Even John Wayne, the ultimate right-winger, acknowledged the presence of a coupla blacks at the "real" Alamo...
Let's get something straight.
It was always "left wingers" aka Democrats who ran the plantations, racist Sheriff departments, and imposed Jim Crowe laws on black citizens --
not Conservatives or "right wingers" as you imply. It was a liberal Democrat Governor, not "right wingers", who stood in the school house door blocking black kids from entering.
Truth is, deeply racist Southern "Dixiecrats" in Congress realized they couldn't fight the Civil Rights Act any longer {
and fight it they did} so they "adopted" black causes under a phony claim of "compassion" in order to keep their party viable. After signing the legislation, a snickering President Lyndon Johnson-D was overheard telling his aids
"we'll have the n****ers voting Democrat for the next 200 years". Academia, Hollywood, and the media have reinforced the big lie about race for so long now that many Americans simply repeat it without doing any independent research first. The ignorant quote at the top of my post illustrates my point perfectly.
And the dead shall be raised incorruptible,and we shall be changed.~1 Corinthians 15:52
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pontevedro
9 years ago
Democrats have not always been liberal and Republicans have not always been conservative. In the 1860s, the Republicans were, if anything, the liberal party and the Democrats were conservative. Even in the 1960s, there were liberal Republicans and conservative Democrats.
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Andrew_S_Hatton
9 years ago
I was born in outer London, UK in 1948 and when I was growing up it was an event to see a non white person - despite many already having settled in the UK, particularly in areas where there was either industrial demands or cheap housing - we had race riots in 1958 in Notting Hill London, yet the media , more or less ignored the underlying issues, once the initial disturbances were past.
When I saw "How the West Was Won" at the cinema in 62 or 63 it was a big family event - I think marking my younger brother's birthday - this was special because of the Cinerama wide-screen production. As a young teenager (from a 21st century stand point) - I am ashamed I did not give the fact that there were no significant numbers of non-whites in the film - native Americans apart any attention - but that is simply how it was - we were brought up to be bigots & it was not until the late seventies, by which time I had worked in central London, with West Indians and then in Liverpool - with very mixed race areas that I began to give the issue any serious thought.
Now back to the film - it was for a world-wide audience - though obviously it needed to be a financial success firstly in the USA - TV was in the ascendancy - Movies were trying to cling on - hence the special effects - big stars - big story - 3 films in one - yet not complicated or sophisticated - made for a mass audience who had been familiar with 'the old west' from 'Wagon Train', 'Rawhide' etc., etc. and the whole gamut of semi serious western TV series that were more subtle than the earlier shoot 'em up "Lone Ranger" type fare - where my mother made jokes about sweeping out the bodies from the back of the TV at the end!
Sadly as it has been said we were ONLY at the beginning of an awakening - but it had not spread very far or wide or deep & so films like this were made without giving a real thought to race issues, I suggest.
Mention has been made of Sidney Poitier, who was certainly one of several actors who could have played a relevant part - if the film makers wanted to broaden our knowledge about the Civil War, rather than just reference it and use it as a backdrop for some on screen violence and special effects that hold an audience's attention - similarly with the train fight at the end and the stampede - all standard fare for western movies - but just done on a bigger scale. It was still five years before Sidney Poitier would play a black London school teacher in 'To Sir with Love' - but by 1967/8 things were changing and some entertainments were seriously examining race issues - hardly surprising in view of there being increasing tension playing out on the streets in several countries around the world - including France, UK and the USA.
The opening poster is right to mention the issue - BUT in 1961/62 realistic representation of the different races was just not an issue for most in the entertainment industry and sadly neither for most of us - whites - in the cinema seats - I guess the black people and other races - would mostly have expected it to be thus - hence we are still struggling - at least in parts of Britain today with some very nasty attitudes from some towards those of different races to themselves - despite us all probably having originally descended from Africans!
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cfwente
9 years ago
"... but that was simply how it was -- we were brought up to be bigots and it was not until the late seventies ..."
Whoa there, big fella! Where I come from - the USA - not all (or many) of us were brought up to be bigots. Race consciousness had begun being seriously introduced into our collective consciousness during the 1950's.
Frankly, when I was in high school (early 1960's) -- a white middle-class school almost entirely -- only a very few nasty individuals made derogatory race-based comments (not just race-based, btw) and, then, only on rare occasions. The rest of us generally walked away. No parent I know of welcomed these comments and most cautioned the rest of us against following suit. Teachers disciplined students who hurled such epithets at or around other students.
Today, that consciousness and natural turn toward fairness, respect, and accomodation within the culture has become rather more an obsession. And, the government has, in its own inimitable and inevitable way, assumed an inflated and often times questionable role as behavior arbitor and enforcer of any conceivably related issue . . . a kind of finger waggling with symbols, bumper-sticker slogans, and partisanship: Thus, slowing down any more permanent solution to the question of genuine racial harmony which could have been hoped for without the "help" of those folks with motivations less than altruistic or moral.
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