That 'southern mentality' isn't limited to Mississippi.  I grew up in a town in Illinois with a definite southern mindset.  Between the narrow minded town leaders -- white and the activist minority wanting equality, the town closed its public pool when forced to integrate and now is 1/20th the size it was in the late 60's.  There is no commerce, medical care or growth.  The majority of the community is retired and unemployed.  It's hard to change people's minds when they refuse to open them.

Man, if this ain't the truth. Once we had to share, and the poor had to remain in their communities, and the more affluent had cars to get out to the malls, the public spaces and community businesses just scattered to the four winds!!!

I live in Starkville, MS and agree about the sidewalks.  The progressive members here are trying to get them and the old guard is fighting it tooth and nail.  This is 2011 and we're talking about sidewalks.  Pathetic. 

 white fright flight....pathetic

Rand Paul has publicly stated that he thinks the new south should be free to return to the segregationist ways of the old south, as illustrated in the photo. The idea obviously has a lot of support, since Paul's "punishment" for his idiocy was being elected to the Senate.

I have to disagree that this is some kind of "Southern thing", or "racist thing". I think what we are seeing is a result in the changes in America itself, primarily the growth of the suburbs. In the small town where I grew up in New York, the "old fashioned things", like the downtown movie theaters, (we had 2!), went the way of the dinosaur when the mall opened up and included the typical mall multiplex. People went to see movies there instead of the old theaters. Unfortunately, one of the old theaters was eventually demolished, and the other was saved to become a performing arts venue. Everywhere you look, small towns are dying not because of racism, but because big box stores like Wal Mart are killing mom and pop stores.

I'm not denying racism still exists, as it seems to actually be flourishing in way too many places these days, but I don't see it as the cause for the demise of the things mentioned in the thread.

I am 53 and from a small town in east Texas. I clearly remember the balcony where African-Americans had to sit. I have to admit, I so wanted to sit in the balcony! I, also, clearly remember the separate waiting rooms in all 3 doctors offices.

We integrated by court order. And had for years, 2 sets of homecoming queens, and no prom at all. I think that has changed now, but it was that way for a long time. But, don't fool yourself, the bigotry is still there. It's sad that so many things remain the same.

Yes, but.....you're talking about small towns that are dying out, literally. No one moves into them and the biggest business in town is the funeral home.

I live in Huntsville AL and it's pretty progressive for a Southern city. I live out in the suburbs in a mixed neighborhood. It's about half black and half white. There are many such neighborhoods in the Huntsville area in varying degrees of affluence. The biggest impediment to freedoms I see here are because of the religious conservatives....and they come in every color.

Here, we have water restrictions on time and day when you can water landscaping. Well the complaint is why water the [public] school yards, [public] swimming pools and [public] parks. No one ever mentions the McMansions and their BIG private manicured yards. If you can pay the water bill you can use as much as you can. But the poor and middle class can't even have a park, school yard or pool. I guess they don't need anything to "stay out of trouble". Maybe jail is where they want them to be anyway.

The same thing happened in my mid-Atlantic medium size city. After the "riots" following the MLK assassination, all the worst fears of white folks were suddenly reality. All the downtown theaters closed, all the department stores and 5&10's shuttered. Malls in the suburbs had private security forces that could control and eject the unwelcome. Our beautiful art deco library on the downtown square became inaccessible -- and my parents wouldn't allow us kids to take the bus there anyway. The city was dangerous and we never went there anymore. Gentrification of the outskirts helped a little, but the center of the city lost its heart. Attempts are being made to reclaim some of the old structures and re-infuse life into the main streets, but the affluent suburbanites (white and black) seem not a little disinterested.

I don't wish to diminish or disclaim race and racism because it is a very important factor in American Culture. It's critical to understand it's role in the development of our country, especially as it relates to things like the article mentions.

It's also important to understand that technology and prosperity drove many of the changes as well. People did "give up on public places" as our culture changed to value privacy more than community. (Thanks, to a large degree, on the automobile) This happened along side of whites not wanting to integrate, especially in the south. So it's difficult to say "this is why" or "that is why"...because it's a whole mess of cultural/sociological changes happening at the same time.

While it is lamentable that there is no public theater, that's mode of entertainment has been dieing for decades, slowly going the way of "drive-in movies," replaced by home theaters. Speaking personally, I'd rather watch a movie, at home, in widescreen HD, with surround sound. The "theater experience" is over-rated these days, with all the rude people, and high prices.

I am 53 and from a small town in east Texas. I clearly remember the balcony at the movie theater where African-Americans had to sit. I so much wanted to sit in the balcony! I also remember the separate waiting rooms at all 3 doctors' offices. We integrated by court order, and for years, there was no prom, and 2 homecoming queens and courts. That has changed now, but it took quite a number of years.

But,make no mistake, the bigotry lives on in that small east Texas town.

I moved from there as soon as I could. I don't even visit there anymore.

The abandonment of cities (in favor of the suburbs) was and is not limited to the South. It was just another way white America distanced itself from the "problems" (blacks) of the inner-city. I like to call it economic segregation, and it's still going on. We just keep moving the boundaries and raising the admission fee.

This kind of racism is NOT the exclusive province of southern whites, or northern whites or the "white race."

It is in every human. We all have the potential to put up those signs.

Let us not seek scapegoats for all OUR OWN sin.

Otherwise we have learned nothing from this ugly episode.

It is sad that racism is still an issue. You would think that after 150 years since the abolition of slavery that people would understand that what makes a person is their heart, mind, and soul...Not their skin color.

White flight is a true and well-documented phenomenon (biggest case in point I know: Why the Atlanta MARTA line will never be allowed into Cobb County).

