Hypocriternity

I'm being too harsh on Strom Thurmond with that title, for fathering an illegitimate child with a black maid is not inconsistent with being a virulent white segregationist. Such behavior is surprising in today's society only because segregation has become synonymous with racial hate ...a correlation that may not have been necessary for many of yesteryear's Southern gentility.

I wonder if this child troubled Thurmond at all.

Just as pre-Civil War white landowners often fathered children with their slaves, Thurmond may have felt that such a secret was a perfectly normal episode to have tucked away in one's closet.