KKK license plate???

[chi-town_mike]

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/41555558/ns/us_news-life/

I understand honoring , say fallen soldiers in war. I understand honoring soldiers fallen in questionable wars. Vietnam memorial and such.

The denial river runs deep me thinks.

[basstotheface]

Eh, who cares. People get worked up so easily, if they want to commemorate something they have just as much right to do so as we do. The guy in the article saying it is unconstitutional to make this plate is ignorant, it is the exact opposite.

[Muzoid]

KKK is part of your American History, like it or not.

Or should we just pretend it never existed?

I agree with the above "Eh, who cares"

[MiniMoose234]

Originally Posted by Muzoid

KKK is part of your American History, like it or not.

Or should we just pretend it never existed?

I agree with the above "Eh, who cares"

Yeah, it's true, but putting one of the leaders on a license plate to honor them seems pretty bad. Yes we shouldn't ever forget. Doing that just seems wrong though.

[Muzoid]

Originally Posted by MiniMoose234

Yeah, it's true, but putting one of the leaders on a license plate to honor them seems pretty bad. Yes we shouldn't ever forget. Doing that just seems wrong though.

What the heck do I care...I'm a Canuck - hahahaha


I do see your point...but obviously enough people are willing to honor the dude for them to go and make licence plate.

Why?....I have no idea.....maybe next is the OJ plate

[C.Linton]

Well, let me put this scenario forth. What if American Nazi groups wanted to put out a license plate honoring Hitler?

[Muzoid]

Originally Posted by C.Linton

Well, let me put this scenario forth. What if American Nazi groups wanted to put out a license plate honoring Hitler?

Oddly enough, I have a feeling it would actually happen.

You guys do lots of stuff I don't quite understand....but you're our neighbor country, so we just sit back, cheer ya's on and say "well done!"


hahaha

[waleross]

Does not surprise me in the least some of our Southern States are still fighting the Civil War. Having a personalized plate with something distasteful on it is one thing but since it comes from Misssissippi, they might as well just use the N word on it....................shame on them ..................

[Rudyboy98]

Nothing surprises me anymore. American or not...

Of course...I don't think his car will last that long in the wrong neighborhood...

R...

[Curtybob]

Why does everyone always complain about things that will make idiots easier to spot from farther away?

[Muzoid]

Originally Posted by Curtybob

Why does everyone always complain about things that will make idiots easier to spot from farther away?

^^Right there people....pure gold!

*two thumbs up* !!!!

Take a bow man!

[Floyd Eye]

Originally Posted by MiniMoose234

Yeah, it's true, but putting one of the leaders on a license plate to honor them seems pretty bad. Yes we shouldn't ever forget. Doing that just seems wrong though.

It says " It is believed he was a grand wizard for the KKK". Believed by whom? I believe NASCAR was invented by aliens plotting to take over the earth. Where's the outrage?

[colcifer]

Originally Posted by C.Linton

Well, let me put this scenario forth. What if American Nazi groups wanted to put out a license plate honoring Hitler?

We've been visited by Godwin's Law a bit too frequently in TBOT this week, I think.

[Floyd Eye]

From WIKI:



"Early on, Forrest became a member of the Ku Klux Klan (KKK). Civil War historian, author and Forrest biographer Brian Steel Wills writes, “While there is no doubt that Forrest joined the Klan, there is some question as to whether he actually was the Grand Wizard of the Ku Klux Klan.”[37] The KKK (the Klan) was formed by veterans of the Confederate Army in Pulaski, Tennessee in 1866 and soon expanded throughout the state and beyond. Forrest became involved sometime in late 1866 or early 1867. A common report is that Forrest arrived in Nashville in April 1867 while the Klan was meeting at the Maxwell House Hotel, probably at the encouragement of a state Klan leader, former Confederate general George Gordon. The organization had grown to the point where an experienced commander was needed, and Forrest fitted the bill. In Room 10 of the Maxwell, Forrest was sworn in as a member.[38]

