Editorials

Signs of trouble

One message won’t be missed

By the time you read this, those billboards that have caused so much angst in Harrison, Ark., might be changed already. Word has it that the only reason they haven't been changed by now is because the wind and weather has kept workers from getting up there and re-papering the things.

Harrison sure is a pretty town for having such an ugly past. Race riots roiled the place more than 100 years ago. In more recent times, some grand-poobah-or-something with the klan made his home near Harrison. Then, just about a year ago, somebody--somebody anonymous--bought space on a billboard on the U.S. 62/65 bypass that said: "Anti-Racist is a Code Word for Anti-White." Whatever the brave, nameless person who paid for that message might have intended, one thing is for certain: He disappointed his eighth-grade English teacher. Why capitalize all those words?

What, exactly, were the rest of us to think about the sign's message, such that it was? Was it saying that those of us living in 2014 and who are against racism are also against white folks in general? We give up. No amount of stewing over this thing is going to make it make sense.

Then another anonymous person bought space on another billboard close by saying, "Welcome to Harrison. Beautiful town. Beautiful people. No wrong exits. No bad neighborhoods."

Better, but that wrong exit stuff . . . . Some folks say they take that to mean other cities have wrong exits. Or is everybody being overly sensitive when it comes to billboards in Harrison?

Somewhere in the noggin, where good memories go to be stored until needed, we remember driving through the hills of Boone County just outside Harrison back in the early 1980s. On one side of some road there was a green pasture with a few cattle sprinkled about. At the top of the hill stood an apple tree weighed down with the reddest fruit you ever did see. The backdrop was a blue sky with a few clouds painted here and there for effect. At the time we thought it was the most beautiful scene put together by The Maker, and vowed never to forget the sight. Even if we've forgotten the exact time and place.

That's the Harrison, Ark., most of us would like to see. Without billboards interfering with the picture. Especially billboards with nasty messages.

Happily, the leases on both billboards expired back on Nov. 1st, and the folks who bought space on them were told, no thanks, their contracts would not be renewed.

The new wrap that will be put up on the billboards is to go up as soon as the wind dies down. The sooner the better.

And another outfit promises to be heard from. The nice folks at the Calvary Baptist Church have leased one of the billboards and plan to put their own message on it, saying . . . everybody is welcome in Harrison, Arkansas. And you wouldn't expect anything less from church people, bless their hearts. They might remind you of the people in Harrison who, right after the billboards went up last year, began their own campaign, putting up yard signs and printing T-shirts that said "Love Thy Neighbor." Which sounds like good advice, even after all these years. And centuries.

Maybe the rest of us should thank the person who started all this with his anti-racist/anti-white message. After all, if it wasn't for Brer Anonymous, the rest of us might not have experienced all this outpouring of love.

Editorial on 11/20/2014

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