Racist Ozark Tea Party Makes It Hard to Be Proud of My Hometown

*Note* I’m continuing my trend of finally writing about topics that interest me long after they initially broke. My apologies.

It’s a shame to be unproud of your hometown, but my hometown, Mountain Home, Ark., makes it pretty damn easy to be so.

For the second time in just a few years Mountain Home made national news for doing something extremely prejudiced. A few years ago the city made national news when the local Harps grocery store inserted a censorship sticker over rock and roll hall of famer Elton John and his husband David Furnish with their adopted child on a magazine cover.

A few weeks ago the city entered the news again when Ozark Tea Party board member Inge Marler told a racist joke at a Tea Party rally in Mtn. Home on June 9. Speaking in a fake black dialect Marler said:

“A black kid asks his mom, ‘Mama, what’s a democracy?’

“‘Well, son, that be when white folks work every day so us po’ folks can get all our benefits.’

“‘But mama, don’t the white folk get mad about that?’

“‘They sho do, son. They sho do. And that’s called racism.’”

The joke itself was disgusting enough, but the truly repulsive thing about the story is that the large crowd of around 500 people had a rather warm reaction to the joke, as reported by the local newspaper The Baxter Bulletin.

Not a single person in attendance stood up and said something or even walked out in disgust. Everybody just seemed to be OK with the racially insensitive joke. In fact, it wasn’t until being approached by a reporter of the Baxter Bulletin after the rally that Ozark Tea Party founder Richard Caster admitted that the joke was in bad taste.

This leads me to believe that Caster, who in 2010 became the youngest elected official in Arkansas history when he was elected to the Baxter County Quorum Court, is frankly incompetent at his leadership duties and should have effectively resigned his position. A true leader would have immediately realized the problem, condemned Marler’s joke and apologized for her actions and wouldn’t have waited until he realized that he’d been caught by the press to do so; Caster, by the way, on his website claims that he “will always lead my life with honesty, integrity and hard work.” His leadership in this situation doesn’t fit his statement.

Marler’s joke and Caster’s handling of it aren’t the only ones at fault in the situation. Anybody who laughed at the joke or really even remained in the audience after its telling was supporting racism and prejudices.

The fact that not a single person objected to the joke doesn’t mean that everybody in the room was a racist, but it does mean that they’re OK with racism, which is pretty much just as bad.

The Tea Party has a bad image all across the country for being racist or at least supporting racism. Despite the fact that many Tea Party members denounce this as fact; the Ozark Tea Party has done a damn good job at either proving the image to be true or at least furthering the image.     

Now, this is only one group of people in a city of over 12,000 residents, but there certainly seems to be a recurring theme of insensitivity, racism, prejudice and hatred in Mountain Home. When a city of this size is making national news multiple times in a short span for these reasons then there is a serious problem. I’d like to be proud of the city where I graduated high school and shared many of my most precious memories, but I can’t be proud of it right now.

It's Hard Out Here for a Cicada

I was witness to some pretty weird/interesting/cool (all wrapped into one) nature activity going on as I both walked into work on Wednesday morning and left work on Wednesday evening. As I walked from the parking lot in Conway Regional Medical Center, where I’m a cashier in the hospital cafeteria, I witnessed what I thought to be a rather large bee feasting on an upside down, deceased locust, with another dead locust close by its side. I found it both unique and horrifying at the same time, but didn’t really have time to stick around and watch as I stepped to the side of the flying insect’s meal in an attempt not to attract it to myself from its current prey.

Immediately upon seeing this I felt it would be a bad omen for the day at work. The day turned out to be extremely busy and long and certainly wasn't one of my favorite days ever at work, but it really wasn’t as bad as I expected. I figured that I was going to be the dead locust and the hospital would be the hungry bee; you know, because I think of allegorical shit like that when I’m sleepwalking into work.

After clocking out from the long day’s occupation I made the long trek to the very end of the parking lot and much to my amazement right in front of my eyes was a bee again (maybe the same one, maybe not) in flight with its dead locust prey attached to it, which was quite an impressive feat considering that the dead insect body was bigger than its hunter.

