  The Confederate Flag! My heart doesn't go "pitty pat" for it any more than for the American flag. I do not pledge my allegiance to it either. There the similarity ends. I have never been told that I cannot fly the American flag and doubt that I ever will be told anything like that. On the other hand, the right to fly the Confederate flag is under attack. In some quarters, a lot of quarters, it is not nowadays "politically correct" to fly the Confederate flag because of what it represents to some people - generally not the same people flying the flag. Few seem interested in what the Confederate flag means to those who wish to fly it. All too many people have their minds made up that when someone flies the Confederate flag that they are expressing hatred or bigotry; and, that just "tain't so!" To most of those who fly the Confederate flag, it is a symbol of ethnic pride. Maybe it is not the best symbol; but, it is the one we have; and, when people tell us we can't fly it, it is like telling us that we should be ashamed of who and what we are - and we get enough of that! And, every time that others tell us that we cannot utter the words to songs like "Old Folks at Home" which is my home state of Florida's state song, we feel like they are trying to erase a part of our past and a part of us! Flying the Confederate Flag is a way of thumbing our nose at the rest of the world that tells us that we are not as good as they are!
I will admit that some people have used the Confederate flag as an emblem of hatred and bigotry; but, haven't some people used the American flag in the same way? Don't some people hide their bigotry and narrow mindedness behind patriotism? Of course, they don't see it that way, don't want to see it that way; but, that is the way it is!
And a refusal to see what the Confederate flag represents to some people is a kind of bigotry. It sees only one side of injustice and refuses to see the other. It also falls for the oldest trick in the book - "Divide and conquer!"
Poor whites, poor blacks, the disenfrancised of this earth, no matter what our racial or ethnic background, no matter what our spiritual beliefs or sexual orientation, we have a lot in common! We are all in the same boat; and, we do not need to waste time and energy hating and fighting one another! Now I am not into the Conspiracy view of world or current history. I don't believe that a group of people got together in a room somewhere and decided "We gotta keep those people down!" I do believe that some people are naturally aggressive with a view of the world which says that "In order for me and mine to survive, somebody else has to not survive." This world view might have worked in the past, how well is up to speculation; but, it is a different world now; and, if we don't learn to work together, we will eventually destroy ourselves. The quality of life for all is already suffering! But it does seem to be that those with the way of looking at the world which says "me and mine against the world" have through their natural aggressiveness taken over the world order of things and through a kind of mutual, if probably unspoken, understanding arranged the system so that their power and wealth is kept and perpetuated within their own tight little circle. Their system does not work perfectly. Occasionally people do manage to break into the circle and people do fall out of it as well; but, that does not mean that the circle does not exist and that it is not self-perpetuating!
It is time that the circle included the whole human race! Opportunity must be made available for all; and, it must be recognized that some people will need help in taking advantage of those opportunities It also must be recognized that some people will never be able to take care of themselves! This is not a popular idea; but, it is so! In this we will lose some of what many now call "freedom"; but we will gain even more freedom; freedom of a somewhat different kind, but, a very real and important freedom! This I will go into in another series of posts when I get the chance! |
