I'd Rather be Dead Anywhere than Alive in Mississippi

Of all the states in the United States of America, Mississippi is an entity unlike any other.

Last week we were reading a survey that said that Mississippians consider themselves the most religious, above and beyond the residents of any other state.

This week we've already found out that they never got around to ratifying the Thirteenth Amendment abolishing slavery, and only did so after a recent immigrant from India pointed out that somehow they'd forgotten to do that.

Phew.  So now that's over all the slaves in Mississippi are finally free!

In case you've forgotten, Mississippi has the highest teen pregnancy rate in the Union.  It also usually wins the "Fattest" and "Poorest" state prizes.

It's been a while since it took the Stupidest state prize, but perhaps with this slavery snafu it's looking that that 2013 might be its year for that too.

Very Politically Incorrect

Emancipation Proclamation

Remember that?

A teacher in a White Plains, NY middle school is in a heap o'trouble.

In order to 'enliven' a lesson on slavery she picked out two black girls in her class and bound their hands and feet.

The teacher, Eileen Bernstein who is (curiously enough) white, doesn't understand that she did anything wrong. She was just concerned when told that one of the girls was upset about the incident.

The demonstration took place on November 18th and as of yesterday the teacher was still at work.

This is just one incident of some of the extremely inappropriate things teachers do in the classroom. Most of them never get caught or called on their behavior. I could write a book on all the occurrences that I know of, but of course there is always the union to leap to their defense.