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Title: South Carolina Needs To Take That Confederate Flag Down Now
Source:
The Frisky
URL Source: http://www.thefrisky.com/2015-06-18 ... ehouse-in-spite-of-hate-crime/
Published: Jun 19, 2015
Author: Robyn Pennacchia
Post Date: 2015-06-19 11:36:01 by Willie Green
Keywords: nazi, KKK, bigots
Views: 1748
Comments: 19
The Confederate flag is having a moment in the news today. First, the Supreme Court ruled that the state of Texas does not have to issue Confederate flag license plates–and, if you want the truth, I was actually a little surprised that the state didn’t want to issue them. But hey, a little improvement is always nice. Then came the news that while the South Carolina State flag and the American flag at the Statehouse were at half mast in response to the mass shooting at the Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church–the Confederate flag, which also flies there, was still at full mast. Now you’d think, given what had just happened not even a full day before, that they might remove that flag altogether. But no, not only did they keep it, they kept it at full mast. Because class. I’m just gonna come right out and say it–the Confederate flag is absolutely revolting and has no place anywhere that has anything to do with the United States Government. It makes me ill to look at it, just as it makes me ill to look at a swastika. If individual people want to go around with it plastered on the backs of their denim jacket? Fine! They are free to do that, and besides, it helps me know who to avoid. However, a government that is supposed to represent all the people in this country should not be publicly flying a flag that harkens nostalgically back to the days when one group of people were allowed to keep another group of people as property and committed treason for the purpose of being able to continue to do that. That is completely insane. Sure! Those who love the Confederate flag continue to insist that it has nothing to do with racism but with “Southern Pride” and “states rights” and honoring those who died in the Civil War (or, as they might call it “The War of Northern Aggression”). But the “state right” those people were fighting for was the right to keep human chattel, and I am not quite sure that’s a thing worth “honoring.” You don’t see the German government flying the Nazi flag around, out of “respect” for Germans who died during WWII. Germany has the good sense to be embarrassed and ashamed, and not go around trying to claim it as a symbol of regional pride anywhere. Even if those who embrace it feel like it means something different to them than it does to everyone else–the meaning it has to everyone else matters more. It matters that when people see that flag they think “that is someone who wishes they could still keep black people as slaves” or “that is a state that is disappointed they lost the Civil War, because now they don’t get to keep slaves anymore.” I don’t know why anyone with any capability of empathy would want to remind people of something so horrible and stomach-churning or make people feel that way if they could help it. The fact that such a symbol is flown at a state capital…I don’t even know. It’s just cruel. It’s easy to see why Southerners might feel importantly about holding onto symbols of “pride,” as they are quite often targets of derision, and often unfairly so. But perhaps they could come up with something else that isn’t the symbol of something so hurtful to so many people or that doesn’t exclude Southerners who aren’t white. Certainly, they can find something to be proud of that doesn’t evoke the specter of slavery. Something a little less explicitly violent. Things read how they read, no matter how much people may want that to be different. The Raëlian UFO cult wants to rehabilitate the image of the swastika, but that is not going to happen because it’s associated with too much pain. The same for the Confederate flag. Similarly, I could not throw on a black tricorn hat, an eyepatch and a fake hook hand and expect everyone at a costume party to immediately recognize that I was dressed as Tinkerbell. It’s time for South Carolina to take that Confederate flag down. Not just for today, but forever. Poster Comment: The GOP/Tea Party is afraid to offend and purge the whacknut, neo-Confederate bigots and racists from its ranks.
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#5. To: Willie Green, Vicomte13 (#0)
Ill? Does she vomit? Take sick days at work? Enter the hospital? See a specialist? Racism of all varieties is directly fed by race rants of all stripes. This woman has a lot more in common with the St*rmfr*nt types than she'll ever admit. Naturally, her claims and description should be examined. She gives the impression that the "Confederate flag" is being flown on the SC capitol. Clearly, it is at a separate soldiers' memorial on the grounds of the capitol. And many people should recognize (but don't) that that flag is not the Confederate flag at all. It is a battle flag of a particular Confederate army (the Tennessee Conferate Army, also for 2 years, the Confederate Navy Jack. And a square version was the flag of the Army of Northern Virginia. Most citizens of the Confederacy never saw what we today call the "Confederate flag". Ever. The actual Confederate flags in use changed over the course of the war. However, there is another angle to the endless controversy over flying the "Confederate flag" at the SC capitol. The colonial flag of South Carolina was the Moultrie flag and it was the state flag and the militia flag. In 1861, when South Carolina had seceded, the new state flag became the Palmetto flag. So people object to the "Confederate flag" over at the Confederate soldiers' memorial. But, since the true cause of the Civil War was states' rights (primarily over increased taxes levied on the South and doubled just days before Lincoln became president), the true Confederate flag of SC is the Palmetto flag, the same one that flies over the capitol every day and that symbolizes South Carolina's Confederate past far more than the battle flags of various armies that weren't even from South Carolina. Yet, no one objects to the real Confederate flag of South Carolina, the one that still flies every day.
