The creation of an incident to promote a preconceived agenda?
by Al Benson Jr.
In the odd and strange world of those who despise Confederate heritage and symbols many things occur, often defying common sense. I guess this situation could be listed in that catagory until a few more answers are forthcoming.
Back in December of 2006 (it seems so long ago now) there was, so some alleged, a problem with the Confederate flag at Allen Central High School in Floyd County in eastern Kentucky. The way the story went, at least from the media perspective, was that a black basketball player from the private David School in Floyd County was "taunted" by Confederate flag wavers at a game against Allen Central when he came to the line to make a foul shot.
The coach for the David School, Ned Pillersdorf, proceeded to make a big fuss about this alleged "incident" and he sought to get other schools to boycott Allen Central. He also sought cancellation of a game between his team and the Allen Central team that was to be played on the 200th anniversary of Robert E. Lee’s birthday, on January 19th, 2007. The "news" media naturally presented this situation as though the students at Allen Central were little more than a bunch of rednecked racists, waving their "rebel" flags at students of colour to taunt them whenever opportunity arose. Supposedly, Pillersdorf took a vote of his team and they agreed to boycott the January 19th game.
About this time (coincidentally of course) a Rev. Louis Coleman, all the way from Louisville, appeared in Floyd County, complaining loudly about how the Confederate flag was a symbol of slavery and that students that used it as a symbol would not be prepared to deal with a real world in which that horrible symbol had been eliminated. How do you address such hogwash and still keep it printable? Either Rev. Coleman learned this twisted version of "history" at some politically correct government school somewhere, or he hoped that was the situation with his audience. Rev. Coleman would be hard put to document that the Confederate flag was a symbol of slavery, but, then, I supposed he felt if he just made enough noise he might be able to silence his critics without the thorny problem of having to come up with any facts. Those on the political Left usually operate that way.
And speaking of the political Left, Rev. Coleman has had some interesting associates over the years, among them the late Anne Braden, who, with her late husband, Carl Braden, was a member of the Communist Party. There are sources that can be checked out for any interested enough to take the trouble. Coleman once had his picture taken standing next to Anne Braden at a birthday party given for the founder of the Highlander Folk School in Monteagle, Tennessee, a school that has been listed as a "Communist training school" in the Louisiana Report. So it seems that Rev. Coleman’s good buddies are all over on the political far Left. That being the case, what business has he got telling patriotic Americans anything? I don’t know exactly how he showed up in this situation, or what connection, if any, he has with Ned Pillersdorf, but let’s wait and see.
Now, though, the plot thickens! Mr. Pillersdorf sent a letter to the athletic director of Allen Central High School stating that his players had voted unanimously not to play the scheduled game with Allen Central on January 19th. However, there was a small fly in that buttermilk. The administrator of David School, Emma Kriz, issued a press release dealing with all of this in which she said: "I want to set the record straight…The David School’s ball team players never voted to boycott the game at Allen Central." He says they did and she says they didn’t. It would appear, according to Emma Kriz’ press release that the players on the David School team had no real problem playing the scheduled game at Allen Central. He release stated: "The team said they had no problem playing Allen Central." And the allegation about the black player being "taunted" by the Confederate flag seems to be rather largely undocumented. Kriz’ press release stated that there was no evidence that the taunting situation occurred. Does something smell rotten in Floyd County?
In regard to Allen Central High School, the players on the David School team have stated that they realize the Confederate flag used by Allen Central is "just a symbol" and that there has never been any racist intent in it. One player even stated that he had never seen Allen Central fans wave flags at any particular person in a racist way. (Wonder how long he’ll remain on the team after his coach read that!) The David School team did end up playing another team instead of Allen Central on the date in question, but they insisted that the Confederate flag had nothing whatever to do with that decision. One David Schoo player made quite a revelatory comment when he said that he had no bad feelings toward Allen Central but that: "…now everything’s been turned into something it’s not." Good observation on his part. That is exactly what has happened. Allen Central has been branded as a nest of racists (and even that word is becoming a bit suspicious) when they have done absolutely nothing to deserve that reputation. One has to wonder why and whose agenda is at play here.
Why did Pillersdorf create a mountain out of something that wasn’t even a molehill, and why did this Rev. Coleman from the Left-wing environs of Louisville show up to put his two cents worth in? Since Allen Central seems to be an all-white school, is there some sort of behind-the-scenes ploy going forward to create some sort of busing situation whereby they bus in black kids to Allen Central from somewhere else and bus some of Allen Central’s white kids out to a black area somewhere? I realise that sounds a bit far out, but you do have to wonder just what is going on here. Are supposed "racism" and the Confederate flag being used as scapegoats to promote some other agenda?
It is worthy of note that, years ago, when the Marxists promoted some project it was often two-pronged, in ;that it was engineered so that it would accomplish two different goals with the one action–more bang for your buck!
So it seems that, in the final analysis, Allen Central seems to be guilty of exactly nothing. The "news" media should now take some pains to report that fact. And then, if they are really interested in investigative journalism (which I doubt) they should start digging into just why this phoney situation came up in the first place. However, on that last part, folks, I ain’t holding my breath!
Copyright © 2006-2007 Al Benson, Jr.
On The Web: http://www.albensonjr.com/gollyned.shtml
