The Flag.
If you live in the United States of America you know what I'm talking about.
The Confederate flag.
As much as I hate to start controversy, I feel it needs to be discussed. The Confederate States of America, the eleven states that broke away from the union to fight for what they believed in. Now, as much as I don't support slavery, white supremacy, etc. I do believe the flag stands for something more than just oppression. The Confederate flag stands as a solemn reminder of our countries long and enduring legacy. It stands as proof of our spirit, our culture, our life. Why take it down? Many critics claim the flag is an eyesore, that all it stands for is hate and racism. And yes, the Confederacy did support slavery, but that's only as far as they see. They don't see past it, they only read the first page and put the book down. Our great nation is not perfect, and the Civil War stands as proof of that. And the Confederate flag is part of that, it's part of our history, its part of our blood. In my view, banning the Confederate flag is like banning my children from learning the vibrant history of the United States. There is a story in every star of that flag, one waiting to be discovered, and it wont even be looked at if its hidden away in some museum. I have black friends, and they aren't offended by the flag. The flag is what you make of it, it stands for what you see in it. It is either a symbol of freedom, or a token of oppression, a sign of our rebellious nature, or a sign of our racist past.
What are your views on the flag? How do you see it? Should it come down?
I would ask only of you guys to keep this under control, I understand this is a hot topic, but please respect others opinions.
Comments
The flag is apart of history but I think we should take it down, at least in most places. The flag stands for oppression and rebellion, not exactly something a part of our country should be flying with pride.
I can agree with not flying the flag on government property for the most part.
Yes, I can agree with that. After all, it can't exactly be banned because of Freedom of Speech and all that.
I knew that.
Thank you. Thank you, thank you, thank you. You've just summed up all of my thoughts. If we ban this flag because it offends someone, we should ban alcohol and cigarettes, guns, bumper stickers, billboards, commercials, fast food, practically everything.
Thank you again. The Union and the Confederacy were both guilty of unspeakable acts and thus are both condemnable. If they ban that flag, whats stopping anyone from petitioning the American flag? Like you said,
This wouldn't work. Seeing as every time someone who disobeys the law is killed the country goes into riot mode, why would they not just riot if they wanted it gone.
No, if you leave a gun on a table it won't kill you. If you leave a bottle of alcohol on a table it won't kill you, if you leave an unlit cigarette on a table it wont kill you. Its the wielder whom is the killer, not the tool.
(I only put that on the list because they are debatable topics.)
The Confederacy was evil. Fighting for the right to hold other human beings as property is evil. Just as fighting to champion the supremacy of the Aryan race is evil.
That's not to say that every soldier who fought under the Confederate was evil; just as not every soldier who fought under the Nazi flag was evil. They too were cousins, uncles, fathers, brothers, and friends who may have simply viewed themselves as patriots fighting for their country. But that doesn't change the fact that one of the key tenets of their country is based in mass human suffering.
And whereas Germany now utterly condemns anything related to Nazism as a national shame, the Southern states inexplicably hold onto the Confederate battle flag, not only as a historical artifact, but as a symbol of pride. That's...pretty fucked up.
If I'm reading a book, and the first page of the book says "Human slavery should be a protected institution," I think I would be pretty justified in putting the book down. I don't think further reading would be required to make a judgment on the morality of that book.
It's a symbol of freedom...to declare other human beings as property. It's a sign of rebellion...against the United States of America culminating in the deadliest war we've ever fought.
For the sake of freedom of expression, I'm against banning the flag when flown on private land. But I find the idea of looking to it as a symbol of pride to be abhorrent. The line that's so often quoted in defense of the flag is "Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it." Well that only applies when you remember the past as a bad thing. If we look with pride upon a flag that was flown by those who mounted an armed insurrection against the United States government in order to uphold their "right" to hold other human beings as slaves, then we have already forgotten our past.
Is slavery and institutionalized racism a heritage that's worth preserving?