These images stuck with me and interested me enough to look this up when I got home. The primary thing bothering me about the entire thing was that I didn’t realize bees were carnivorous. Turns out bees aren’t carnivorous. After doing some Googling I found an entomologist who answered another person’s question (who must’ve been witness to similar strange sights as I) on Yahoo! Answers. The insect that I thought was a bee was actually a type of wasp simply called the cicada killing wasp (do you realize how much of badass you must be of a creature to be named after what you do/kill?). Oh, by the way, the dead insect wasn’t a locust either, but a cicada, which proves that I’m certainly no expert on insect life forms.

According to this entomologist the cicada killing wasp is a real bastard (OK, that’s my word, not his). He said: “The wasps dig a burrow in the ground, go off and sting and paralyze a cicada noisily strumming away high in the trees [this is what I witnessed before work] and then bodily fly it back [this is what I witnessed after work] to the burrow and carry it down in inside. The burrow has several chambers and several paralyzed cicadas are placed into each chamber (sounds like the serial killer of the insect world). One egg is laid on the last cicada placed in the chamber and the chamber is sealed.”

The relationship between the cicada and the cicada killing wasp is one that I think really represents life for myself and probably most of us in this world we live in. Some days you’re the cicada killing wasp conquering all and nothing can stop you and some days you’re the cicada being stung and paralyzed by all that surrounds you in life. Unfortunately, for me (and I’m sure most people I know) there are a lot more days that leave me feeling like the cicada than the cicada killing wasp. 

Some days you're the cicada killing wasp, but most you're the cicada.

Little Rock Christian Academy Makes Decidedly Un-Christian Move

*Note* OK, so I’ve been meaning to write about this for a couple of weeks now and just haven’t gotten around to it … now that it’s old news I guess it’s time for me to do it.

When I started this blog I intended it to be for topics outside of my usual writings (entertainment and sports). Topics that I was interested in like politics, human rights, morals, wrongs and rights in this country and the world. I honestly didn’t really think that I’d ever write about a local incident (thought there doesn’t seem to be a shortage of them around) that I found despicable, but here I am early on in this blog doing just that …

A couple of weeks ago I either read or was told about a story in the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette about the Little Rock Christian Academy rejecting a student who they initially were going to accept when they found out that the child was a Mormon.

The 35-year old Christian Academy no longer allows members of the Mormon Church to attend its school because as school board member Carla Emanuel puts it in a quote from the ADG: “It’s very, very sneaky when people come in, especially in elementary and junior high grades where the kids are very influenced. It’s frightening how quickly things can get turned around. They are called to do that, which is fine. But then start a Mormon school.” (By the way, it’s interesting how people are OK with being outed as bigots by having themselves quoted in newspapers)

Emanuel’s quote today about a Mormon student being allowed into LR Christian Academy honestly doesn’t sound much different than what I’m sure some white people were saying back in 1957 when nine African-American students tried to integrate Little Rock’s Central High School. However, people do more frequently and freely seem to throw their bigotry around when they feel like they’re backed up by religion.

I understand that the Little Rock Christian Academy is a private school and that private schools can dictate who they allow into their schools and why they will or won’t let someone into their school, but I’ve got to say that what Little Rock Christian Academy has done in this scenario goes beyond that because it seems to be completely against everything they are supposed to be about. Not allowing a Mormon student into their school because he is different (it’s a four-year old kid by the way who likely doesn’t know Mormonism from Jupiter) is decidedly un-Christian. It’s bigotry. It’s prejudice. It’s hate. That’s evident in quotes like those of Emanuel’s. If this is the kind of stuff that the Little Rock Christian Academy stands for than I’d hate to see the kind of adults they turn out. Is the school a breeding ground for bigots? It’s probably not, but if many of them are taught to treat other religions, other peoples differently than maybe, at the same time, it is. I’m sure most of the students will follow the lead of their institution. If this is the lead that they’re following than I feel they’re being poorly educated in the ways of true Christianity.

I don’t see how parents can allow their children to remain enrolled at the Little Rock Christian Academy when seeing the school participate in something as un-Christian as not allowing a student because their faith is different than the majority of the others. I don’t care how great a school may be academically if they’re showing my children that it’s OK to banish those who aren’t like us.

Upon seeing this story I don’t believe it’s right or fair for this school to include the word Christian in their name. I feel bad for the young boy and his family who’ve been refused and I also feel bad for the students attending this school, for fear they’ve been shown the wrong way.