Dowdell apologizes
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Dowdell Addresses Public
Dowdell Addresses Public
Vasha Hunt | Opelika-Auburn News
Auburn City Councilman Arthur Dowdell, who removed confederate flags from Pine Hill Cemetery April 23, discusses his position with the media Tuesday prior to the council meeting.
Staff Writer
Published: May 5, 2009
Updated: May 6, 2009
Auburn City Councilman Arthur L. Dowdell apologized Tuesday night for removing four Confederate battle flags from Pine Hill Cemetery on April 23.
Statement from the Mayor of Auburn
Bob Norman’s statement and text of the resolution.
Slideshow of the meeting is also available
Dowdell, the representative for Ward 1, pointed his apology toward members of the United Daughters of the Confederacy and Sons of Confederate Veterans attending the council’s regular meeting.
At the beginning of the meeting, the council passed a resolution urging Dowdell “to make a public apology to the citizens of Auburn.” With the resolution, the city council also condemned Dowdell’s actions as “inappropriate and beneath the office of a city councilman.”
Dowdell opposed the resolution since he hadn’t seen it prior to the meeting, but agreed to voice his opinion to the council and citizens later in the meeting.
During the citizens comments portion of the meeting, Dowdell and the rest of the council listened to 25 citizens express their opinions on Dowdell and the Confederate flag for nearly two hours. After 12 people had spoken, Ward 8 Councilman Bob Norman asked to suspend the rest of citizens communications in order for the council to proceed with the remainder of the agenda. The remaining business took all of five minutes and citizens were speaking again.
The majority of citizen speakers were from outside Auburn. About half supported Dowdell and his actions, agreeing use of the flag was offensive.
“I don’t care if it was one flag or 100 flags, if it don’t say United States of America, to me, it’s wrong,” said the Rev. Larry Taylor, who identified himself as Dowdell’s brother.
Others, including several members of the Sons of Confederate Veterans, disagreed, and said they considered the flag removal a violation of civil rights.
“You may not agree with them, but that doesn’t give you the right to violate freedom of speech,” said Auburn resident Benjamin Bacon.
Billy Bearden said he traveled 90 miles from Mt. Zion, Ga., because he was so motivated by the issue. Bearden, dressed in a full Confederate uniform, carrying a small Confederate battle flag, marched up and down the sidewalk in front of city hall for a couple of hours before the meeting.
“I’m here to speak for those who can’t,” he said, referring to the Confederate soldiers.
Bearden told the council he considered Dowdell’s actions to be the same as someone knocking over his father’s headstone in Arlington National Cemetery and spitting on it.
Dowdell defended his actions in his address. Since neither the city manager nor the mayor were able to tell him why the flags were in Pine Hill, Dowdell said he thought they were there for a KKK rally. Had he known they were there for the Confederate Memorial Day ceremony, he said he would have walked away.
He apologized to both Confederate groups. He said it was not his intention to hurt them. Dowdell said his actions were the result of “miscommunication” and “ignorance.” “I’m sorry this happened,” he said. “I hope we can get passed it.”
During the meeting, the mayor and Norman each read prepared statements expressing their disapproval of their fellow councilman’s action.
Ward 5 Councilman Robin Kelley got in the last word of the evening when he expressed his disappointment in Dowdell for not asking him about the flags. Pine Hill is in Kelley’s ward.
“I was never contacted,” Kelley said. “If you called me, I would have told you (what they were for.)
“It’s desecration what you did. End of discussion.”
Reader Reactions
Lady Val: Hey Lady Val, we could call it “White versus Wrong”, but then we would be a ‘hate group’. LOL
Or maybe ‘Same blacks, different day’.
How about ‘The welfare monolouges’.
Or ‘freeloader island’... is Tattoo still alive?
Jim
MPB3: Another stupid, thoughless post. Isn’t that special…
Tut, tut, foolish child. Count not thy chickens, as the old saying goes! I intend to keep a weather eye out on Dowdell and Auburn and any other such incidents.
But be of good cheer! I came to offer you yet ANOTHER compliment! For years decent white folks have believed that they only had to treat the “black community” (as currently defined) decently, honorably and with civility and society would redound with people of all races rationally and intelligently living a good life together.
However, the likes of Dowdell, the NAACP, the Sharptons and the Jacksons and all the rest (include yourself here if you wish) are proving to even the most deluded white that such can never be. Dowdell and his ilk don’t want equality - they want preference. They don’t want to “live and let live” - they want to be both victim and ruler, telling others how to live according to THEIR desires (no battle flags etc.). They don’t want equal opportunity - they want equal results no matter how impossible that is. They demand jobs for which they lack the most basic skills - always assuming that they are actually seeking jobs and not just another rise in government largesse – and when they do not “measure up”, they cry foul and demand a “do over” until all standards fall.
Slowly but surely, a large segment of the MAJORITY population is starting to see that NOTHING will satisfy the likes of Dowdell but that he and his kind should rule no matter the fact that they have not a clue how to run their OWN lives much less anything more complicated. Black-run cities (black mayors, black legislators, black fire and police chiefs) are statistically the worst or among the worst in this country and yet, the cry is still “Racism!“ Meadow muffins!
Dowdell and you and the rest of his apologists should, by all means, continue to do what you’re doing and who knows? Maybe decent folks both white and black (for black racists are worse to blacks who prosper in “white” society than to whites) will kick the PC movement in the teeth and tell Dowdell and Company that their “Day of Jubilo” is over; get to work and EARN your keep!
