Perhaps one of the better outcomes of all this talk about songs and mascots at Fort Smith Southside High School is the introduction of a bunch of new folks to that gravelly voiced Arkansan Levon Helm and The Band's rendition of "The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down." Just the fact that "Dixie" is in its name might convince people it's not worthy of a listen, but that'd be a shame. It's a mighty fine song, selected by Rolling Stone as No. 245 on its list of the 500 greatest songs of all time.
Fort Smith's relatively civil war over modern-day sensitivities and the traditions of its second high school -- opened in 1963 -- focused on a different song, "Dixie," and the Rebel mascot selected by the student body early in the school's existence. That happened at a time when black students segregated to the city's Lincoln High School were attempting -- with local resistance -- to transfer to the all-white Northside High School.
What’s the point?
The pride of Fort Smith Southside can live on “with a beam strong and bright” without a fight song and mascot that harken back to segregationist times.
No matter the history of the traditions' origins, in Southside's 50-plus-year history the school has undoubtedly graduated many fine people who sang "Dixie" and showed their Rebel pride without an ounce of racism or hatred in their bodies. It was, for many, symbols of their high school allegiance and unity.
High schools can often be parochial places for students. For a few years, high school becomes their community. Whatever relationships exist, whatever attitudes flourish, whatever cliques develop, it's defined by that largely confined atmosphere and not by what happens outside a high school's walls. It is hard for strangers to understand how symbols often associated with racism could possibly mean anything different, but high school environments everywhere encourage a myopic focus on school traditions. How else can one explain deeply held allegiances, flags, songs and uniforms dedicated to Elks, Bulldogs, Tigers, Grizzly Bears, Wildcats, Wolverines or, hold on, even a red Hog?
But life does go on outside those walls. And in extraordinary circumstances, what happens in the "real world" invades. The tumultuous civil rights battles of the early 1960s clearly set the stage for Southside's selection of its mascot. And although the Rebel and "Dixie" left many feeling uncomfortable in recent decades, it took an external shock to the system to finally dislodge them from their inertia -- nine people shot in a Charleston, S.C., church by a man who also embraced Civil War-era imagery as symbolism for racial hatred.
Southside's traditions needed to change not because they fostered racial hatred in the hearts of the student body. They needed to change because symbols don't mean only what the school wants them to mean. As a community, Fort Smith would only be seen as racially insensitive at the least and potentially bigoted by those without benefit of experiencing the school's traditions from the inside.
On July 27, the Fort Smith School board voted to immediately end Southside's association with the song "Dixie." By the 2016-17 school year, a new mascot will be in place. The loss of more than 50 years of tradition understandably hurts those who attended the school, but continuing with those symbols would have been affirmation that Fort Smith schools, in 2015, are not ready to cast aside ties to the segregationist sympathies that gave birth to them in the first place. Fort Smith as a community could hardly want to be seen through such a lens, and does not deserve to be.
On the one hand, we commend the school board. On the other, it's unfortunate its members failed to fully accept the yoke of leadership by simply casting their votes, after 90 minutes of public feedback, and not offering their own perspectives about the change. In situations like this, leaders can embrace the rare opportunity to begin the healing process and to bring the community to a new understanding of its better self. This school board voted and moved on. That's certainly their prerogative, but it represented a missed opportunity to go beyond a vote and lead.
Let those who still simmer over this change also realize their high school experiences and those of their children are not erased or somehow diminished as a result of this change. Neither "Dixie" nor the Rebel mascot were what defined those years spent together with friends in the final stages of the transition of children into adults. Those memories and bonds are reflected so much more accurately by a different song.
Southside High, we hail you
And hold your honor high.
Never will we fail you;
Your glory cannot die.
Your colors we'll remember,
The white, the red, the blue!
Your memories live forever.
Our youthful hearts are true.
Like a torch in the night,
With a beam strong and bright
We will stand til we die
To proclaim you're the best
SOUTHSIDE HIGH!
Commentary on 07/31/2015