Ah, Those Southern Trees & Their Strange Fruit

Shit like this makes me nostalgic for them good, ol' days when us Whaht fokes could jist lynch any nigra what pissed us off:
Black High School Students in Louisiana Threatened With Lynching

"In September 2006, a group of African-American high school students in Jena, Louisiana asked the school for permission to sit beneath a 'whites only' shade tree. There was an unwritten rule that blacks couldn't sit beneath the tree. The school said they didn't care where students sat. The next day, students arrived at school to see three nooses (in school colors) hanging from the tree ....," writes Rick Perlstein of TomPaine.

Jena's up in the 'cracker-barrel/po'-whaht traish' part of the state, north of Cajun country; around Alexandria, where Barksdale AFB is. I wouldn't live there on a fucking stipend. Here's Wikipedia on "race relations" in Jena:

Racial tensions surfaced in Jena on September 1, 2006, when hangman's nooses were discovered in a tree on the high school campus. Despite the school head recommending the noose-hangers be expelled, the board overruled him and the three white student perpetrators were suspended from school for three days, what some called a mere "slap on the wrist"[2]. On November 30, an arson fire destroyed the main academic building at the school. On December 4, a fight broke out on campus, after which six African-American students were arrested and charged with attempted second-degree murder. Law enforcement officers told the Alexandria Daily Town Talk they have found no links between the noose incident, the arson fire, and subsequent fights. The six accused of attempted second-degree murder are black and were fighting a white student after a week of intimidation by white students, including the one who was assaulted.[3].

On june 26 the first day of trial for Bell, one of the defendants, the prosecutor agreed to reduce the charges for Bell to aggravated second degree battery and conspiracy to commit aggravated second degree battery.[4] As of june 26 there is no word as to whether the charges of the other 5 (for which the trial date is later) will be reduced.
Hence, the town has gained international notoriety as an example of the alleged "new 'stealth' racism" that lives on in America

I have been told by several black folks they prefer living in the South, where the bigotry and racism are obvious, to living places where it's less evident, but not less toxic or pervasive.