" Why would you fly a flag of fucking losers? Couldn't even win their first war, now look at em. Best thing to happen to the south since then has been the Saints winning the Super Bowl. "This.
Is anyone on GB offended by the Confederate flag?
It offends me because it represents bigotry. But, its pretty asinine because the Confederacy lost... So people can be proud in losing if they want.
Hardly anything "offends" me, meaning it manages to touch my own set of morals and ideals. But, I do think it's stupid the way it is most used today and hate when here in the South it is sometimes flown at the same height or higher than the U.S. flag (which is illegal; you can not fly any flag the same height as the U.S. flag).
" @ryanwho said:But did the "good guys" lose? The Communist supported side lost --- and I'd happily argue Communism isn't a "good guy" in any conflict on its own. Spain protected its Jewish citizens from the Holocaust (the French, even before Petain, cannot make similar claims). They didn't involve themselves in World War II to any appreciable degree. Franco was bad." @BiffMcBlumpkin said:Well, technically the Holocaust is also a vast oversimplification of World War 2, which had a lot to do with not wrapping up the first one properly, economics and the political situation inside and outside of Germany. It still kind of taints every symbol of the Nazi era, though. I would find it a suitable comparison if it wasn't such a cliché to bring up nazism on the Internet. So let me propose an example that hits closer to home for me. I'm Spanish. We had a Civil War in 36. The good guys lost and fascism rose to power. They had a flag and we lived under it more or less peacefully but oppressed for four decades, until long after Hitler fell and well into the seventies. Then the bastard of a dictator we had died of natural causes and we became a democracy, changing the flag in the process. To this day, extreme right wing nutcases use the old flag ("pre-constitutional", they call it) as a sign of pride and claim we were better off back then and that fascism is misunderstood and it's really not intrinsically genocidal and that it gets a bad reputation unjustly. To this day, it disgusts me, scares me and offends me whenever I see that thing, and I was born (shortly) after democracy started. So yeah, I do sympathise with people who don't want to see the Confederate flag waving proudly if they can help it. Very much. "Not even close to the same. And you want to say "but slavery", scept that's a vast oversimplification over the reasoning behind the war. The vast majority of southerners who faught didn't have slaves, most slave owners didn't fight, the emancipation proclamation only made slavery illegal in the south(who already rebelled, so its kind of like the US making a law for Maxico and expecting them to follow) and 3 states in the north continued to practice it. I could go on. Also its an important symbol in Hinduism and continues to be, if you go to that part of the world you'll see a huge number of people with a swastik necklace. But I guess they should pack it up, a fringe of radicals hijacked the symbol and changed the meaning and they don't want to offend you, right? "" I know, right? Sometimes people are offended by my Swastika. I have no idea why those knuckleheads don't understand it has nothing to do with the Holocaust, it's just a general German pride thing. "
The alternative was likely much worse.
Having never lived in the US, the confederate flag does not offend me on a personal level. I can understand why it would offend Black People however. Sure, the Civil War was not just about Slavery, but it played a pretty big role. The confederates were dead set on retaining slaves - heck, read the some of the comments by the Vice President of the Confederacy if you don't believe me - the confederate government believed that black people were inferior and deserved to be servants of the white people. It was in their freaking constitution - they proclaimed "white supremacy" to be a "noble" and "moral" truth. That's pretty bloody offensive, ya know? And flying the flag of a government that preached (and practised) slavery and white supremacy definitely gives the impression that you support those ideas.
I'm sorry you cannot separate slavery from the confederacy, since the confederacy explicitly supported slavery and the domination of black folks. Slavery is as confederate as anything else out there. It is. Sorry, but it is. Slavery wasn't the only thing about the Confederates, but neither was killing jews the only thing about the Nazis. Was every single confederate solider a baby eating monster with 100 slaves? No, but neither was every German Landser (Ground-trooper) an SS-officer.
Was the confederacy as evil as the Nazis? No. But, like the Nazis, did they hold a pretty horrible core ideology? Yes. The Confederacy supported Slavery. Maybe they can be forgiven, given the times they grew up in, but it doesn't mean we can let that ideology flourish. Every time you or someone else hoists up the Confederate flag, we kinda get the impression that you're saying "Black folks shouldnt' be free", and you can imagine why that's pretty frickin offensive.
Just another thing I wanted to mention: To say that "not every confederate owned slaves" or that the War wasn't "about slavery", misses the ponit: The Confederacy backed Slavery very strongly. Therefore, it was a bad government. You can't argue that fact away, unless you support slavery. Most historians do agree that Slavery was a huge motivating factor in the war, but even if it wasn't (and it totally was), it doesn't change the fact that the Confederacy would have let slavery flourish. They had no intention of freeing black folks.
Was the Union a perfect, virtuous side? No - they still treated the blacks very poorly. But at least they didn't enslave them. Slavery is, when you really think about it, one of the worst moral crimes you can commit. There's very little else you can do that would be worse than being a slaver. The only thing worse than slavery is genocide in my opinion.
So that's why the Confederacy was a bad government. And if you fly the flag of that government, to us it seems like you support that government and wish it hadn't lost the war.
And you know there are OTHER ways of showing southern pride that don't involve flying the flag of Pro-Slavery government.
" And you know there are OTHER ways of showing southern pride that don't involve flying the flag of Pro-Slavery government. "Right. Like lynching black people, or the white people people who dared to speak out for equal rights for those blacks. A celebrated tradition of the south all the way up to the late 60s. That southern pride must really run deep, you just can't beat southern hospitality.
" @Korolev said:Yeah.... you've got a point there. But the south isn't all bad - some democrats live in the south. Brad came from the South. And um...... they gave us Coca Cola? Oh, and deep fried Snicker's Bars. The South has improved a lot since the 60's. Is there a disproportionate amount of racists in the South of the USA? Yes, can't argue with that, but things have improved. To stereotype the South as a land of rednecks and hicks doesn't help. Plenty of NASA scientists came from the South you know. It's not like every southerner is a overalls-wearing, tobacco chewing, pig farmer/moonshine maker who hates blacks. There are quite a few people who fit that description, but again, plenty of good folks in the South. Are the outnumbered by the bad folks? I don't know, but I do know that good people live there." And you know there are OTHER ways of showing southern pride that don't involve flying the flag of Pro-Slavery government. "Right. Like lynching black people, or the white people people who dared to speak out for equal rights for those blacks. A celebrated tradition of the south all the way up to the late 60s. That southern pride must really run deep, you just can't beat southern hospitality. "
Some parts of Southern USA culture aren't all that bad either. They make great food, for one. I kinda like their accent, strange as though that may sound.
I think more than being offended I see it as who it is I am speaking to. I don't personally live in the south but in the number of times I have been there visiting family and such I have found that the people who generally wear and promote the confederate flag aren't the brightest folks around. I see that flag as a territorial marking used to establish 'friendly' and 'unfriendly' territory both to keep southerners in and foreigners out.
A symbol or feeling should be all encompassing like for example my college flag brings to me feelings of pride and if I were to hang it outside of my house you wouldn't think twice of what kind of a person lives there, perhaps a black or white or whatever. My point is that it is not race specific. When a flag such as the confederate flag (or any such divisive, non inclusive flag like the Nazi Swastika or a 'Keep the Christ in Christmas' flag) implies to all seeing it: This is how I feel about the world around me, if you agree great, but if you don't you don't belong here.
I can't see the south progressing racially, culturally, and ultimately academically until their fawning over days long since past and ideas dead in the ground are tossed aside. So you ask me if I am offended by the flag, I would say yes I am. To me it represents the stubborn acceptance for change and progress of America.
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