I waited to comment on a Washington
Post story from August concerning a band of Virginia rednecks causing still
another conflab over one of the biggest con jobs of all time: the so-called Confederate
flag–though it's actually no such thing. The Virginia Flaggers hoisted a 30' by
22' Confederate battle flag along a busy Virginia highway. They call themselves "activists," though a different word beginning with
"a" comes to mind.
Did I wait because I was too angry? Because the issue is too
delicate? Because I didn't wanted to offend people from the South? Nope. I
waited because this is what journalists call an "evergreen" story–one
you can run any old time because it's always ripe. There's never a shortage of
racists who wave the Stars and Bars and claim it's about Southern pride and has
nothing to do with race. They know damn well they're being provocative, so they
hide behind an artificial heritage hedge, and play wounded when anyone calls
them out.
I'll give the Virginia Flaggers grudging credit for riding
the Zeitgeist Hogwash Loader. One of their spokesmen, with a Visine-aided tear
in his eye, spoke of a broken heart as he considered that unknown, unburied
soldiers might be lying on the very site upon which the flag is raised. One might
note that's an appropriate fate for traitors, but I'd rather address historical
ignorance.
I sometimes see Con-flag T-shirts emblazoned with the
slogan: "If this shirt offends you you need a history lesson." Sorry,
but if you wear such a shirt, you're the
one in need of a history lesson. (You also need a grammar lesson to brush up on
comma usage.) The first Confederate flag was a single white star against a
field of blue, known in parlance and song as the "Bonnie Blue Flag." The
one called the "Stars and Bars" wasn't adopted until May of 1863 and
it wasn't the one "heritage" abusers call the "Stars and Bars."
The first Confederate States of America bannerol looked like the U.S. flag,
albeit with fewer stars and just three broad stripes of red, white, and red. The
design today's good old boys love was actually the battle flag of the Army of
Tennessee or, in square form, the Army of Northern Virginia. In 1863, it made
its way onto the official flag on one of the uglier designs in flag history: an
undersized perversion of Scotland's St. Andrew's Cross on a white background. It
looked like an envelop stamped on the wrong side.
Once the Civil War war ended–a struggle to preserve the
Union and end slavery, by the way, not malarkey over state's rights, the
tariff, or Northern aggression–all the flags were closeted away. Occasionally
they came out for Civil War reunions, but they didn't fly over state capitols
until later. They came out again when Southerners fought and (eventually) lost
another war–the one against civil rights. Defenders can cry
"heritage" until the kudzu comes home, but that shameful blue and red
rag is indeed a racist symbol.
As with most heritage claims, it's important to ask when a symbol becomes "heritage"
and who is pushing that agenda. The second part is easy: white groups such as
the Sons of the Confederacy and the United Daughters of the Confederacy pedaled
a load of ideological hooey known as the Lost Cause during Reconstruction
(1866-1876) that sought to transform treason into a noble quest. Alas, they
were somewhat successful. Once Reconstruction ended and the Jim Crow era began,
it was okay to be racist again. In 1894, Mississippi added the battle flag to
its state flag because the white folks in the blackest state in the Union
didn't want black folks doing radical stuff like voting, holding political
office, or thinking they might be first-class citizens. Not to be outdone,
Alabama modified its state banner to allude to the battle flag in 1895–just in
time for the Plessy v. Ferguson decision
in 1896 that shamefully gave the stamp of constitutionality to segregation.
Florida altered its flag in 1900.
 |
| 2003 in GA |
Lest you think this was just the times, consider what
happened when the times they were a changing. Southern Dixiecrats throughout
the South dusted off the battle flag during the 1950s for the sole purpose of
symbolizing their opposition to civil rights. Georgia put the starry cross on
its flag in 1956! Think Brown v. the
Board of Education or the rising civil rights movement may have had
anything to do with that? When Governor Zell Miller tried to alter the design
in 1993, the legislature voted him down. When those white peachy Georgians
finally altered their flag in 2003, they sewed the controversy right back into
it.
Most egregious of all, South Carolina waited until 1962 to
start flying the self-proclaimed Rebel flag from its capitol dome. I'm sure that
decision had nothing to do with the sit-down movement or the Freedom Rides,
right? Know when it came down? In 2000, and only then because a four-year
boycott knocked the wind out of the tourist industry. It still flies beside a
monument to the Confederate war dead on the capitol grounds in Columbia. Austin
has three monuments to the
Confederacy outside its state capitol.
Everywhere the Stars and Bars flies it causes uproar,
whether it's in a dorm room at Harvard (1991) or if you color it yellow and
wave it a LSU football games every other autumn Saturday. Each time decent
people get upset, cowards cry "heritage" because they lack the guts
to proclaim their racism. Does this flag offend me? Yes it does. And those who
fly it need a life and a history lesson. I'd settle for a one-way ticket to
Syria.
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