If that is the result of the Councilman’s efforts, I will say that he has achieved a great thing - albeit, it was the furthest thing from his very little mind.
Well nobody has censored me so far, and this IS my local paper. Any fantasy is in your mind, Mia.
You can’t even imagine how wonderful and satisfying my life is! My guess is that you wouldn’t make it past the security gates at any of my homes or businesses.
You, on the other hand, are filled with hatred and self loathing. You have such a poor attitude that you are destined to fail. Condemed to a life living on whatever scraps fall from the “Leader’s” table. The Obama mistake is already beginning to unravel. When Obama is in the dustbin of history (with Jimmy Carter), you will find that YOUR life will be even worse than before.
Why would anyone threaten to take such a worthless life as yours? I was referring to a black couple who was attacked at home in front of their children by a black man looking for drugs. She was stabilized with a chest tube, but died anyway on the way to Birmingham. As I recall, I was complaining about having to get up at 2:00 AM to go deal with the carnage.
My suggestion was, that if I knew in advance that it was you (instead of her), I would have just rolled over and gone back to sleep.
You can drop your ridiculous “death threat” bit any time; nobody’s buying any of it.
Watch the price of gas, coffee, and sugar (and Gold) going up in the near term, and listen to the growing drumbeat calling for Barak’s resignation. Watch and learn something (for once)...
Jim
Bravo, Lady Val. Oh and I have a possible name for your new blog:
“White is Bright, Black is Wack!“
or
“White is the New Black!“
Good bye, we hope, and good riddance!
Well, I do agree with one thing: neither you nor “Bishop” Dowdell are worth any further time and effort. Of course, it won’t be too long before the Councilman will be back at it stealing from graveyards and threatening ladies and I’m sure you’ll be there in his corner cheering him on.
But for a change, you do have a point. There are far better things to do than think or write about EITHER of you. I have cat boxes to clean and that is far more elevating than listening to him OR you.
Good lord you people are too much!
Hey, here’s an idea. Why don’t you all start a blog? You can all be posters to the blog and Lady Val can be the administrator. Then you can leave our local paper’s Web site to the normal people and you won’t have to listen to anyone who disagrees with you. Now, I know “Staunton” will be sad because he won’t have me around to threaten or call names, but he’ll be happier as a blogger living in his own little fantasy world! And he won’t have to have his petty little insults and death threats censored.
A friend of my own age was speaking about what happened in her neighborhood in Queens when she was a young married woman and blacks moved in. Within a matter of months, they had increased in numbers far more than should have been the case. They did this by putting four to five times the number of people per house than was seen in white homes.
They had driven a local dentist to flee the area in the middle of the night without notifying his patients. He left everything behind because the blacks wanted drugs they believed that he could get for them - and threatened to rape his wife and daughters if he didn’t comply. My friend had one man try to get into her home when her husband was at work. She was taking her baby in the carriage up the stairs and this big man grabbed the carriage and told her he’d help her inside and come in himself as that he knew her husband wasn’t home. She managed to wrest the carriage from him and get into the house and lock the door. That night her husband came home and the family - like that of the dentist - left and never came back to that neighborhood. Within 6 months, the slums had moved into a formerly middle-class area and it was unlivable.
Now, I know that this isn’t EVERY black in EVERY instance, but apparently it was common enough to cause real estate values to plunge in formally all white neighborhoods when blacks moved in - even middle class blacks. In fact, many middle class blacks lamented that they could not “move up” economically because when they moved to a formerly all white neighborhood, real estate speculators fostered ‘white flight’ so that they could buy up the homes for a song and then sell to people that the middle class blacks didn’t want to live with!
Most people tend to want to live with those with whom they have something in common. This is why you have places like Williamsburg in Brooklyn which is all Hasidim or Chinatown or Little Italy. Certainly for some there are racial and religious reasons, but most of the time we are comfortable among our own. There is nothing wrong with that. Indeed, it is the BLACKS who have chosen to segregate themselves. The whole ghetto culture is about segregating themselves from the “mainstream” or white culture. You see blacks in predominantly white TV programs, but seldom do you see whites in black sitcoms. If you do, they are usually stupid or racist.
There is nothing intrinsically wrong with wishing to live where you are culturally comfortable. Freedom of association is also a constitutional right.
JHMulis - The rectangular flag was also the battle flag of the Army of Tennessee, modeled after the square battle flag of the Army of Northern Virginia. I had ancestors who fought under both flags in the war. I also had ancestors who were prisoners of war and mistreated under the stars and stripes or the slavers flag, as you put it so well!
Just Wondering - I suggest you read some books on the war and learn the truth. It’s always better to know that just wonder!
Auburn Guy - Southerners take attacks on our heritage seriously, regardless of where we live. As far as Dowdell is concerned, at least one flag he picked up was placed by the UDC and was on a UDC member’s ancestor’s grave. In a sense you are correct. He did indeed pick up a flag from the grave of an ancestor. In this case though, it wasn’t his ancestor’s grave. He is nothing more than a common thief looking to stir emotions in your community and fan the flames of racial unrest. You should all be proud of his actions and the reflections on your fair city!
Just Wondering = MPB3
There are no new posters on this stale thread, so nice try…
Segregation is the natural order of things. Why would anybody move to a neighborhood overrun with violence, drugs, poverty and crime? Why would I want anyone in that neighborhood moving in next door to me??
It’s pragmatism, not racism. It’s not your skin color, it’s your bad behavior. Fix your corrupt culture before you talk to me about racism…
Jim
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