The only freedom the confederate flag represents is the freedom to own other human beings. I'll never understand why some people in the south make every attempt to languish in their racist past rather than move on.
That said, this is a free country. I don't give a damn if you wave the confederate flag around, but it shouldn't be the official flag anywhere.
tl;dr: The confederate flag shouldn't be banned, but South Carolina should change their state flag.
The Confederate flag isn't South Carolina's state flag. It just happens to be flying next to their capitol building because...reasons. Mississippi is the one with the Confederate cross on its state flag. Also because reasons.
I think a flag only represents what a person wants it to represent. To many, the American Flag stands for unity, freedom, independence, and the men and women who died for this nation. To others it could just as well mean genocide, racism, oppression, and imperialism. Just the same as the Confederate flag to some could mean slavery and war, to others it seems as the symbol of pride, heritage, and states rights.
It depends on ones own outlook on things.
There's nothing inherently racist about any inanimate object, it's what's taught, not what's seen. At one point, the swastika was a symbol of peace and tranquility. Then that small change of twisting it on it's side and putting the Nazi movement behind it made it a symbol of hatred.
Being someone who has lived in the deep south and had friends who wore the flag with pride I can tell you a lot of those people also hung out with black people and enjoyed their company. So although I don't care about the flag, I take no offense with anyone who feels pride with it and uses it as a heritage remembrance or what have you.
Is the American flag also racist? Is Christianity also racist? Both are supported by the same hateful ignoramuses that wave the confederate flag around their pick-up while mudding and chugging their moonshine.
Ah, thanks for the clarification.
OH MY GOSH, KILL IT BEFORE IT LAYS EGGS!!
I agree the flag shouldn't be outright banned. Then you have people wanting it even more, prices go absurdly through the roof, and of course all the free speech issues.
But as the practically cliche Spiderman saying goes, with great power comes great responsibility.
And it has been pretty clear for a long time that too many Confederate flag wavers aren't doing it just to remember our history. They're using it as a symbol of racism, twisting the facts of what happened 200+ years ago to further narrow agendas, and other forms of ignorance that need to be challenged.
No, not everyone is doing this, but you can't deny it's a notable part of the equation.
I'm not sure exactly what to do, though. I think public places & government offices should take it down unless there's a qualified purpose to keep it flying, such as a museum or something.
i think flags are stupid.
I honestly think all the people who think the Confederate Battle Flag should be taken down is stupid. Racism and slavery existed under the US way before the Confederacy and there have been way more human right crimes under the US flag so why not ban the flag we use now. Everybody who wants to take it down are just massive hypocrites and political extremist who use everything they don't like as a scapegoat just to make themselves feel better.
If a person gets offended by a fucking flag then they should get help
It doesn't depend entirely on one's outlook towards things. Intentions do matter (a KKK member displaying the Confederate flag would a lot more offensive than your average South Carolinian displaying it), but symbols also have shared meanings that go beyond the intentions of the person displaying it. If I decide tomorrow that I would fly the Nazi flag on my front lawn as a symbol of acceptance and togetherness, that doesn't mean that it stops being a symbol of genocide, because that's how it was founded and used. And my neighbors would be quite justified in criticizing my display of the flag, even if my intentions were pure.
The US flag was founded and used as a symbol of colonial independence from England. There's nothing inherently terrible about that. On the other hand, the "Confederate flag" was founded and used as a symbol of the Southern states' rebellion against the United States over, among other things, the right to hold slaves. That's simply what the symbol is. You can't divorce that aspect from the flag any more than you can divorce the aspect of independence from the US flag.
When is this liberal bullshit going to stop. Seriously.
The flag is in the cemetery where CIVIL WAR SOLDIERS DIED/FOUGHT FOR THEIR COUNTRY, and now the LIBS want to take the flag away from them , because some RACIST nutjob killed people, and took a SELFIE with it.
BLAME THE FLAG , it was the flag who shot them people. PUT THE FLAG ON TRIAL DAMMIT.
