Posted on 12/05/2006 5:42:24 AM PST by WKB
ACKSON, Miss. (Dec. 5) - For Mississippian Rick Looser, the last straw came on an airline flight a couple of years ago when a 12-year-old Connecticut boy sitting next to him asked: "Do you still see the KKK on the streets every day?"
That prompted the advertising executive to spend his own money on a campaign to dispel Mississippi's image as a forlorn state of poor, illiterate, racist good ole boys.
"Mississippi has more black elected officials than any other state in the country," Looser said. "The old stereotype of the short, fat, white, bald men in suits smoking cigars just doesn't carry weight."
Looser's campaign - "Mississippi, Believe It!" - doesn't shy from the fact that the state has a segregationist past, or that national studies consistently put it near the bottom in education and near the top in poverty and obesity. But through a Web site, posters, T-shirts and other merchandise, it seeks to show another side.
One of the slogans - "No Black. No White. Just the Blues."
points out that the state is the birthplace of the blues and home to such greats as B.B. King, Bo Diddley and Muddy Waters.
Another says, "In Mississippi, We Always Have Our Hand Out. But It's Usually to Give, Not Receive," pointing out that for eight years in a row Mississippians have given more per capita to charity in relation to income than residents of any other state.
The debate over exactly what Mississippi has to offer came to the forefront last month when Rep. Charles Rangel, D-N.Y. said to The New York Times: "Mississippi gets more than their fair share back in federal money, but who the hell wants to live in Mississippi?" Rangel apologized days later.
Looser plans to send Rangel a shirt with the slogan: "Yes, we can read and a few of us can even write," which is part of a campaign to highlight the state's literary giants such as William Faulkner, Eudora Welty, Tennessee Williams and John Grisham.
"If he is truly sorry, we want his staff to take a picture of him in the shirt and send it to us," Looser said. "That will close the chapter on his apology."
Looser has spent about $300,000 overall on the year-old campaign.
Looser, president of The Cirlot Agency in suburban Jackson, said the biggest stumbling block remains Mississippi's turbulent racial history. Several of his ads meet this head-on, including one that touts the state's status in electing blacks. The slogan? "Meet a Few of Our New `Good Ole Boys."'
Mark Potok, director of the Southern Poverty Law Center's Intelligence Project, which monitors hate groups, agreed that Mississippi doesn't always deserve such a bad rap.
"People think that the Klan and white supremacist groups in general are Southern artifacts, but that simply is not the truth," he said. "We see as many hate groups, and certainly as many hate crimes, in Northern and even coastal states. It's a cliche that has some residual truth, but essentially doesn't describe the situation as it is anymore."
But even Potok couldn't help taking a fun jab at Mississippi: "Over here in Alabama, we say, `Thank God for Mississippi' or else we'd be last in everything."
Looser has also sent his "Mississippi, Believe It!" posters to every school in the state, seeking to instill a sense of pride in youngsters by showing others who have made it from the state.
Such as world-class entertainers Elvis Presley, Morgan Freeman, Faith Hill and Leontyne Price, sports greats Brett Favre and Walter Payton, and Dr. James Hardy, who performed the world's first lung transplant and the first transplant of a chimpanzee heart into a human.
"I have kids in school and I want them to see those wonderful people and know that being raised in Mississippi is not a disadvantage," Looser said. "It's an advantage and they can be anything they want to be."
Mississippi ping
I feel his pain, people up north have such an astounding amount of ignorance when it comes to the south. Sucks for him that his name is Looser though. I know he gets some serious crap for that name.
I call Mississippi "God's Country" myself.
Sterotypes don't work here anymore. Growing up in Marshall county in NW Miss., I never knew of any Klan or anything in my area. I go to Hawaii on spring break from college in 1988, and the lady there hearing my southern drawl thinks I'm from Texas. No I say I am from MS. She immediately asks if I am in the KKK, as "Mississippi Burning" was a movie out at the time.
Fast forward to the mid 90's, and the KKK had a rally in Memphis. There wer no local area KKK present, it was some from PA and IN.
At least his parents didn't name him Sore...
Most people don't know that the KKK at its height was biggest in Indiana, not a southern state.
This is great. I think. But on second thought, do we really want a lot of people finding out how great our state really is? We might get overrun! Maybe it's best to just keep the secret to ourselves. ;~)
And we agree 100% AGAIN!!
Bought my Christmas Present yet?
Still trying to decide what you might like. Hmmmm.... what to do, what to do?
To all: I am not posting a "post and run" here
but I must leave for a while
DSL from Bell South would be nice.
Pre Katrina Mississippi gulf coast was a beautiful area and from what I have read it is fast recovering and will once again be beautiful.
I'm also impressed by the residents almost total lack of whining as compared with residents of New Orleans.
They seem to have an attitude of, "let's just get it done and go on with our lives" while many people of New Orleans still have their hands out to the government waiting for the tax payers to make everything right again.
The biggest racists nowadays: Jackson, Sharpton, Rangel.
Good point. Remember what happened to northern Virginia, south Florida, metro Atlanta, and parts of North Carolina when Northeasterners swarmed into these area, fleeing their Yankee hellholes. However, they also changed the culture from that of the traditional South to that of a suburban county in the Northeast. A new breed of politician arose in these areas who more resembled Ted Kennedy or Chuck Schumer than Jesse Helms or John Stennis.
It might be best not to publicize Mississippi and let liberals assume the worst.
Only if people, like yourself, mistakenly spell and pronounce "loser".
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