Teabaggers spoil football game at Penn State

[scheming daemons]

*Disclosure:

I am a Pitt graduate. I despise everything about the middle "T" of my state. James Carville once said that Pennsylvania is Pittsburgh in the west, Philadelphia in the east, and Alabama in the middle. The behavior described in this article is typical behavior for rural white Pennsylvanians. I've lived in this state for 43 years. I know this state. Stories like this piss me off:

Fans play race card, spoil day at PSU
By Eric Heyl
PITTSBURGH TRIBUNE-REVIEW
Sunday, November 14, 2010


It didn't take long for Happy Valley to turn miserable for Linda and Bobby Baker.

The Greensburg couple attended the Penn State-Michigan football game Oct. 30 and displayed colors that got them harassed by unruly fans of the home team.

It wasn't just the fact that the Bakers were sporting the blue and maize of the Michigan Wolverines that upset some Nittany Lions supporters. It was the fact that Linda Baker is white and Bobby Baker is black.

"We were prepared for the usual high-spirited fun that goes along with being fans of the opposing team," Linda Baker said. "We weren't prepared for the verbal assaults that were rude, degrading and demeaning."

Linda Baker, 45, an Irwin native, met her husband while both served in the Marines. They moved back to the area in May from Ohio to help care for Linda Baker's ailing parents.

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Read the whole thing. It will enrage you. But it will give you an understanding as to the conservative white mindset in this country.

http://www.pittsburghlive.com/x/pittsburghtrib/news/columns/heyl/s_709246.html

[auntsue]

1. It's so depressing

I thought we were beyond that crap. My dad was born in California in 1912 and he never internalized the racial bias that was so prevelant in his generation. My mom was born in Missouri she grew up seeing it but felt it was wrong. I was born in '46 but, was raised that "race don't make no differ'nce". I live in the LA area and have been around a multi-cultural society. A range of multi-colored faces just looks normal to me. When I see a bi-racial couple I think "mmmm nice, progress continues". I went to Utah to visit a friend and it was so wierd to see a room full of all white faces.

[dmr]

2. Shameful

Prior to 2008, the bigots would have been silent. I blame Palin for stirring the hornet's nest during that campaign, & then the GOP leadership for not speaking out against it. It's been downhill since. It's a damn shame.

For Linda Baker, the incident represents more than just a ruined football game.

"My husband and I were Marines who lived all over the country and all over the world without experiencing anything like this," she said. "It deeply saddens me that when I experienced blatant discrimination for the first time, it happened right here."

Is she still angry?

"I'm embarrassed," she said. "I'm embarrassed that people from my home state are still so ignorant."

[Scuba]

16. +1

[Tyrs WolfDaemon]

3. This is disgusting.

We (humans) should be better than this.

[southmost]

4. I feel ashamed of this country

no, this country is nowhere near past its racism

[Skittles]

5. WTF

W....T.....F :o

[HughBeaumont]

6. UH-high-ah's the same damned way . ..

Cincinnati (some call it Cincitucky because of it's white-flight burbs) and Athens on the bottom, Columbus in the middle, Northeast/East Ohio up top . . . sea of racist, backwoods, churchy, voted-fer-Bewsh-TWICE-n-proud-OF-it redneckery everywhere else. Even Northeast Ohio isn't immune to racist idiots. I honestly don't know how Barack Obama won this state, since the Republiclowns swept nearly every important position in 2010.

Michigan, Indiana . . . it's all the midwestern states, really. Aside from the big cities, most of the counties are still firmly locked in Reaganland, where racism is fashionable, homophobia is like breathing, bullying is a way of life, and they amazingly don't blame corporations, but rather DEMOCRATS, for lost/outsourced jobs.

[mmonk]

7. Personally, the reason I think the tea party Republicans are so

popular with aging whites is racism. Some mistakenly think it's back to being socially acceptable.

[OneGrassRoot]

10. I rant about this a lot...

I grew up in Western PA, have relatives there; was born in Alabama, have relatives there.

Racism and bigotry are not regional and it's been simmering below the surface for three decades. I don't know many things but I KNOW it's at the root of The Tea Party movement for the majority of them.

And it's why they've dissed the term "political correctness" for two decades (thanks to Limbaugh fueling this particular fire since the early 90's): they resent not being able to use all the pejorative words for different races and ethnicities.

But, even though I know they want to scream from the rooftops, "Get the *&*(%^ out of the White House!" -- Limbaugh has successfully brainwashed them into thinking they're really NOT racists and bigots. It's amazing to behold.

The Palin Mob Summer unleashed this pent-up racist anger, imho.

I hope this dies out with our generation, but I fear younger people will be poisoned, and if it's not addressed it'll just go underground and the same eruption will occur in another 30 years.

:(

[mmonk]

12. I've been pleased at the reaction of students

to the resegregation attempts by the tea party candidates. That part gives me hope. However, the older set and the Limbaugh/Beck set kill me when they claim Obama is racist and hates white people. They are currently doing a lot of damage to our society right now.

