Confederate flag isn’t a flag for the South
We need to talk about the confederate flag.
For starters, it’s not the confederate flag.
The flag with the blue cross and stars on a red background? That flag never represented the South. Ever. That was the battle flag of the army of Northern Virginia, the force Robert E. Lee inherited. General Lee didn’t like the design and instead used one much more similar to the American flag: Three stripes with a group of stars in a blue corner. The actual confederate flag looked a lot like Lee’s flag, it just had a circle of stars instead. Its short-lived successors had large, white backgrounds.
So no, the “confederate” flag is not about southern heritage, or at least not that heritage. It most recently gained popularity during George Wallace’s campaign in the ’60s. You know, the George Wallace whose slogan was “segregation now, segregation tomorrow, segregation forever?” The one who stood in the University of Alabama’s auditorium entrance to block two black students from entering until he was forced to let them in by the national guard? That George Wallace.
That flag is a racist symbol. That’s why Georgia changed their flag in 2003, removing the “confederate” symbol that was conveniently added in 1956 after the Supreme Court decided that segregation in schools was unconstitutional in Brown vs Board of Education. That’s why the marine corps banned confederate paraphernalia long before any of this George Floyd stuff started, and why the navy has since followed suit.
The confederacy was a failed nation that didn’t last a decade and ended 150 years ago. It was an enemy insurrection, just like ISIS. Imagine Iraqis 150 years from now, hoisting the flag of ISIS for nostalgia. Imagine an army of apologists carrying around Nazi flags, claiming it’s not a racist symbol because the swastika is viewed positively by Jainists, a religious group hardly anyone in this country has ever heard of.
I understand wanting to display a symbol of the South. Southern culture is great! I like my tea sweet and my shine bright, I think barbecue should be its own food group, I watch college football religiously, and I have a thing for old rusty farm trucks. Southern culture was great long before the confederacy, and long afterward.
That flag is not a symbol of the South. It dredges up images of the most immoral, evil times in Southern history. Its most recent use was by people who engaged in lynchings, assassinations, church bombings, and arson; Terrorists.
Terrorists.
You might want to think twice before sporting a symbol that wasn’t even good enough for Robert E. Lee and saying “I want people to associate me with this.”
Justin Sims
Uniontown