I just cannot remember who took me to a cross burning in
Georgia.  I am sure it was not my grandparents or my parents but probably an uncle and aunt.  I just really don't remember.  Let me tell you, this is something an adult cannot comprehend, but a child?  I remember all of those white sheets and it was in the fifties.  I remember the area where the rally was held.  It was on Highway 78 in Douglasville, Ga about 45 miles west of Atlanta.  Not much further down the road where I live now.
I remember a lot of people with kids on their shoulders and
three crosses being burned which boggled my little mind.
Why were these people burning the cross that was supposed to be sacred?  

I really didn't understand any of this thing that was going on and remember being very very fightened.  I rmember
someone under that sheet having a bullhorn and yelling
terrible words that kids basically took for granted if you were white.  I remember shaking because these people were so mean.  I must have blocked a lot of this event other than the memory of the whole incident because I have no clue who took me to this thing.  

I remember hearing words like Grand Wizard.  Kids back in the day, didn't ask questions and the thing that troubles me is the fact that my parents allowed me around such hate.
They were not haters.  Maybe that was just the way it was back then, but I do not have a clue what role some of my white relatives played in the racism that tore Georgia
up for years and years and still tearing it up !
I think the problem with the south and Georgia in particuliar, including Alabama and Mississippi, as in the movie Ghosts of Mississippi, the hatred affected the baby boomers.  It did one of two things.  The children in the south were never not exposed to some sort of bigotry, either black or white. I think what happened to the baby boomers in the south is that they carried some of that hate with them and accepted it as normal and became IMO some of what the tea party people are, or they became activists and haters of hate.  I am so glad that I got on the right side of that issue.  It did affect me.  I think the racism affected Mrs. Sherrod.  I think she overcame and was just sharing a story.  Her whole incident has rattled some memories  in me that makes me feel soooo bad.
We need to have a discussion on race but it won't happen because people like this right winged jerk will take everything out of context.  Example.  They would turn my whole diary into..the fact I had attended a hate group gathering as a child but would never tell that it made me an activist for civil rights and I had no choice.  They would cherry pick our words.