Opinion - RHETA JOHNSON: Jim Crow days are here again

Fishtrap Hollow, MS

Jim Crow days are here again, in Mississippi, this time segregating gays and lesbians from fine, God-and-diversity-fearing citizens. But this latest mossback move to keep business at bay and our poor image intact might not stand.

Why? Because some employers with big payrolls don’t like it.

To paraphrase the Bible, a little car company will lead them. Not so little, because Nissan employs 6,000 people in Mississippi, and the company says it opposes any law that discriminates. This one does. Also on record as opponents are Ingalls shipyard and MGM with its big state casinos.

So when the governor of the Great State of Mississippi signed into law something called the “Protecting Freedom of Conscience from Government Discrimination Act,” an unconstitutional and thinly veiled slap in the face and freedom of the gay community, he might have triggered what might be huge economic repercussions.

One can hope.

Mississippi, always following, rarely leading, isn’t the first state to play with discrimination fire. Ten have. The Georgia governor vetoed a similar effort by yahoos in that state’s legislature after Hollywood threatened to rule out that state as the setting for money-generating movie shoots. Businesses in North Carolina are urging repeal of a law limiting transgender bathroom options in government buildings.

Mississippi isn’t paying any mind to the missteps of others. Why learn from the mistakes of others when you can make your own?

I was expecting out-of-state visitors one day last week and felt like hiding the local newspaper. Here were the headlines:

“Coast religious leaders split on armed guards in places of worship”

“Judge blocks ban on adoption by same-sex couples”

“Coast clerks say they’ll issue licenses to gay couples despite bill” (The aforementioned “Protecting Freedom of Conscience …”)

And that was just the front page. How long, Mississippi, how long?

The Mississippi Legislature manages to keep itself and the courts busy, doing things you might expect in a state that has both the highest potential and lowest success rate in almost any category you could name. Please, you’re saying, give me an example of that ignored Mississippi potential. OK, here’s one.

With the highest percentage of African-Americans in the country except for the District of Columbia, Mississippi could, if it would, become a beacon of how to coexist in an increasingly diversified United States. Already we have more black elected officials and have dug out of a deeper hole than any other state when it comes to race relations. Instead, the legislature spends its time figuring out how to alienate and discriminate against another minority, eclipsing any forward motion we’ve made.

Mississippi arguably produced the nation’s best novelist, William Faulkner, its best short story writer, Eudora Welty, its best playwright, Tennessee Williams, and a host of other writers and musicians. Yet we compete with Alabama to be tops in underfunding public education and throwing stumbling blocks in front of all the arts.

With our abundance of churches – I’m guessing more per capita than any other state – we should have plenty of potential for teaching lessons of love for all of mankind. But, no, not happening, because we’re too busy figuring out how to arm a deacon.

Rheta Grimsley Johnson’s most recent book is “Hank Hung the Moon … And Warmed Our Cold, Cold Hearts.” Comments are welcomed at rhetagrimsley@aol.com.