Is This a Racist Flag?

I doubt those that created A2K could agree with you less. Thought and discsussion provoking threads are what the place is all about. Perhaps you missed the point.

Here's cjhsa admonishing Setanta that A2K is for provoking thinking....

Oh de irony of de thing.

And it continues... the agony of the left....

"the agony of the left"? Looks to me like the agony's on the right,as witness the start of this whole topic, as you guys get pushed farther and farther back on the cultural war front. The General Lee loses its flag. Southern state legislatures apologize for their racist, slave pasts. The country overwhelmingly repudiates our massively incompetent administration. The courts scathingly rebuke him for his actions which don't bear constitutional scrutiny. Somewhere in the neighborhood of twenty percent of the people who identified themselves as Republicans a few years ago don't anymore. Crash and burn, cj, that's what's happening.

Why did you start a culture war in the first place? Because of your own hatred perhaps?

Also, "username", you and others are entirely missing the point of the thread, and showing you emotional political correctness for all to see. An unintended consequence, I assure you, but you don't wear it well.

Ooh, yeah. Ludacris wore the confederate flag. That proves...
something, I'm sure.

uh, cj, have you been unconscious for the last thirty years?I/we didn't start the culture wars. That's one of the standard terms to describe the conservative knee jerk reaction to changes in American culture, which the right politicized as "liberal". Silly. And a losing battle, since most of them are supported by the vast majority of the American people.

And what exactly is it that you consider the point of this thread to be, if not determining whether or not a symbol that has had extraordinarily intense emotions connected with it for a century and a half and still carries a heavy emotional freight, carries racism in its emotional baggage? That's what we've done. The consensus is yes, it does. That's not "political correctness", the right's essentyially meaningless term for anything it doesn't like. That's history. That's the American experience.

He quotes from PBS... cute.

Personally I don't think a flag can be racist any more than a gun can kill somebody.

Just about everyone missed it.

Oh, the thread was a trick question?

What passes for a trick question at his house.

oh, another language pedant. <sigh> why am I not surprised?

Well, let's look at the topic. The exact question was "Is This a Racist Flag?"

If you had posted a picture of the stars and stripes and asked "Is This an American Flag?" the answer would have been a two-fold yes: it is the flag of America throughout its history (in its different variations), and it is a flag for Americans and used by Americans.

The confederate flag is certainly the flag used by American racists, both those supporters of slavery during the Civil War, and by racists since, as amply mentioned above, the flag used by the KKK, the flag used by the White Citizens' Councils and the segregationist state and local governments that said "Never" in the 60s and their descendants today. So yes it is a racist flag--its symbolism is racist and it is used by racistswhich makes it a racist flag just as an American flag is a flag for Americans. The confederate flag is thoroughly identified with racists. Trick question or no, its a racist symbol, and it's a racist flag.

And think about this: I know of no one who waves the Nazi swastika flag and says "I just think it's a great example of graphic design and it's a part of German heritage and German history and I'm proud of German heritage, and that's all I mean by it." I really don't think you could legitimately get away with it. There's too much tied to that flag, just as there's too much tied to the stars and bars.

word

Rebel flag= raceist!?
well i mean its just a flag and everyone is soo very easy to ofend these days than ever before. I have been yelled at before for saying Black. I have told to say African-American. Now Oprea is saying that African-American is ofencive!?!?!?!?!

so who knows.....

You never hear any1 being blamed for being racist when they say White.
We don't yell and say no! Say Caucasion! or how ever you spell that!

& many people say...........


"Its Heritage not hate."

sooo.......I say NO.

Oprah is offensive, but that's another thread.

