God Bless Maryland? Goddamn Maryland!
Like most sports fans who grew up inside the beltway in the 1970s, I rooted for the University of Maryland. Rooted hard. The Terps basketball teams under Lefty Driesell were as lovable and entertaining as any local squad in any sport in my lifetime — where have you gone, Ernie Graham? — and I screamed for 'em through what I remember as last-second loss after last-second loss after last-second loss to Dean Smith. (Coach K is more despicable than Smith, for sure, but I'm too old and burned out by those years to work up the same bile for him that I had for Smith.)
But, after getting sorta immersed in the Terps' athletic and racial history over the last few months while preparing a story about a guy named Wilmeth Sidat-Singh for this week's issue, it's hard to feel anything but hate for the school and the state.
Historically, Maryland might have the worst combination of a liberal veneer and a racist foundation of any state in the union. You don't have to know much more than what happened to Sidat-Singh back in 1937 to figure that out.
Rather than retell the whole story here, let's just say a whole lotta people should be burning in hell for the way the state's flagship university denied Sidat-Singh a chance to play ball because he was the wrong kind of black.
Sidat-Singh was 19 years old at the time.
Sure, it was a long time ago. But, far as I can tell, the school has not only never apologized for the organized and contractual hate it directed at the teenager — it's never even acknowledged any wrongdoing.
Somebody in the administration in College Park or the statehouse in Annapolis should step up.
11:49 am
"Historically, Maryland might have the worst combination of a liberal veneer and a racist foundation of any state in the union."
Then again, it might not. Take a stand McKenna.
12:12 pm
Eaton:
two words: Massachusetts!
"maybe"s and "might have"s are for sissies, for sure, but i only know more about maryland because of geography. and, being a native of Virginia, a state that elects noose-lovin' macaca-haters, and spending the last two-plus decades in DC, which has as embarrassing and hateful a racial history as anybody -- look up DC schools pre-1954 and get back to me -- i don't feel right slamming other states too much...there's a whole lotta evil out there, guy.
but, thanks for playing the feud!
12:43 pm
First black ACC football player: Maryland
First black ACC basketball player: Maryland
First black ACC basketball coach: Maryland
Get your liberal head out of your liberal ass!
1:00 pm
Charles '78:
First black ACC football player: 1963
First black ACC basketball player: 1965
First black ACC basketball coach: 1986
yeah, you SHOULD be proud of that, Charlie! from your tone, i'd bet those racial milestones came to your school far too early for your liking. if you're actually boasting about that history -- and you are boasting, aren't you Charlie? -- you must be some piece of work. good god.
but, thanks for playing the feud!
1:27 pm
Massachusetts definitely has more than it's fair share of racism, but if you're going to talk about "history" than I think you've got to give it credit for being one of the most abolotionist states in the North. Now that all occured a long time ago, but you did say "historically".
And re: DCPS. I would certainly not defend segregation, but I ask you: would you rather send your children to pre-1954 DC schools or to the ones we got nowadays? At least back then students got an education along with the injustice of segregation. Now they just get the segregation part.
(I don't have Dream City in front of me, but I do recall it saying that DCPS, even the segregated ones, were actually pretty decent before the politicization of the school board [and White and middle-class Black flight] destroyed them).
2:12 pm
Reid:
it ain't like the city schools started with a clean slate in 1954. without DC's clearly defined US vs THEM situation pre-Brown vs. Board of Education, surely the post-1954 collapse of the schools wouldn't have been so severe. school segregation was just one symptom of a larger evil that did a number on this city that it won't get over in my lifetime.
having said that, this issue is about as complicated as the meaning of life, and i have no special insight into that, either, so i better stop here before my head explodes.
3:11 pm
True, but I guess I thought you were implying that the Black DC schools were in terrible shape before 1954. My impression is that while they were worse than the White schools of the time, they were comparatively better (and certainly closer to the regional norm) than our modern schools, which aren't even that much less segregated.
I'm not so sure I agree that it was the "us vs. them" attitude that resulted in the catastrophic decline of DCPS, the MPD, and DC as a whole. I suscribe to the Dream City idea that it had more to do with the history of Home Rule (or lack thereof). I believe that if there were more of a history of local governance by the time Home Rule occured, we wouldn't have been stuck with an awful government of Barry (which, imo was the single most detrimental element in the history of the city's decline). Before the late 60's, there was literally no civic engagement. How can you expect either a "good government" class or an effective political machine to emerge from that?
Plenty of other cities had worse segregation and "us vs. them" attitudes than DC, yet few of them had as such a percipitous decline (and the ones that were as bad normally had a huge loss of factory jobs [e.g. Baltimore and Detroit], which didn't happen here). That's because they had more of a culture of civic engagement. As one senator said of DC (I'm paraphrasing) "I've seen good governments that can't deliver good services, and I've seen corrupt governments that could deliver good services, but DC is a corrupt government that can't deliver good services".
3:51 pm
Reid: you can't get more segregated than 100 percent, which is what DC schools were pre-1954, so I don't know what you mean by "worse" segregation. i wasn't around for the old system, so everything i know about the segregated schools comes from reading old newspaper stories about such things as the shift of the building on 13th St. from white Central High School to black Cardozo High School. get this: "separate but equal" was a hoax!
my head's hurting, Reid. seriously. let's stick to sports-related hate for now. please!
4:28 pm
Ok fine. I hate Maryland too, but it's because I hate all ACC teams. Big East forever!
(But just cause I can't let anything go: I wasn't saying that the pre-1954 schools weren't completely segregated. I was saying that they were of better quality relative to the White and suburban schools of their day than our current schools are. So while our schools are (somewhat) less separate, they're even less equal).
4:50 pm
Reid:
ok, reid, i accept your last word: Legally segregated schools are the way to go!