The Confederate Flag

[Armoured]

"Don't let a good crisis go to waste" - Rahm Emanuel

This administration is obviously not interested in the number 4 or 9.

Uh-huh...

 

[KWCrazy]

Yay! Haven't had a good Benghazi derail in a while! Yep, 4 dead at Benghazi years ago means the terrorists are winning. 9 dead in Charleston last week don't even rate a mention.

What happened in Charleston was terrorism. The young terrorist should have a swift and sure execution.
He didn't kill because of any flag.
He killed because he hated.
Hillary killed because her personal ambitions mean more than the lives of others. Obama let men die because their lives weren't nearly as important as his next campaign speech.
And you want to talk about a flag Democrats raised over their state capitol building?

 

[TerranceL]

Same to me.

Some symbols with negative history cannot be reclaimed.

So when you travel to asia you will look down your nose at all the people/signs/buildings with swatikas on them?

 

[Eudaimonist]

And the swastika may just mean German culture to some germans.

It may, though I doubt it.

However, I have heard that the Confederate flag does not mean racism or slavery to many Southerners.


eudaimonia,

Mark

 

[Eudaimonist]

So when you travel to asia you will look down your nose at all the people/signs/buildings with swatikas on them?

If they are German swastikas, yes.


eudaimonia,

Mark

 

[Armoured]

What happened in Charleston was terrorism. The young terrorist should have a swift and sure execution.
He didn't kill because of any flag.
He killed because he hated.
Hillary killed because her personal ambitions mean more than the lives of others. Obama let men die because their lives weren't nearly as important as his next campaign speech.
And you want to talk about a flag Democrats raised over their state capitol building?

Uh-huh...

 

[Armoured]

So when you travel to asia you will look down your nose at all the people/signs/buildings with swatikas on them?

Seemed apt

 

[Winepress777]

Do you know what the Confederate flag meant before it was co-opted by the 1920's Ku Klux Klan? Do you know what it still means to Soutpeople today (not the Ku Klux Klan)?

Did you know the original Ku Klux Klan was a peaceful, men's fraternal organization (1860-1870) as a way to cheer up the families of the defeated South? It was disbanded when unscrupulous men donned the Klan robes and committed lawless acts. But this did not stop these lawless individuals.

What is interesting is during the birth of the KKK the confederate flag was NOT used as a symbol. Even today that do not accept the flag as their main symbol. A blood dripped cross is. Is a cross racist? They also use the bible. Is the bible racist? Or are these sick misinterpretations?

A few more factoids.
The Confederate Flag was never the official flag of the confederacy. It actually became more prominent after the war ended.

The flag actually became seen as racist during the civil rights movement. Not the civil war.

The war was fought on a false premise and, given time, slavery would have disappeared from the South in another generation. It was already waning, because of industrialization. Had the North not been secretly fearful of the South's innovation, trade inroads, and business acumen that was outstripping the performance of the northern industrialists, the war would have never happened.

Excellent to see this wisdom. Liberal news spinning has only confused the Confederate Flag with racism. The Civil War wasn't begun over slavery. Slavery wasn't even part of the issue until it got politically thrown into the mix two years after the war began. So many negative comments made against the Confederate Flag by so many drifters of the hard blowing wind...

 

[The Cadet]

Wouldn't it be nice if people devoted a little of this passion to things that actually mattered, like four dead Americans in Benghazi, leadership who watched men fighting for their lives for 7 hours and did nothing, a government cover-up, systematic lying to the American people, a man arrested because he made a video very few people ever saw making light of the false prophet, and the fact that the woman personally responsible for the death of an American ambassador thinks she should be elected president because she's female? Seriously, whining about a flag while our country is rotting away and terrorists are winning all over the world is a pathetic waste of energy.

There is not a single thing in this which is accurate. Like, not one thing. It's actually kind of astounding. Was history always like this? Was there always two sides to an issue, where one side clearly has none of the facts and makes almost all of it up based on false information? Hey buddy? It was a parole violation. Whoever told you that he was arrested simply for making a video like that lied.

 

[TerranceL]

If they are German swastikas, yes.


eudaimonia,

Mark

Then your just being a bigot.

I don't get what's so hard to understand that symbols don't mean the same thing to everyone.

You can find asian cartoons with characters in SS uniforms, those are the heroes.

Western cultural imperialism is bad.

 

[SuperCloud]

^Tell me those are aren't Japanese in some weird fetish? LOL!!!

(At photo above of bride and Asian Nazi)

 

[TerranceL]

Seemed apt

No doubt the cultural imperialist in the thread will tell us how these people are evil horrible racist.

Because you know, if a symbol means something to an American it's gotta mean that everywhere.

 

[Albion]

They are somewhat different, but I think they are both similar in ways which are relevant to whether it's wrong to fly the flag.

If you think it's wrong to fly a flag that stands for genocide, you should probably also think it's wrong to fly a flag that stands for slavery.

I'd say that it would be necessary to show that the flag does in fact 'stand for slavery.' Seems pretty obvious to me, yet I notice that you didn't even make an attempt at doing that.

