Date: Sun, 5 Apr 2009 17:52:07 -0400
From: Gene Galin
Subject: Natives, newcomers spar over county – Story about Chatlist in Herald Sun newspaper
Natives, newcomers spar over county
BY BETH VELLIQUETTE : The Herald-Sun
Native vs. newcomer. Local vs. outsider.
In Chatham County, there’s a group of people who have been writing online on the Chatham Chatlist who have been going round and round for nearly a month about whether natives have a special claim to the county, if newcomers are ruining it and who has the right to call it “home.”
The Chatlist is a widely used and viewed electronic bulletin board that is a first-alert to the pulse of the community. It carries inquiries for everything from handyman services to dog training classes, from fundraising announcements to government notices and, on occasions such as the most recent spate of filings, lively discussions of cultural and social differences of opinion.
Maybe it started when a person with the online moniker chadrodeo wrote on March 11. “From a life time? chathamite I have a suggestion.Take all the Chapel Hill and Carrboro liberals out?of Chatham and turn it back 2 a nice town.If u want it 2 be like Chapel Hill Carrboro Or Cary? Go back home!Leave our town”.This is my town”as?Montgomery Gentry ?says.”
Not the greatest typist, but Chadrodeo got his point across and raised the hackles of other writers who responded with opposing viewpoints, explanations of how natives feel about newcomers, newcomers’ explanations about how they feel about natives, a few insults thrown back and forth and a couple of pleas of “can’t we all just get along?”
Read the entire story at
http://heraldsun.southernheadlines.com/chatham/13-1135579.cfm?