LOL Well. One day we will ban the American flag. I'm sure the smartest kids at Yale/Harvard want to do that already.
People should be able to hang it up, just not on state buildings. It offends too many people. And whether people want to admit it or not, that flag has a lot of hate and oppression in its past.
It was removed from the State Capitol, like in 2000 That one is not even the same flag.
Taking the flags down (even to the extreme of taking down games that contain images of the flag) is dismissing our history. Taking them off of government buildings is understandable, and should have been done a long while ago, but trying to oust every flag is ridiculous.
Those Civil War soldier fought and died against this country, for another country founded on an inherently evil principle. The fact that a person fought and died for a cause they deeply believe in doesn't make that cause something worth celebrating if the cause itself is evil. The Confederacy was an evil institution. Remembering the dead of the Confederate does not necessitate venerating the evils they stood for.
Now that being said, the crux of the debate isn't on a Confederate battle flag flying in a cemetery. It's on a Confederate battle flag flying next to South Carolina's state capitol. It's a legislative body in the United States displaying a symbol of rebellion against the United States. That's just dumb.
You're right, I can't "divorce" what it stands for, but it's completely possible to change it from what it once meant. The swastika didn't always stand as the symbol of the genocidal nazi's, but once stood as a symbol of peace. Just the same, the Confederate Flag, a symbol once standing for rebellion against the union can just as easily be changed to stand as the symbol of unity and heritage.
The only flags that should be flying on state capital grounds are the state's flag and the American flag. Perhaps another country's flag can be flown if that country's dignitary is in the building at the time.
That would be tantemount to changing the flag of Australia because of our now abolished "White Australia" policies.
The decision to de-stigmatize a symbol of its oppressive meaning can only come from the victims of its oppression. If an oppressed group wants to "reclaim" a symbol that was used against them and change its meaning as a way of empowering themselves, that's fine. That's what homosexuals did with the pink triangle. But what you have with the Confederate flag is the equivalent of the German government repurposing the pink triangle as a positive emblem while it's still being decried by homosexuals as a symbol of the atrocities committed against them by the German government. That would be grossly inappropriate.
Breathe it in, George. We're on the rise.
I'm against the flag for its historical representation but, if you feel interested, watch this historical update on the not Confederate flag by CGP Grey
Not the Confederate Flag
How dare States, wish to govern themselves, and not be told what to do by the federal government.
H.K. Edgerton is a fringe activist who believes that slavery had nothing to do with the Civil War and that his ancestor's enslavement in America was divinely inspire.
Needless to say, his views do not coincide with the vast majority of blacks (or the vast majority of historians for that matter).
Yes, how dare the states enslave other Human beings and rebel to keep their slaves because they were stupid enough to base their entire economy on it.
Eh, there's literally nothing I could do to prove that the vast majority of blacks agree with the dude, because there is probably absolutely no proof for it what so ever. It's just this whole damned flag thing is what people are hearing about over more important things. Thus why I've adopted the "It can stand for anything" outlook. I feel there is truth to be found in what I said about the meaning of the flag being able to change. It would take time and a good bit of effort, but I believe it could be achieved.
The fact that we get so worked up about a flag because a mentally unstable man shot up a church and took a picture with the flag is just sad. The confederacy fought for independence and preservation didn't fight for slavery until the later stages of the war, even Lincoln didn't want to ban slavery just so he can keep the Union together, even during the war when slavery was outlawed in the south, he allowed the border states which were the union to keep their slaves until the end of the war. Both sides for one word, America, we were and still are Americans. The reason why the Confederate Battle flag flies at capital buildings is because the state governments wanted to pay tribute to the men who died in the civil war both north and south and to remember the war.
when i was young i thought that by now we'd have some crazy ass technology and science and shit
instead people are stuck debating wether a piece of cloth representing a crucial part of a nation's history should be allowed to flutter around because idiots get offended by anything