 

[Armoured]

^Tell me those are aren't Japanese in some weird fetish? LOL!!!

(At photo above of bride and Asian Nazi)

IIRC, it's a themed wedding. In Asia, Nazis are just seen as "cool baddies" by many people, much like how we view pirates here in the West. The intent is roughly as racist as a themed Star Wars wedding here.

 

[Eudaimonist]

Then your just being a bigot.

No, I'm just not dropping context.

I don't get what's so hard to understand that symbols don't mean the same thing to everyone.

I agree that symbols don't mean the same thing to everyone. I'm saying that to millions of people, and with good reason, the swastika is a symbol of evil.

And, yes, I mean the German swastika, not any Asian ones.


eudaimonia,

Mark

 

[Dave-W]

If they are German swastikas, yes.

You can always tell a German.

You just can't tell him very much ....,

[btw - I am German]

 

[Armoured]

No, I'm just not dropping context.



I agree that symbols don't mean the same thing to everyone. I'm saying that to millions of people, and with good reason, the swastika is a symbol of evil.


eudaimonia,

Mark

I still say the intent of the user is what matters. Symbols are not inherently offensive. They can't be. It is the user's views that are either offensive or not.

As said elsewhere, my caveat is that the user is obliged to be aware of baggage associated with a symbol, and prepared to explain their position if people assume the wrong meaning.

 

[The Cadet]

Excellent to see this wisdom. Liberal news spinning has only confused the Confederate Flag with racism. The Civil War wasn't begun over slavery. Slavery wasn't even part of the issue until it got politically thrown into the mix two years after the war began.

http://www.history.com/topics/american-civil-war/crittenden-compromise
http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2015/06/what-this-cruel-war-was-over/396482/
http://www.salon.com/2013/03/16/the_south_still_lies_about_the_civil_war/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lost_Cause_of_the_Confederacy#Contemporary_historians

It's not "liberal news spinning". It's the consensus view among modern historians, and the evidence is hugely visible throughout their own words.

Or just read this one speech:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cornerstone_Speech#The_.27Cornerstone.27

The new Constitution has put at rest forever all the agitating questions relating to our peculiar institutions—African slavery as it exists among us—the proper status of the negro in our form of civilization. This was the immediate cause of the late rupture and present revolution. Jefferson, in his forecast, had anticipated this, as the "rock upon which the old Union would split." He was right. What was conjecture with him, is now a realized fact. But whether he fully comprehended the great truth upon which that rock stood and stands, may be doubted. The prevailing ideas entertained by him and most of the leading statesmen at the time of the formation of the old Constitution were, that the enslavement of the African was in violation of the laws of nature; that it was wrong in principle, socially, morally and politically. It was an evil they knew not well how to deal with; but the general opinion of the men of that day was, that, somehow or other, in the order of Providence, the institution would be evanescent and pass away... Those ideas, however, were fundamentally wrong. They rested upon the assumption of the equality of races. This was an error. It was a sandy foundation, and the idea of a Government built upon it—when the "storm came and the wind blew, it fell."

Our new Government is founded upon exactly the opposite ideas; its foundations are laid, its cornerstone rests, upon the great truth that the negro is not equal to the white man; that slavery, subordination to the superior race, is his natural and normal condition.

. . . look with confidence to the ultimate universal acknowledgement of the truths upon which our system rests? It is the first government ever instituted upon the principles in strict conformity to nature, and the ordination of Providence, in furnishing the materials of human society. Many governments have been founded upon the principle of the subordination and serfdom of certain classes of the same race; such were and are in violation of the laws of nature. Our system commits no such violation of nature's laws.​

No, I'm sorry, but this is just plain historical revisionism. You might as well claim that the Nazis went to war because Poland was looking at them funny! That's just not what happened! The civil war was largely about slavery. Not entirely, but white supremacy and the role of african-americans as subservient played a huge role. As historian William C. Davis put it:

To the old Union they had said that the Federal power had no authority to interfere with slavery issues in a state. To their new nation they would declare that the state had no power to interfere with a federal protection of slavery. Of all the many testimonials to the fact that slavery, and not states’ rights, really lay at the heart of their movement, this was the most eloquent of all.​

 

[Albion]

No, I'm just not dropping context.



I agree that symbols don't mean the same thing to everyone. I'm saying that to millions of people, and with good reason, the swastika is a symbol of evil.

And, yes, I mean the German swastika, not any Asian ones.


eudaimonia,

Let's go with that reasoning for a minute. Millions of people see evil in the "peace sign" and also the square and compass of Freemasonry. Is there a moral obligation for society to ban their display, therefore? For that matter, millions of people (including some here) think that Christianity has blood on its hands because of events in the history of the church(es). Should the display of the Cross be banned?

 

[Eudaimonist]

I still say the intent of the user is what matters. Symbols are not inherently offensive.

The intent of the user is not always obvious, and symbols may offend for perfectly rational reasons. I have little doubt that many Southerners don't see the Confederate flag as a symbol of slavery, but people who understand that slavery was one of the biggest stated motivations for secession can hardly be faulted by being offended.


eudaimonia,

Mark