[color="Blue"](The chutzpah is just dripping off this one. How funny is it that even the
ACLU and NAACP didn't want to have anything to do with this nonsense.

Prediction: We'll see backwards swastikas painted on her house soon. )

http://www.charleston.net/assets/webPages/departmental/news/Stories.aspx?section=localnews&tableId=117415&pubDate=11/7/2006

Woman jailed in battle to have slogan T-shirt removed from fair
She viewed design as promoting racism

November 7, 2006
BY YVONNE M. WENGER
The Post and Courier

Deanna Bernstein of Summerville wanted to spend a night at the Coastal Carolina Fair
eating the food and enjoying the rides and playing the games. Instead, she ended up in jail.

When Bernstein passed a vendor selling a T-shirt Wednesday with Confederate flags and
the words "Confederately Correct Civil Rights for Southern Whites," her stomach turned.

Bernstein said the T-shirt promotes racism. In fighting to have it removed, she was
charged with trespassing.

[highlight]"If people don't like it, then complain, use your voice," said [color="Red"]Bernstein, 38, a California
native [color="red"]who is white.[/highlight]

She asked the vendor to remove the shirt and complained to fair management. When the
T-shirt wasn't put away, a friend bought one for Bernstein and she stood outside the fair
gates with the T-shirt in hand to ask people coming in what they thought about it.

[highlight]In the 10 minutes Bernstein said she stood there, she said most people were complacent
about it but some who passed her said they liked the shirt.[/highlight]

"What I see is the adults are perpetuating all of this," Bernstein said. "These children are going
by and they see the T-shirt and they think hatred is OK. How could anything change?"

Charleston County sheriff's deputies asked Bernstein to leave. When she didn't, she was
arrested on a trespassing charge and fined $440, and she said she spent about eight hours
in the county detention center.

Bernstein said she was confused by the arrest because she had paid admission
and was not disruptive.

Chip Boling, president of the Coastal Carolina Fair, said Bernstein was well-mannered,
but he said she was asked six times to leave for violating the fair's policy against
expressing political views on the private property.

"The reason she was arrested was because she refused to leave the grounds," Boling said.
"She was advised she was trespassing. It was an unfortunate thing, but it was her choice."

Likewise, Boling said fair security asked people distributing campaign literature to leave the
grounds throughout the 10-day fair that ended Saturday. He said in his 20 years with the
fair, he knows of no other similar arrests. Boling said the fair respects individuals' rights
to personal beliefs and would not take a position on the T-shirt.

The Charleston County Sheriff's Office could not provide a copy of the arrest report.
A spokesman declined to comment until a report was available for him to review.

[highlight]The American Civil Liberties Union of South Carolina supports the free speech rights
of Bernstein and the vendor, spokeswoman Barbara Joslin said. But private property
owners have a right to decide exactly what takes place on their land, she said.

Dot Scott, president of the Charleston branch of the National Association for the Advancement
of Colored People, said she would not take a position on whether the T-shirt was in good
taste. However, Scott said if she had seen the T-shirt she probably would not have
objected in the same way. "I probably have thick skin, because I am so used to seeing it,"
she said.[/highlight]

Scott said her concern is that the fair's policy is written and equally applied to all attendees
and whether a written policy addresses what merchandise is prohibited.

Boling said the policy against political expression is not written but is a long-standing
practice that is equally applied. In regard to what vendors can sell, Boling said the fair's
unwritten practice is to prohibit merchandise with profanity or pornography.
"Obviously, we may be looking at it further to see if it is something we need to do," Boling
said of any potential vendor limitations.

Bernstein said she did not believe the vendor had the right to sell the shirts, because she
said it was offensive and inappropriate for children to see. [highlight]"The more people generalize,
the more people hate, the more divided the cultures are going to be," said Bernstein,
who moved from Los Angeles nine weeks ago. "It is so ugly here in the South."[/highlight]

Bernstein said she does not have a record of protesting but felt it was her duty to speak
up about the T-shirt for her 15-month-old son. "I am raising a child and what kind of mother
would I be if I didn't fight to change something as gross as this?" Bernstein said.

After seeing what she perceives as racism in the area, Bernstein said she plans to move as
soon as she can afford it. She wants the fair's management to apologize and drop the charge.
[highlight]She also wants the managers to provide fair staff with diversity training and have a booth
at next year's fair that promotes multiculturalism.[/highlight] She said she contacted all the fair's
sponsors to ask them to consider the situation when giving future support.

[highlight]Boling said he does not know why the fair should apologize. "We tried not to send her to jail,"
he said.[/highlight]

The fair's objective is to retain a family-friendly atmosphere that improves the community
by providing donations to organizations throughout the Lowcountry for program costs,
Boling said.

Reach Yvonne M. Wenger at ywenger@postandcourier.com or 745-5891.