However, that said, small town and regional movie theaters have been also closing down or disappearing in all kinds of communities (e.g. small towns in Wisconsin that don't have enough people of color living in them to even have a "color line" or a redlined "part of town").

The disappearance of the old hometown theaters owes as much to the rise of the mall (and yes, suburbia and car culture) and the multiplex as to anything. Also, a deliberate decision by big chain theater owners to dispense with the "nickel matinees" of my mom and dad's childhood to the nearing -$20 movie theater tickets of today.

The loss of community spaces isn't just white flight. It is the loss of the Commons everywhere, the privatizing of the public spheres (and the rise of the Digital Commons, because when cut off, many people will still find a way, such as the "privately hosted" community here).

I think John raises an important point about valuing privacy over community, but I also think it should be noted that this is a result of what community has become. The example of movie theaters is perfect: it's not worth the ever-increasing cost of a ticket to be subjected to someone else's lousy standard of politeness, which more often than not will place you at the mercy of people who talk or text on their cell phones, talk out loud at full volume, or bring very small children and/or crying babies into the theater. Over the years, everyone's sense of community has been scaled back farther and farther because of diminishing expectations of decency, until for many of us it refers only to a select group of friends -- and it's no wonder that so many of us have found these friends on the internet, at a distance. It's not that people don't go to as many public places or events because strangers will be there -- it's that other people totally fail to respect boundaries.

As for racism, I've come to the depressing conclusion that it's going to take much longer than I ever expected for it to die out. I used to think it was a matter of waiting until the nastiest bigots were in the ground, but now that many of them are, I see that their sons and daughters are, as often as not, every bit as hateful as the previous generation. Even if this only happens 50% of the time, that's an awfully heavy burden for society to have to bear, and those people are going to hand their bigotry down to their children as well. It should also be noted that this is a nationwide phenomenon, much like the death of community.

Wow, I forgot that not having a movie theater in some backwoods country town qualifies as an evil white plot to destroy the black race.

Get a life Laura, and get netflix and invite all your (one) black friends!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Just read John Dollard's "Class and Caste in a Southern Town." It's a study of this very thing, conducted during the WWII era, but applicable today in many ways. 

Mississippi is my home, although I do not live there now. I love her with a passion and despise with a fury how many of the people hang on to the old ways.

Urban sprawl and greed are killers of all communities - no community buildings - no decent transit - no sidewalks - you couldn't get to your job if you had one to get to. I'm an immigrant (fr. Canada) and I was not able to get a license for the first 4 years that I've been here. I studied the effects of urban sprawl in school but unless you see it with your own eyes and experience it - it's hard to comprehend the devastation it causes. It just makes the rich richer. Up here in NJ it oppresses the poor - mostly Mexican immigrants - and low income families. Personally I was offered a job in NYC but I had to turn it down because Gov. Christy allowed them to raise bus fare to NYC from $29 per day to $40 per day. That was a $300 per month increase and it cost me a job. I will never understand the unnecessary difficulties being made on the poor in the North or the South. The local government has a choice on where to spend their money - they choose not to spend it on community buildings, transit, low income housing, building up town centers to localize communities. They choose to build an unnecessary Walmart or a Home Depot or a Staples 20 minutes away from another Walmart, Home Depot or Staples - just so they can pocket the taxes. I'm guessing the big box stores don't even pay that much tax - they certainly aren't improving communities...

 Rachel, Unfortunately You aren't old enough to have really experienced racisn. I know you think being female and gay qualifies you but until you've walked in our shoes you will truly never understand.  The mystque of "white only"   establishments iis  long gone.Being white owned doesn't make it better.  In 2011, believe it or not  racism still exist. They don't have to have the white only signs up, but the fact many businesses still don't hire Blacks to work in their establishment speaks volumes. We're good enough to give them our money, but we're not good enough for them to pay us to work for them. If I walk into a business and it's in a city that has a large Black population, and their are no Blacks working in that Business, I turn around and walk back out. JThe boycott is still alive in 2011 and I choose to not spend my dollars where we are still not totally welcomed.

Like Eugene Robinson, I spent a good part of my youth in Orangeburg, South Carolina, and I've seen this effect continuing today.

There are 13,000 people in the city of Orangeburg, and 90,000 in the county that shares its name, but it's only served by a single, dingy, run-down three-screen movie theater. The only bowling alley in town, the site of the Orangeburg Massacre in 1968, stayed open for 40 years after that incident, but today has been abandoned out of apathy.

Those who can afford it typically drive 40 miles up the interstate to Columbia to see a movie, go out for the night, or do any shopping other than for groceries. There are a few refuges of entertainment left in Orangeburg for the well-off, including local golf courses and a charming community theater, but as you point out, those are not the kind of places that would have to be shared.

Eufala, AL has a beautiful old theater that had the same issue. When there I asked my friend from the town about why it wasnt' in operation any more. "No one wanted to go there after integration." "Wasn't that like forty years ago?"I asked. She shrugged. "I guess."

Yes.  The collapse of small towns in the South has a lot more to do with economics and the population shift towards the cities.  Read "Crazy Quilt" by Janisse Ray.

This is the theater we went to in my home town. They never cleaned the restroom (1), the seats were wooden and often broken. We had to go downstairs to buy popcorn and sodas. After they finally integrated the place in the late 1960s early 1970s, we discovered that the balcony seats were the best seats after all! The black owned theater was called the Harlem, and it was beautiful inside. It had stage curtains, glass bricks and prize give-a-ways before the movie. I do not know what happened to it. This situation was common all over the south. Even medical care was segregated and sometimes uneven. Things have improved, we have a African American Mayor and many political posts are held by African Americans. It seems as if there is a joint effort to improve our town. Oh yes, Belzoni is the Catfish Capital of the World.