My sister, Stephanie, is the wife of William Quick a frequent troll here. She is upset that I write a lot about South Carolina, the place she and William chose as a retirement home. Stephanie feels I ought not to make an issue of their choice of a place to live.
Dear Steph,
You wrote objecting to the coverage of South Carolina on THE Ave.
“If you choose to pick on Southern states, you have quite a choice, so picking on SC appears to be a blatant attempt to get my goat. Especially as you sprinkle your texts with comments like “I have relatives who chose to live there but I doubt I would ever want to visit their home”and “I write a lot about South Carolina, the place where my sister has chosen to live. As a peaceful person, I find it difficult to imagine her choosing to live in a place where violence is celebrated…” Your commentary about SC would read the same without these statements. In addition, such commentary appears to deliberately indicate to the readers that Bill and I must be horrible people because we live here”.
You are correct, South Carolina is only one of the unrepentant States of the Confederacy. The image I attach to these “South Carolina” posts is intended to provoke people like yourself who choose to live there. The image would bother me too, if I lived there .
My attention was drawn to South Carolina for several reasons, your choice was only one of these. If you read TA, I have said several times that South Carolina is not the only place the hateful heritage is still celebrated. However, the same could be said about Austria’s role in preserving the heritage of the Third Reich. Do the problems in Greece exempt Austria from blame for the way it perpetuates its Nazi heritage? Is South Carolina OK because of Mississippi and Texas?
I understand that you feel goaded. I feel the same about far worse accusations you have made publicly about me .. accusations that have included public charges, filed in court, of theft and assertion that I hated my father. You even defamed my reputation in emails to Michael Young, the President of University of Washington. Of course there is also your horrible effort to prevent me from making our father’s legacy in the liberation of Buchenwald available to the survivors and to the public. Is that also an issue you do not want discussed publicly?
Of course I do not know why you and William chose to become South Carolinians. Perhaps you chose to live there because you did not want to pay taxes? Or perhaps you enjoy low prices because workers there do not get a minimum wage? Or, you may enjoy the antebellum charm of Charleston. Or maybe you like the weather? Having, myself, visited Charleston once, I could understand that.
I use your choice to live in a place like this because your choice and the family feud provide context for my writing baut the persistent racism of the Confederate states. I could also write about relatives we have in Alabama or friends and relatives I have in Georgia. The relatives in Alabama, however, moved there because of opportunities to create a business, not as a place to retire. Unlike yourselves, their stories are rooted in the efforts of Jewish families to find places they could make a living. Most of my friends in Georgia are Black and, for the record, I do give them a very hard time for not working harder to take control of their state. My relatives in Georgia are pretty wonderful people who belong to a community that does good things in Atlanta. They are proud of their community’s Tikkun. Also for the record, I very much enjoy visiting Atlanta and, thanks to your questions, will write more about my experiences in that wonderful city.
Perhaps the closest family I have that is comparable to your own issues, are my relatives in Florida. Of course the good news there is that Jews in Florida have people like Wendy Marcus to look up to. Maybe I should write about aspiring politicians in South Carolina who are following her path? Are there any?
For that matter, I also do not know much about your own politics. You are currently represented by Paul Thurmond, the son of a man many would rank with an American version of a Nazi. Do you support Paul? Is he in his father’s image? I assume my friends and relatives in Georgia are supporting Michelle Nunn for Senate. Who are you supporting in the South Carolina race? Is it Lee Bright, the man who raffled of an AR 15 to support his campaign? Are you planning to vote for Nikki Haley after her choice of a CCC member as a campaign co chair? I hope the answer to all of these questions is “no” but it must be difficult to live in a place where there are few good choices.
In this feud we talk a lot about our father. Let me finish by telling you something about Mom. Do you know how we came to live in Hyde Park? That was her decision. After they got married she chose to build their home and practice in a Catholic neighborhood because, Mom believed the Jewish communities of Boston, even newly affluent places like Milton and Newton, were a form of ghetto. Do you remember our wonderful friendships with the Sayers? Did you think the Christmas stockings with small gifts from Dad’s patients were an accident? Do you remember Representative Feeney or our neighbor, the reformed Nazi?
I realize politics are a very personal matter. You have no reason to respond to these questions. However, I suspect that may readers of TA would be interested in your perspectives of life in South Carolina.
As I have offered before, you would be welcome to post here.
Be good.