[OneGrassRoot]

13. Agreed on both counts. :) n/t

[Arugula Latte]

34. Right, thanks to Limbaugh, Beck, Savage, Fox "News," etc.

[JanMichael]

8. I hope the Southern hating DUers read this

racism is an American problem, and is not relegated to states south of the Mason Dixon line.

[OneGrassRoot]

11. Absolutely. n/t

[scheming daemons]

17. Central Pennsylvania is a "confederate" stronghold

These are the idiots that voted in great numbers for Pat Toomey.

[Dappleganger]

36. Southern DU-er here

but we have lived in NH, traveled all over PA and NY state and there are racists/bigots/shitheads all over. Some are more subtle about it until they believe they are in "like" company, then they let loose.

Well said, racism is everywhere.

[AspenRose]

38. "As long as you are South of the Canadian border, you are South."

Brother Malcolm X

[The Doctor.]

9. This is disgusting. It's the same exact kind of ugly people get over all equal rights.

[Altoid_Cyclist]

14. Preaching to the choir.

This Altoona resident couldn't agree more. The overt racism has intensified markedly since Pres. Obama was elected. Even some (too many) of the so-called Democrats in this part of the state voted for McPalin because they didn't want one of "them" as President.

I mean no disrespect for people in the southern states when I use Carville's description of central PA. You just can't believe how many Confederate Battle Flags you see around here. I just don't think that it's a mere coincidence when you realize the amount of racist BS that is a part of life here.

[Lorien]

18. I recently got into a debate with a 60 something year old African American friend of

mine about this topic. I told her that racism, as well as sexism and homophobia, has increased in the past ten years and especially in the past two years. She argued that it's unchanged; that I'm only just noticing what's been there all along. But I'm not just noticing it. Yes, I was very sheltered as a child. i was raised in a racially mixed, very liberal academic community and never even heard a white person say the "N" word anywhere but on the TV until 1996 when I was living in the South. She grew up in a rough area of Chicago that she says is no different now then it was in the 1970's or 80's. But I HAVE heard many more white people-men in particular-saying horribly racist things against blacks and Mexicans in the past few years. They are completely unashamed of their bigotry toward gays, women, and those of other races or religions. There's a social acceptance now of bigotry that didn't exist for at least 25 years in this Country, and I think that it's scary as Hell. I've broken off several friendships recently because the people I knew wrote racist or homophobic crap on their Facebook pages. It's increasing and we can't just sit by and act like this is just a few yahoos exercising their "first amendment rights"-we have to let them know that this crap DOES NOT belong in a civilized society!

And yes, I was in Altoona for an Illustrators convention not so long ago. It is a lot like the southern States up there! :-(

[Altoid_Cyclist]

30. Correct!

This area isn't just racist. They do indeed feel the same way about the various groups that you listed. This is an equal opportunity area when it comes to hate and ignorance.

Toomey, Bill Shuster, John ( I think that gays should be allowed to exist) Eichelberger... these are who the people vote for here.

I'm glad that you only had to be here temporarily. After a while, it gets to be overwhelming having to deal with the locals. We have some good people here of course, but one story really epitomizes this place.

This is from Oct. 2008 and demonstrates the general attitude here. If you didn't see it back then, it's worth reading.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=132x7275200

Let me know if you have to visit this area again in the future. It would be nice to meet a fellow DU'er around here.

[GrpCaptMandrake]

20. Don't feel bad . . .

Remember: even R.E. Lee knew what folks were like in central PA all the way back in 1863. That's why he ordered (whether the order was successful is another story) his troops to be solicitous of the folks as the Army of Northern Virginia marched through Maryland and into Pennsylvania.

It's saddening, but not surprising. Here in WV, the May 2008 Democratic Primary saw literally 21% of the Democrats who voted for Hillary saying they did so because they weren't "ready for one of THOSE in the White House." No. Really.

[Altoid_Cyclist]

32. I have no doubt that those numbers or the reasoning (??) are correct.

Racism and intolerance are the anchors of the human race it seems.

[butterfly77]

26. These are the same people..

"of the so-called Democrats in this part of the state voted for McPalin because they didn't want one of "them" as President."

Who get angry and say blacks only voted for Obama because he was black. Did they all vote for Jesse Jackson or Al Sharpton,Carolyn mosley Braun? What color or race did they vote for in those elections?

[elocs]

15. Racism is taught and learned, and as a boy I don't know how I didn't learn it.

We lived in Memphis when I was 4, having lived in Washington, D.C. when I was 3. My dad was from Mississippi, went to school through the 3rd grade, and his family were poor cotton pickers.

I could remember the women who would babysit me and hearing my dad talk with them and say "yes maam" and "no maam". I played with lots of kids who lived nearby. It wasn't until years later that I learned that the babysitters were black as were most of the kids. At the time nobody had pointed out to me the distinction of skin color and I didn't think anything more of it than the difference in hair color.

When I was 5 we moved up here to La Crosse, WI, a city of still about 50,000 and at that time (late 1950s) was one of the most white cities in the nation. I think there was 1 black family that lived here then.