Your post initiated a flashback for me. Provenance Reconstruction: This flag is an Army of Northern Virginia, 3rd wool bunting issue. Flags of this pattern were manufactured at the Richmond Depot between July 1862 and May 1864. This flag was issued to the 6th Alabama Infantry in April, 1863. It was captured on the night of May 8, 1864 at Spotsylvania Courthouse (Laurel Hill) by Captain Benjamin F. Davis, 22nd Massachusetts Volunteer Infantry. According to the Official Records, Davis was killed two days later on May 10th by a sharpshooter. According to a letter from Captain R. G. Carter dated March 28, 1905, Davis was killed the following morning (May 9) as he emerged from the woods with the captured colors. The flag was forwarded to the U.S. War Department on October 6, 1864 by G. K. Warren, Major General of Volunteers commanding the 5th Army Corps. The flag was assigned War Department Capture Number 194. It was returned to the State of Alabama by the U.S. War Department effective March 25, 1905. Edit,to add: I enlisted in the USAF in Montgomery and have a great grandchild living there now who if following family tradition will make me a great great grandfather next year.
I find the battle flags a little out of place. Emblems of armies, not of the Confederacy as a whole. Why not use one of the Confederate national flags if you have to use a flag? BTW, the current "Confederate flag" as it is known now is actually entirely a creation of the twentieth century, not the nineteenth. It merges features of two different Confederate battle flags (one of them the Confederate Navy jack, as I recall). So that "Confederate flag" in SC isn't a real Confederate flag at all.
I don't have a historical answer to give you as a reason....maybe Google does. I only know that the battle flag was just “the flag.” I could venture a guess that maybe it was/is because of the symmetry and vibrant colors. The flag was never a symbol of racism in my neck of the woods, as it apparently is to the kid in SC today. I grew up with segregation but I never saw racism. There was/is a difference. The former we could not control….the latter we did, and did it well. I am speaking from the experience of living in a farming community and just outside the County Seat of 2,500 people.
#13. To: Gatlin, TooConservative (#12)
(Edited)
Regarding the flag - the states have a democratic system - in time they will probably take down the flag - some southern states had old confederate flags become state flags as a way to cope with their total defeat in the civil war - the north did not really care because they won and if this little token to lost pride kept the peace - so be it. But the number of people still smarting over that war diminish each day. What is really facinating to me is that modern day "Republicans" are the ones advocating for the confederate flags to stay in place - who were hated in the south except by blacks who voted GOP until the GOP gave up on the south and until Nixon's southern strategy invited in the disaffected Dixie-crats. Having Republicans defend states rights and the confederate flags is as ironic and as comedic as it gets.
Top • Page Up • Full Thread • Page Down • Bottom/LatestIt makes me ill to look at it, just as it makes me ill to look at a swastika.
The third flag came late in the war so few Confederates ever knew it. It seems most of the flags made were the first flag with a fair number of the second flag in some places closer to the Confederate heartland. 
first flag, March 1861-April 1863 
second flag, May 1863-February 1865 
third flag, March 1865 
#6. To: TooConservative (#5)
(Edited)
The 6th Alabama Infantry Regiment was organized at Montgomery with 12 companies and 1,400 men and Commanded by Colonel John J. Seibels. The 6th Alabama Infantry Regiment mustered 2,109 men during the Civil War. Of these, almost 400 were killed and 243 died of disease. Three of my great grandfathers served with the 6th Alabama and survived the war.
#9. To: Gatlin (#6)
(Edited)
#12. To: TooConservative (#9)
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