Feeder 3.1 - Draft

Many people have different views on what the south is and what it means to live there. In Tony Horwitz's book, Confederates in the Attic, the south is portrayed as a place where the racial divide is still dictating everyday life. He only writes about his encounters with the most extreme southerners whether they be black or white. His recordings are not an accurate representation of the average southern experience. The Coen Brothers do a much better job illustrating southern beliefs in their movie "O Brother Where Art Thou." The movie doesn't just cover the extreme confederates, but also lets the viewer see the non-extremist southerners.

The Coen Brothers give more than one persons opinion on certain southern issues, namely race. For example, when the Soggy Bottom Boys went to sing on the radio for money, the radio voice wanted to know if they were black because he wasn't going to let them sing if they were. It makes it obvious that the man doesn't think highly of blacks, but it's clear he wouldn't be in the groups that Horwitz encounters. On the opposite side, the three escaped prisoners have to problem with blacks as they befriend one they picked up off the side of the road. Not only did they give him a ride, but when they saw the KKK about to kill him, they stepped up and risked their lives to save his. Of course, the Coen Brothers do show the extreme southerners with the scene just mentioned with the KKK. This movie also provides a little history lesson as it is set in Mississippi in the 1930's. This is important because equal rights has not yet been achieved and so it was common, as portrayed in the movie, for politicians and high-standing members of society to be in the KKK. There's more southern history in the movie than just the racial divide. The fact that the three escapees were in search of "treasure" that Clooney had hidden hits on the fact that people were struggling financially after the Great Depression and also hints at the "American Dream" that is a goal for so many. Also, they way that Clooney's wife divorced him and how she told her children is important because it touches on the domestic south. She tells her children that their father was hit by a train and that he wasn't "bonified" enough to be their father anyway.

The image of the south that is portrayed in Horwitz's book is quite different than that of the Coen Brothers. In the chapter "Cats of the Confederacy", Horwitz's first encounter in Salisbury, North Carolina is with a black man named Jim O'Connor. Their conversation alludes to the south being cleared of all racial tension because Mr. O'Connor says that he was surprised that he was "treated like a normal human being" when he moved to Salisbury. It then takes a turn in the opposite direction when Horwitz talks about the UDC and SCV groups in the South. At first these groups come across as just having southern pride and were mainly for people who wanted to learn about their family history, but after he got to know the members and attended some meetings, it became clear that they weren't only interested in their history, but also the beliefs that their ancestors held and fought for. The war wasn't just an occasional hobby for many of these people, but more like a part-time job. One man that Horwitz meets in an old gun shop is dying of leukemia and is spending his last few months learning his family's war history and attending those type meetings. Horwitz doesn't do a good job getting information from both sides of the racial debate as he spent most of his time with the white war buffs. The really only information given about the blacks perspective was from Michael King, a black preacher, who said how the confederate statues scattered around the town are offensive because they basically mean that they honor the men who fought for the suppression of colored people. The information given by Horwitz is correct, but not an accurate interpretation of most southerners.

Both the Coen Brothers' and Horwitz's visions of the south are correct in their own way and commonly highlight similar southern aspects. They both agree that there is a racial divide that exists, but the Coen Brothers do a better job of showing all parts of the spectrum, not just the two extremes. Obviously the purpose of Horwitz's book was to record the things he encountered, and that influenced his un-balanced accounts. However, he only went to places that housed extreme racial views so thats all he encountered. The disadvantage of the Coen Brothers movie is that it portrays a time that racism was common since the equal rights amendment didn't exist yet. The movie did, however, give a better picture as to what living in the south would be like as long as the seventy year time difference was accounted for.