South Carolina Ping
Posted on 06/12/2005 3:25:21 PM PDT by QwertyKPH
MYRTLE BEACH, S.C.(AP) _ If Crystal Hunt and Marquita Jackson were looking to draw attention, they succeeded. Wolf whistles and honking horns followed the bikini-clad duo as they strutted down Ocean Boulevard.
Hunt was wearing a red-white-and-blue Confederate battle flag wrap over her white two-piece, Jackson a bra bearing the familiar diagonal blue cross and white stars co-opted by the Ku Klux Klan. You could say the two black women were thumbing their noses at the NAACP's 5-year-old boycott of South Carolina except for one thing: Neither of the 21-year-old North Carolina women had any idea there even was a boycott.
The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People started the boycott in 2000 to get the Confederate battle flag off the South Carolina statehouse dome. That goal was achieved in July of that year, but the organization continued the sanctions when the flag was moved to a memorial on the statehouse grounds _ a place of honor the group feels the flag doesn't deserve.
But judging from the columns of black motorcyclists zooming up and down the Grand Strand during the recent ``Black Bike Week,'' few are heeding the call.
``I spend my money wherever I want to,'' Jackson, a stay-at-home mom from Fayetteville, N.C., said defiantly as she headed for the beach Memorial Day weekend. ``They don't give it to me.''
In the heady early days of the boycott, business and civic organizations canceled conventions at Palmetto State venues and pickets stood vigil at highway welcome centers. The National Collegiate Athletic Association, under pressure from black coaches, declared a moratorium on scheduling new events in South Carolina or Mississippi, whose state flag incorporates the Confederate banner.
The NCAA moratorium still stands, and some presidential candidates campaigning in the state last year were careful to bring their own food and stay at supporters' homes to avoid feeding the local economy. But the boycott has largely slipped from the public eye and out of most people's minds.
``I'll be honest with you, we no longer see any significant or measurable impact from that _ haven't since the flag came down,'' said Marion Edmonds, spokesman for the Department of Parks, Recreation & Tourism.
The NAACP insists the boycott is still having an effect. But hard numbers are difficult to come by.
If there has been an effect, it is not reflected in tourism-related tax collections, Edmonds said. According to his agency, accommodations tax receipts increased $3.5 million during the boycott period, and admissions tax collections grew $2.5 million _ slow but steady.
Edmonds thinks event planners saw the removal of the flag from the statehouse dome _ where it was raised to commemorate the centennial of the Civil War and remained flying in defiance of the civil rights movement _ as ``a good-faith effort.''
Steve Camp, president of the Midlands Authority for Conventions Sports and Tourism in the state capital of Columbia, said he still fields calls about whether the boycott is on _ and still has people tell him they'll take their convention business elsewhere.
``I don't know that we lose money,'' he said. ``I think that we lose opportunity.''
For instance, Camp would love to pursue the NCAA men's basketball tournament, but he knows that's a nonstarter as long as that flag remains on the statehouse grounds. In the meantime, he's grateful that organizations like the Eastern Intercollegiate Athletic Association _ a small conference of historically black Southern colleges _ agreed to return its basketball tournament to Columbia this year.
``We just need to leave that issue alone,'' said conference President Willie Jefferson. ``We can call for that boycott from now to the 22nd century, and things still will not change.''
Dwight James, executive director of the NAACP's state conference, said the need to maintain the boycott transcends mundane economics. He said one need only have attended the black biker festival over the Memorial Day holiday in Myrtle Beach to witness ``the Confederate mentality'' that he sees as still rampant in South Carolina.
When the predominantly white Carolina Harley-Davidson Dealers Association held its annual rally in the beach resort the week before, traffic along Ocean Boulevard was the usual two-way affair. But when the black riders came to town, orange cones went up, and the popular strip was limited to southbound traffic only.
For two years, the NAACP has battled the city in federal court over what the organization sees as an ``apartheid traffic pattern'' imposed during the five-day festival.
Though angry over the one-way traffic and jacked-up hotel rates, the black bikers were not going to let their fun in the sun be spoiled by a perceived hostile environment _ or by a boycott called by NAACP officials.
``I mean, they represent me and stuff, but at the same time they do expect a whole lot,'' said Maurice Christian, a 28-year-old car dealer from Raleigh, N.C.
Some visitors questioned the very logic of the boycott. Sitting in a lawn chair outside his hotel on the strip, Lamar Banks, an Air Force staff sergeant from Hampton, Va., said:
``Most of the people working in these hotels, cleaning the rooms, sitting at the front desk are African-American. So if we don't come down here, then we're taking money out of their pocket and food off their table. How's that helping us as a whole?''
Hunt, one of the bathing suit rebels, feels the NAACP should be focusing on more important things, like educating poor black youth. If the boycott hasn't achieved its objective in five years, she said, it never will.
``It's silly,'' said Hunt, a criminal justice student at Fayetteville State University. ``It's a new millennium. Everybody's not worried about a flag.''
New title "Showing the Poverty Pimps the Pimp Hand"
More importantly, it clearly demonstrates the apathy towards the NAACP and its demands.
They should never be taken seriously again.
Two cuties out struttin' it in bikinis in this story, and NO photos? Isn't there some kind of rule about that sort of thing on FR?
I'm bein' discriminated against! I protest!!
A.A.C.
The NAACP put itself out of business with it's excesses.
Everyone should ignore the NAACP. There's no point in listening to anything they say any more. (Like there ever was.)
This says it all.
``It's silly,'' said Hunt, a criminal justice student at Fayetteville State University. ``It's a new millennium. Everybody's not worried about a flag.''
This photo sounds familiar. I saw something like this on a FReeper's profile... Found it.
http://us.news3.yimg.com/us.i2.yimg.com/p/ap/20050601/capt.scwg60106012117.naacp_boycott_scwg601
Take the example of Arizona and the MLK, Jr. holiday. I believe that the NFL was going to pull Superbowl XXX if the MLK holiday was not implemented. All the press coverage calculated the value of the Superbowl, the impact on hotels, room taxes, restaurants, etc. etc. etc. But the reality was not zero business in the absence of the Superbowl - it could have been the American Dog Breeders Association conference and tons of professional meetings, etc. etc. etc. Not necessarily as valuable as the Superbowl - but no doubt the presence of the Superbowl in a given city on a given date - deflects some discretionary travel away from that location (e.g. - I'm not going to Atlanta, are you kidding? With the superbowl there that week the place will be nuts, let's go to Phoenix instead.") Someone should be calculating the net value of event X not being held in a given city or state.
The initial coverage of the NAACP effort assumed a great deal - and vastly overstated the dollar impact. It also vastly overstated the ignorance of some people, such as those mentioned in the lead, completely unaware of the existence of the boycott in the first place. Sheesh!
Yes! Common sense is breaking out all over!
Right...that's a Dixie flag not a white flag and Blacks are very much a part of Dixie and should wear it proudly.
What's so amusing about that is that if you worked in the NFL Headquarters in NYC you did not have MLK day off. Go figure!
They were waving the flag of the union long before they hijacked our flag.
Because even the a-hole kkk is free to do so.
And I was just down there a few months ago spending lots of tourist dollars in Charleston and Hilton Head.
Next time I travel there on vacation, I'll be sure to boycott. If I remember.
What if they had a boycott, and everyone came---LOL!
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