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The
National Association for the Advancement of Colored
People started the boycott in 2000 to get the Confederate
battle flag off the South Carolina statehouse dome.
That goal was achieved in July of that year, but the
organization continued the sanctions when the flag was
moved to a memorial on the statehouse grounds _ a place
of honor the group feels the flag doesn't deserve.
But
judging from the columns of black motorcyclists zooming
up and down the Grand Strand during the recent ``Black
Bike Week,'' few are heeding the call.
``I
spend my money wherever I want to,'' Jackson, a stay-at-home
mom from Fayetteville, N.C., said defiantly as she headed
for the beach Memorial Day weekend. ``They don't give
it to me.''
In
the heady early days of the boycott, business and civic
organizations canceled conventions at Palmetto State
venues and pickets stood vigil at highway welcome centers.
The National Collegiate Athletic Association, under
pressure from black coaches, declared a moratorium on
scheduling new events in South Carolina or Mississippi,
whose state flag incorporates the Confederate banner.
The
NCAA moratorium still stands, and some presidential
candidates campaigning in the state last year were careful
to bring their own food and stay at supporters' homes
to avoid feeding the local economy. But the boycott
has largely slipped from the public eye and out of most
people's minds.
``I'll
be honest with you, we no longer see any significant
or measurable impact from that _ haven't since the flag
came down,'' said Marion Edmonds, spokesman for the
Department of Parks, Recreation & Tourism.
The
NAACP insists the boycott is still having an effect.
But hard numbers are difficult to come by.
If
there has been an effect, it is not reflected in tourism-related
tax collections, Edmonds said. According to his agency,
accommodations tax receipts increased $3.5 million during
the boycott period, and admissions tax collections grew
$2.5 million _ slow but steady.
Edmonds
thinks event planners saw the removal of the flag from
the statehouse dome _ where it was raised to commemorate
the centennial of the Civil War and remained flying
in defiance of the civil rights movement _ as ``a good-faith
effort.''
Steve
Camp, president of the Midlands Authority for Conventions
Sports and Tourism in the state capital of Columbia,
said he still fields calls about whether the boycott
is on _ and still has people tell him they'll take their
convention business elsewhere.
``I
don't know that we lose money,'' he said. ``I think
that we lose opportunity.''
For
instance, Camp would love to pursue the NCAA men's basketball
tournament, but he knows that's a nonstarter as long
as that flag remains on the statehouse grounds. In the
meantime, he's grateful that organizations like the
Eastern Intercollegiate Athletic Association _ a small
conference of historically black Southern colleges _
agreed to return its basketball tournament to Columbia
this year.
``We
just need to leave that issue alone,'' said conference
President Willie Jefferson. ``We can call for that boycott
from now to the 22nd century, and things still will
not change.''
Dwight
James, executive director of the NAACP's state conference,
said the need to maintain the boycott transcends mundane
economics. He said one need only have attended the black
biker festival over the Memorial Day holiday in Myrtle
Beach to witness ``the Confederate mentality'' that
he sees as still rampant in South Carolina.
When
the predominantly white Carolina Harley-Davidson Dealers
Association held its annual rally in the beach resort
the week before, traffic along Ocean Boulevard was the
usual two-way affair. But when the black riders came
to town, orange cones went up, and the popular strip
was limited to southbound traffic only.
For
two years, the NAACP has battled the city in federal
court over what the organization sees as an ``apartheid
traffic pattern'' imposed during the five-day festival.
Though
angry over the one-way traffic and jacked-up hotel rates,
the black bikers were not going to let their fun in
the sun be spoiled by a perceived hostile environment
_ or by a boycott called by NAACP officials.
``I
mean, they represent me and stuff, but at the same time
they do expect a whole lot,'' said Maurice Christian,
a 28-year-old car dealer from Raleigh, N.C.
Some
visitors questioned the very logic of the boycott. Sitting
in a lawn chair outside his hotel on the strip, Lamar
Banks, an Air Force staff sergeant from Hampton, Va.,
said:
``Most
of the people working in these hotels, cleaning the
rooms, sitting at the front desk are African-American.
So if we don't come down here, then we're taking money
out of their pocket and food off their table. How's
that helping us as a whole?''
Hunt,
one of the bathing suit rebels, feels the NAACP should
be focusing on more important things, like educating
poor black youth. If the boycott hasn't achieved its
objective in five years, she said, it never will.
``It's
silly,'' said Hunt, a criminal justice student at Fayetteville
State University. ``It's a new millennium. Everybody's
not worried about a flag.''
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