Regardless of whether this Confederate flag is a particular flag amongst several Confederate flags, my opinion is that I believe I've seen news photos where some of the soldiers in Vietnam had a Confederate flag displayed here or there prominently.
That would not have bothered me in the least, since a) it could confuse the enemy by seeing two flags, and b) if the flag's history allowed a Southern soldier to feel that that particular history, with its own flag, motivated him to fight better, and thereby help keep alive all soldiers, so be it.
Also, in the way of analogy, possibly a poor one, if there is a "two state solution" to the Palestinian/Israel conflict, should Israel be forced to have a new flag, since the current blue Star of David flag might have negative connotations to Palestinians?
By acquiescing to those that associate the Confederate flag with slavery, I'm sorry for their association; however, I would not want to deny Caucasian Southerners the right to value their particular history in the home of centuries of their ancestors. Without a history, we lose our humanity. I wouldn't want to deny anyone that. Two wrongs don't make a right, I've heard.
And perhaps, the value of the Confederate flag for Black Southerners is that the flag is a reminder how they've overcome so much adversity. What's the saying (from a song, I believe), "You don't know where you're going, if you don't know where you've been"?

Uh, foofie, would you say flying a Nazi flag could be a reminder to Jews of how much adversity they'd overcome?

"Uh, foofie, would you say flying a Nazi flag could be a reminder to Jews of how much adversity they'd overcome?"

I'm not sure if this is a valid analogy, since Nazism is outlawed in Germany. Are we really comparing apples to apples? (And, slavery, while being a sin against humanity, is not genocide). But to answer your question, most Jews I believe, when they see a swastika spray painted somewhere, might report it as a hate crime. Flying the Confederate flag is not a hate crime. And, for many Jews, knowing there are still people that value the Nazi philosophy is not an epiphany; they are quite aware of it, and get no more offended by it then when they weren't allowed to go to certain hotels in certain cities back in the earlier part of the 20th century.
But, and I hope this doesn't offend anyone, when a Jew sees the Catholic cross with Jesus being crucified, it might make one or two Jews wince, since that crucifixion also resulted in two millienia of persecution. I don't remember hearing of any Jews, or Jewish organizations wanting Catholicism to use a new religious symbol. It is what it is!

The confederate flag only reflects the Confederacy, for a short period of historic time, attempting to leave the Union. The Texas Lone Star flag also has a history that included slavery. Is anyone protesting the Lone Star Flag? Both flags, I believe, just reflect a political system. Slavery in the South was part of that political system, but that's not what the flag represented. And by the way, Northern whites joined the Union Army oftentimes believing they were fighting to keep the new states in the West a white area (no slavery = no Blacks). In effect, ending slavery did not seem uppermost in the minds of many Northern whites.

I personally believe making the reference to Jews and Nazi flags was not a worthwhile analogy. What that analogy might explain is why Jews are mostly supporters of Israel. They are quite aware the world's concern for their safety has been shown to be fickle over the course of history.

there is more than one!
so if the well known rebel "Battle flag" is racist than all of the rebel flags the rebels ever had are racist correct??

the very first "Rebel flags was made in 1810



The stars and bars



the battle flag A.K.A the racist flag.




along came another.



the final one. only flown for a few days intill the Rebels gave up.

(no pic)

but is just the same as the last one but with a red stip on the far right.

foofie says the Confederate flag only represents the Confdederacy, for a short period of time, trying to leave the Union. No, foofie, that's not all it represents. I suggest you read, for example, the statements of secession the states that comprised the Confederacy made when they left the Union. That of South Carolina is typical: http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/csa/scarsec.htm

Talk of "states' rights" as they would, what it always came down to was the right to perpetuate slavery. They were explicit about it. The stars and bars in the several variants was the symbol of that fight to maintain slavery. Over the course of the next century, the battle flag gradually became the generally accepted predominant version of the confederate flag. State governments flew it as symbols of their intention to maintain segregation. The KKK flew it at their rallies. Segregationists and White Citizens' Councils wrapped themselves in it metaphorically and sometimes literally. Its history didn't end with the Civil War. It continued for another century as the symbol of black oppression. If it is a symbol of Southern Heritage, Southern Heritage is inextricably mixed with slavery and segregation.

So, yes, it is unalterably racist. Too much was done with that flag as its symbol for it not to be.