In the second grade I saw some kids picking on this one other kid and knocking him down. It suddenly struck me like a bolt out of the sky that it was because this other kid was a different color. I was astounded and it really made me think and I remembered the "no maam, yes maam" and so the incident did not make sense to me.

I don't know why an uneducated, poor white man from the south never taught his young son to look down on black people. I only saw my dad one more time after I was 5, but it was the lesson he didn't teach me that was very important and one that stuck.

[hughee99]

19. I must have missed it, what in the article says it was teabaggers

as opposed to your "run-of-the-mill" drunken racists?

[Cali_Democrat]

21. Riiiiiight

I'm sure the racist fans were avid supports of the Dems and Barack Obama.

:sarcasm:

[Freddie Stubbs]

23. Or, like many Americans, they may be apolitical

[hughee99]

35. If I recall correctly from the '08 primaries

roughly 1/2 of us Dems were racists (the Hillary supporters) and the other half were sexists (the Obama supporters). Or perhaps they were one of the overwhelming majority of people who don't vote at all. While all teabaggers might be racists, there are a ton of racists who aren't teabaggers.

[Kolesar]

22. Police are supposed to keep order at games

At professional sports games, those creeps would have been tossed out.

[Freddie Stubbs]

27. You've obviosuly never been to a PSU night game

Everyone has been drinking all day, so the crowd is very rowdy. The game against Nebraska in 2002, for example, where almost half of the stadium was chanting "F*** Nebraska" in unison.

That said, I'm sure that if they had complained to security, action would have been taken. They have cracked down over the last decade, including going after those who throw full soda cups after each PSU touchdown.

[butterfly77]

24. Did they...

thank them for their service?:sarcasm:

[Blue_Tires]

25. stay classy, Penn State fans...

[Festivito]

28. The dumbing down of America even hits its Universities. Sad, sad, sad. /nt

[eppur_se_muova]

42. Football fans have very little to do with universities. It's just cheap entertainment to them.

It's amazing how many "boosters" will spend wads of $$$$ for "their" team but won't donate anything for the universities' educational mission. Fundraisers know not to waste too much time on the boosters -- most will only give to help build a new stadium, fieldhouse, etc.

[Festivito]

46. Well, it is not for the students anymore, but it does pay for itself over and over.

After ticket sales and TV rights, et. al., football makes a fortune and pays for a lot of other sports, all the while being free advertising.

[WilliamPitt]

29. God damn those Southern racists.

Wait.

[GoCubsGo]

31. I'm not surprised

A friend of mine, a black woman, used to date a white man. She'd go up to PA with him to visit his family. On more than one occasion, they were refused service in restaurants because she was with him. Disgusting.

[KamaAina]

33. Wow. Bigotry too extreme for Mellon Scaife's Tribune-Review.

Boggles the mind. :eyes:

[Texasgal]

37. funny thing..

several years ago I visited a family member in Philly. We drove to the poconos for a day trip and stopped off at a small town cafe for lunch.

While we were having lunch a Black man and a White woman entered the cafe... everyone, and I mean EVERYONE stopped to leer at them. There was a table of those Red Hat ladies having lunch and they even put there silverware down. You could hear a PIN drop in this bustling cafe. This lasted for a few moments until the couple left. At first I was confused, I didn't understand why people stopped eating and leered in an unfavorable way at these folks ... It took a few minutes for me to get it and my family members friend ( a life long resident ) to explain.

I was really shocked and disgusted. I realize that racists are everywhere...... but his was a first for me and I am a native Texan!

[Matariki]

39. James Carville is talking about my people. And he's wrong.

They were/are: Educated. Farmers. Democrats. Many of them went to Penn State. They come from the top of that T. Now I know how Southern State Democrats feel.

[Kolesar]

47. I have inlaws in Centre County and they are not like Alabamans

There is a good amount of skepticism and pacifism in the Pennsylvania culture.

Ever go to the Grange Fair?

[tblue37]

40. Penn State should reimburse them the $500 for their tickets, since they ended up

being driven away from the game before it was over.

[CLANG]

41. This is sadly not surprising to me. I think this happens much more than reported.

There are millions of vile racists in this country. We have to stand firmly against it.

[nadinbrzezinski]

43. I am willing to bet that even eight years ago

people would not feel empowered to voice what they think...

Yes, they were racists eight years ago... but no, they would not say it MOSTLY... outside of certain company

The last two years it's just gotten much worst.

It is part of the severe balkanization we are seeing.

[EmeraldCityGrl]

44. I don't think many of us want to admit it

but we are approaching a state of civil unrest that is escalating.

There is nothing post-racial about America and people now
are crawling out of the racist gutters they've been hiding in
for years.

We have laws in place and we need to document these incidents
and be prepared to fight to have them prosecuted. We also have
to stand up for our neighbors and let the racists know we will not
tolerate this ever again.

This just makes me sick to my stomach.

[Lugnut]

45. I've lived here my whole life.

That would be 65 years. I'm embarrassed for my state.