‘Quick! Bring the best Battle Flag and wrap it on his shoulders. Put a book in his hand and brogans on his feet. 23 Bring the fattened calf and kill it. Let’s have a feast and celebrate. 24 For this son of mine was dead and is alive again; he was lost to Dixie, and is found.’ So they began to celebrate.
