The Wo-ah

Although it ended 140 years ago, some ignert Southerners still cling to what they must consider The Glory Days of the South, when it was legal to own other people and to hang them from the nearest tree if they looked at you wrong. I'd offer than in many parts of The South, those feelings still exist, and will continue to do so for many, many generations yet to be born. Why? Because that's what their mammas and their pappas believe, and since they all Home School their younguns, that's what they're lernin.

I thought about this when I saw a query on a genealogy forum, saying their "proud ancestor" was in the War between the States in a specific outfit, etc. Since they didn't know this ancestor personally, how can they possibly say anything meaningful about him? I never knew my own American Civil War* ancestors (on both sides of The Mason-Dixon line) and they could've been Horse Thieves, as far as I know; I'm not about to deify them.

*yes, Civil War - some say "there was nothing civil about that war" and they may be right, but just because a word has more than one meaning doesn't mean you have to become a zealot, flying the Confederate Battle Flag to show How White You Are

Some of the more bizarre euphemisms include The War of Northern Aggression and (my favorite) The Recent Unpleasantness. There's a long list of alternate names for The War (pronounced Wo-ah) at CivilWarHome.com (I guess TheRecentUnpleasantness.com was already taken).