BAY ST. LOUIS, Miss. (AP) — The man who integrated the University of Mississippi says he's troubled and confused by the protest there against President Barack Obama's re-election.
But James Meredith, 79, says students shouldn't get distracted by what he calls nonsense and foolishness.
"I'm advising all of the students at Ole Miss, white and black, that the Bible says there will be wars and rumors of wars, so you know there is going to be bad talk," Meredith told WLOX-TV on Saturday. "Anybody that lets themselves be sidetracked by foolishness, it's not only something wrong with what they're mad about, it's something wrong with them."
The protest late Tuesday grew into a crowd of about 400 people as rumors of a riot spread on social media. Some people shouted racial slurs. Others yelled the school cheer, "hotty toddy." Two students were arrested on minor charges.
Meredith's admission in 1962 sparked riots that had to be quelled by the military and police.
Meredith, in Bay St. Louis on Saturday to sign "A Mission from God: A Memoir and Challenge for America," said he was cursed every day he attended Ole Miss, but paid it no attention.
If he had a fight, he said, it was with state leaders who created unjust policies. "None of them were up there cussing me, so I didn't hear nothing nobody else was saying," he said.
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