A few columns back, I wrote about the embarrassment many South Carolinians feel over having a statue of “Pitchfork Ben” Tillman on the State House grounds.

The former governor and U.S. senator is a relic from another era, when the racial discrimination he espoused was the conventional wisdom among the people he represented. That attitude, I hope and believe, no longer represents conventional wisdom in South Carolina or any other state.

The question is: Should the statue be left on the State House grounds? If so, should the state modify the plaque to tell the more complete truth about Tillman? Not only did he lead in the establishment of what are now Clemson and Winthrop universities but he also publicly  declared, “We have done our level best [to prevent blacks from voting]…we have scratched our heads to find out how we could eliminate the last one of them. We stuffed ballot boxes. We shot them. We are not ashamed of it.”

When I mentioned that the idea of modifying the plaque enjoyed some support in the state, I received a couple of letters of protest. One of them pointed out that modifying the plaque would put the state on a slippery slope. Where does it end? Should the state eliminate all homage to John C. Calhoun, the most eloquent defender of slavery in the run-up to the War Between the States?  Should it leave the Johnny Reb statues standing as tributes to a noble “lost cause”? Or should it modify the plaques to reflect historical reality? And if so, whose historical reality?

I mentioned to one correspondent that Johnny Reb’s statue could be seen not so much as a monument to the cause he fought for as a memorial to the 650,000 young Americans who gave their lives in the fratricidal war.

I have my own opinion about the roots of the war, but that’s beside the point now. We need to stop letting our hot feelings about the war color our attitudes toward fellow citizens. Johnny Reb has been part of our landscape for more than a century. As far as I know, he hasn’t shot or lynched anybody. A lot of good people are proud of him. Let their pride continue, as the pride of others has been nurtured through countless Martin Luther King Jr. boulevards and memorials. If we treat one another as neighbors, what’s the harm in a memorial?

I have already lamented the stigmatizing of Joel Chandler Harris’ tales of Uncle Remus, the ostracizing of Stephen Foster’s music (why should anyone be offended by the poignant lyrics of “Old Black Joe”?). I have also deplored the heaping of scorn on “The Old Kentucky Home,” “Maryland, My Maryland,” and “Carry Me Back to Old Virginia” because the lyrics are in a dialect rooted in an unpleasant period of our history, though the thoughts are much gentler than those reflected in contemporary rap music.

Anyway, this is a long windup to a commentary on a recent development in Great Britain, where “politically correct” nonsense seems to be as prevalent as it is in this country. A national educational awards program eliminated a digital book for consideration because, among other things, it was based on the classic children’s story, “The Three Little Pigs.”

Who could possibly be offended by a story about three little porkers? The Muslims, of course. Given their aversion to pigs in the diet, the use of three little pigs in a primary-school classroom would be like a “slap in the face.”

For crying out loud. Muslims who move to England know in advance that they’re going to be a minority in a society that has long been a mainstay of Christendom. They have a right to expect no state interference in their worship of Allah. Their right to build and patronize mosques should not be in question. Their right to skip the pork dishes on the menu and go for the beef and lamb should be taken for granted. No one should force them to eat anything that offends their conscience.

They, in turn, have no right to expect the host society to bleach from its culture every tinge of color that might offend the sensibilities of the newcomers.

I know that blacks and whites in the South have separate cultural and historical heritages, and that those heritages sometimes conflict. Let’s not try to widen the differences. Let’s work instead to bequeath to our children and their children a common heritage.

I remember a controversy in Alabama over the name of an elementary school that had been there when the schools were first desegregated. Many black parents didn’t want their children attending a school named for Nathan Bedford Forrest, the brilliant Confederate general who was involved in the birth of the Ku Klux Klan.

Many white citizens saw the removal of Forrest’s name as a slap in the face to a Southern hero. To black citizens, Forrest was more villain than hero.

The answer to that dilemma seems simple: It was an old school. Soon it would have to be replaced. Then would be a good time to choose for the new school a name acceptable to both strands of regional heritage.

Readers may write Gene Owens at 317 Braeburn Drive, Anderson SC 29621 or e-mail him at WadesDixieco@AOL.com.