Understanding the Confederate Flag Debate and Moving Forward as a Nation
May 31st 2009 13:40
“The great secret of succeeding in conversation is to admire little, to hear much; always to distrust our own reason, and sometimes that of our friends; never to pretend to wit, but to make that of others appear as much as possibly we can; to hearken”
~ Benjamin Franklin
~ Benjamin Franklin
A collection of threads shaped into different symbols are the basic elements that go into the creation of a flag.
The colors that are created from this creation of the mind are intended to serve as symbols that represent a certain memory, emotion, belief or to rally a nation.
For the United States of America our flag serves as a reminder of the blood spilled by men and women of every age, race and sexual orientation to gain and preserve the freedoms endowed to us by our forefathers, 13 stripes that represent the original colonies and the representation of the fifty individual states as stars that make up the union called the United States of America.
Through out world history, the creation of a flag has always served as a tool to unify a group of individuals from different cultures, socio economic classes or religious backgrounds.
These people stood behind these symbols but had different reasons for fighting to defend their individual home land.
When the time came for colonists to take arms in protection of our country, social scourges like slavery, the oppression of women and social class strife were thrown on the back burner when men and women of every race took up arms in the formation of this country.
The British took no regard as to the race or gender of an enemy combatant’s home before the decision was made to invade burn or pillage much the same as these very same decisions were made by union forces that burned down entire cities in the South during the Civil War.
What we have in today’s modern society is a muddy conversation based around delusions and misunderstandings in historical facts.
It’s become fashionable and easy to form conversations of pointed fingers at aspects of our country we don’t understand in the battle to win the war of ignorance.
War is never simple and it has and will always be far from easy.
Whether it’s a social, mental or physical war the only easy aspect of this part of our extreme society is within the waging of the battle and continuing the conflict by misunderstanding the aspect of who the real enemy is.
For too long we’ve stood on the hill and sought out the biggest objects to form arguments about why our society is racist.
Objects built from thread that tell the story of our history as Americans and the struggle that still continues today.
The struggle of racism and the existence of this pandemic from both sides of the argument is something that has been left out of the conversation.
Instead of talking about it we choose to demonize objects and look to put everyone on the other side of our personal beliefs into the same box of racism.
When we look deeper into the elements of history and truly understand that not every person who fought and died for the cause of protecting their homes and way of life was a slave owner we can start moving forward as a society.
A flag in itself can never be the torch bearer for the cause of social genocide, oppression and slavery because these dark periods of history were created, carried out and passed on by individual groups of men and women as opposed to entire societies represented under one banner.
The emotions of this issue run deep as both sides would rather scream their side of the argument instead of forming a point of consensus.
Consensuses where we can respect the wishes of the family whose ancestors fought for the cause of defending their homeland and are now in the same position of defending their rights of heritage from a blind sided attack.
Consensuses where we can understand the emotions built up from ancestors of slaves who had to endure genocide, being considered less than a human being and the misuse of a flag created to symbolize states rights and self reliance that later transformed into a social tool of anger and hate in the Jim Crowe South.
Arguments surrounding symbolism of the Confederate Flag and its place in history is far from a black and white issue.
The Mason Dixon line still exists within the minds of Americans as the story of the battle that divided our country is told differently in one place as opposed to another.
The Civil War was created by politicians who couldn’t find a way to balance our forefather’s intentions and later became a social cause of action in a game of chess our country has never recovered from.
Slavery did not spark the Civil War and was never the inspiration for the Southern Man who could never afford slaves to take arms.
Men and women of every race took arms and legal positions on both sides of the battle to defend their individual way of life and the minute we lost perspective of this in our society by forming arguments about symbols we lost any chance of this war ever ending.
The war on symbols has only emboldened the racist to continue their cause of misunderstanding behind the meaning of the flags they wave.
There will always be elements of our society who enjoy rolling around in the mud of ignorance.
The cause of eliminating these thoughts from people’s minds will always end in failure.
The only weapon to combat ignorance is knowledge and understanding.
No amount of yelling, screaming or creation of laws to wipe out our dark history will ever change anyone’s misunderstanding of the history that created this great nation.
The battle of understanding begins inside each and every one of us and it is our jobs to soak in as much knowledge as we can because these are the only weapons suitable for battle.
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Comment by Anonymous
Comment by Khalfani King
Politics and Culture
Khalfani King
Oldies but Goodies From Campaign 08
This action can be used with the American Flag just as much as it can be used with the Confederate Flag or any other symbol of American history.
It's a harsh thing to say but there comes time for all of us to judge people for personal responsbility instead of throwing everything into one big pot.
When we throw everything into a huge melting pot of racism and call anyone who defends the Confederate Flag and Southern Values a racist the only winners are the extremists who misunderstand history and live off of nothing more than division along racial lines.
In the aspect of flying this symbol of State Rights and Self reliance over institutions of the state we run into a slippery slope of weighing public value and the rights of those that want to honor history.
It's up to the people to define this line with logical conversation and to judge the intentions of these lawmakers in wanting to raise this symbol of insurrection against the United States of America.
The issue of this flag flying over a state Capitol building is far from a racial controversy but rather a question of judgement...