According to Wills, in the August 1867 state elections the Klan was relatively restrained in its actions. White Americans who made up the KKK hoped to persuade black voters that a return to their state of repression and near-slavery, as it existed before the war, was in their best interest. Forrest assisted in maintaining order. It was only after these efforts failed that Klan violence and intimidation escalated and became widespread.[39] Author Andrew Ward, however, writes, “In the spring of 1867, Forrest and his dragons launched a campaign of midnight parades; ‘ghost’ masquerades; and ‘whipping’ and even ‘killing Negro voters and white Republicans, to scare blacks off voting and running for office.’”[40]

In an 1868 interview by a Cincinnati newspaper, Forrest claimed that the Klan had 40,000 members in Tennessee and 550,000 total members throughout the Southern states. He said he sympathized with them, but denied any formal connection. He claimed he could muster thousands of men himself. He described the Klan as "a protective political military organization... The members are sworn to recognize the government of the United States... Its objects originally were protection against Loyal Leagues and the Grand Army of the Republic..." Forrest dissolved the first incarnation of the Ku Klux Klan in 1869, although many local groups continued their activities for several years.[41]

Forrest testified before the Congressional investigation on Klan activities on June 27, 1871. Forrest denied membership, but his individual role in the KKK was beyond the scope of the investigating committee which wrote:

When it is considered that the origin, designs, mysteries, and ritual of the order are made secrets; that the assumption of its regalia or the revelation of any of its secrets, even by an expelled member, or of its purposes by a member, will be visited by ‘the extreme penalty of the law,’ the difficulty of procuring testimony upon this point may be appreciated, and the denials of the purposes, of membership in, and even the existence of the order, should all be considered in the light of these provisions. This contrast might be pursued further, but our design is not to connect General Forrest with this order, (the reader may form his own conclusion upon this question,) but to trace its development, and from its acts and consequences gather the designs which are locked up under such penalties.”[42]

The committee also noted, "The natural tendency of all such organizations is to violence and crime; hence it was that General Forrest and other men of influence in the state, by the exercise of their moral power, induced them to disband.”[43]

In 1875, Forrest demonstrated that his personal sentiments on the issue of race now differed from that of the Klan, when he was invited to give a speech before an organization of black Southerners advocating racial reconciliation, called the Independent Order of Pole-Bearers Association. At this, his last public appearance, he made what the New York Times described as a "friendly speech"[7] during which, when offered a bouquet of flowers by a black woman, he accepted them as a token of reconciliation between the races and espoused a radically progressive (for the time) agenda of equality and harmony between black and white Americans."

[C.Linton]

Always good to find a historical perspective on these things. Puts a different spin on things. If the final conclusions in that Wiki article are correct, then honoring this guy might not be that bad an idea. Perhaps a little more intense research into the actual history involved is called for.

[Bigjohn]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nathan_Bedford_Forrest

The South was a defeated nation and Forrest was a die hard partisan, although he eventually relented.
I have also read he left and denounced the kkk.
To the extent that anyone knows or cares, I think he's popular in the South mainly because he was a badass soldier. And I'm sure he's a popular figure to racists.
Honoring him on license plates is stupid IMO.
What's the point? It will only stir up divisions.
Confederate icons mean different things to different people.
To some, they are symbols of southern history, pride, independence, defiance, military skill and a war in which they beat the crap out the invading Northern aggressors against all odds for a few years before finally being overwhelmed.
To others, they are symbols of slavery, post war oppression, murder and racism.
To others they are symbols of racial supremacy.

[bwv1013]

let them have their license plate. i could care less.

[Muzoid]

People will always approve...and people will always protest the same thing.

I mean most of TB would thumbs up a Jaco plate right?...I know I would!

...then some would say, "why are you honoring a drug addict?"

Crazy world.

(but I still see it that no one can actually prove he was the KKK-GW, so it's a catch 22 anyways.)

[MIJ-VI]

Three words: auto insurance deductible.

[Floyd Eye]

Originally Posted by Bigjohn

Honoring him on license plates is stupid IMO.
What's the point? It will only stir up divisions.
Confederate icons mean different things to different people.
To some, they are symbols of southern history, pride, independence, defiance, military skill and a war in which they beat the crap out the invading Northern aggressors against all odds for a few years before finally being overwhelmed.
To others, they are symbols of slavery, post war oppression, murder and racism.
To others they are symbols of racial supremacy.

Because this is America man. Would you object if they wanted one honoring Malcolm X or Liberace or Ted Nugent?