Crystalguy-
Is South Carolina raising a Confederate battle flag over the capitol building or a Union battle flag?
(Either way, buddy, they’re raising a Confederate flag.)
R.J.D.
If I lived in SC, I’d vote to take it down from the state office buildings.
Several points: slinging mud at the various times and people in history that flags represent is a pretty sterile exercise. Nobody is gonna ‘scape hangin’ on that one.
The sad truth is that the Confederate battle flag was rehung in SC as a direct protest against integration in the early 60’. No matter the pride and love of the state, the flag was used as a direct political protest against blacks exercising full civil rights as citizens.
Frankly, outside criticism will just harden the resistence to change. I’d guess some people who were fairly open to considering the idea of removing the flag let themselves be shoved into intransigance through “you aren’t gonna tell us what to do”.
In a way, it’s apt. It was resurrected as a political statement against integration. That political symbolism has boomeranged and backing down even harder.
IMO, the symbolism is ugly. The ugly purpose that flag was used for in recent political past made a mockery of the history, hardship and people of the state. Without refighting or rehashing the Civil War (please!)IMO that battle flag as specific defiance against black civil rights cheapened all the suffering and death that came before.
That battleflag shouldn’t hang over the capital. But the people of SC have to be the ones to see that.
Veb
Seems that just about says it all right there. If I had any say about it, I’d dump the flag. Personally, I equate the Confederate flag and its history to an outdated ignorance such as this. While this example proves you can surely find such attitudes in any state or country, why advertise it???
I dunno, Coldfire. I live in California, which was part of the United States last time I checked. Before joining the Union in 1850 (it’s our sesquicentenniel, as license plates proudly proclaim) this land was Ohlone land, Spanish colonial territory, and part of Mexico (Alta California). But never British.
If it were up to me, the flag would come down. It’s not up to me, and no one cares what I think, but I honor the NAACP boycott and I will not go to South Carolina, nor any of the other states that have incorporated the Confederate flag into their state flags.
~Harborina
“Don’t Do It.”
I think you folks are taking this thing waaaaaaaaaay too seriously.
It should come down. (And this is coming from a Georgia native with plenty of Confederate credentials.)
However, South Carolinians (and Southerners generally) don’t like being pushed. Just turn down the volume on this debate a bit, stick to the boycott, and I think you will see some results.
The boycott, by the way, is working. The South Carolina tourist industry has been hit very hard, and I understand that a number of resorts along the coast are banding together to quietly lobby for a solution to this problem.
Give it some time, ease up on the South Carolina bashing, and I believe you will see the flag come down.
You have to give South Carolina legislators some room for an honorable retreat on this issue, though. If it’s going to look like they are caving in to outside pressure, it will be a political impossibility for them.
Personally, I favor the compromise that would remove the flag from the capitol, but would allow it to continue to be flown over war memorials.
If I were a citizen of South Carolina, I would be deeply, deeply ashamed.
Now. What’s all this about a flag?
– Thanx and a tip of the hat to The Onion, from which the above witticism was cheerfully stolen
If it was up to me, I’d have it down in a heartbeat.
And yes, for those who don’t know (and give a rat’s ass), I’m a Southerner.
You say “cheesy” like that’s a BAD thing.
I’d say that we keep it. Not as a symobol of hatred and anarchy gone amok, but as a symbol of the sweat and toil that really goes into what we so politely call history. It would serve as a reminder of the mistakes modern civilizations are capable of. It would also serve as a reminder how fragile, yet important our lives really are. Maybe someday we can even come face to face with the truth! Besides really getting rid of it would be too much like pointing and clicking our way through life and its various shades of meanings. A rhetorical impossibility. If you don’t believe me get out your dog-eared copies of Bradbury’s Farenheit 451. That should set you straigh. 
“What’s right is only half of what’s wrong and
I want a short-haired girl who sometimes wears it twice as long.”
George Harrison - Old Brown Shoe
Ukelele Ike wrote:
See, this is what I mean. This is exactly the approach to this debate that is not going to get things done.
I know you were just being funny Ike, but the point that I tried to make in my post above is that you can’t get someone to do what you want by insulting them.
If everyone will just tone down the bashing, but keep up the economic pressure, this problem will get solved.
(Not attacking you, Ike; I just want people to consider the perspective of those on the receiving end of the insults, and think about whether verbal taunts are going to make a solution more likely or less likely.)
Hey, spoke-, you’re in Georgia, right?
That flag is next.
It’s because when Captain Cook landed on the Hawaiian Islands, he presented the king with a modified version of the Union Jack, I guess to signify that the islands were under British protection, or something. The king retained it as a national flag. When the U.S. annexed Hawaii, it was kept as first the territorial flag, then the state flag. Hawaii was never a British colony, though.
Heck is where you go when you don’t believe in Gosh.
Just wanted to chime in here, because it seems like there may be a little confusion.
The South Carolina flag does not have any “Confederate” symbol on it…it does not have the battle flag or Confederate flag on it anwhere. It is a dark blue, with a palmetto tree and a crescent. Here is a description of the flag from www.southcarolina.com:
When asked by the Revoluntionary Council of Safety in 1775 to design a flag for the use of SC troops, Col. William Moutrie chose a blue which matched the color of their uniforms and a crescent which reproduced the silver emblem worn on the front of their caps. The palmetto tree was added later to represent Moultrie’s heroic defense of the palmetto-log fort on Sullivan’s Island against the attack of the British fleet on June 28, 1776.
The flag in question is not the state flag. In addition to the state flag and the U.S. flag, the Confederate battle flag flies atop the SC Statehouse.
I heard on the news today that pro-flag groups are going to boycott SC businesses that are in favor of removing the flag. This is just getting better and better.
I think the flag should come down, and if we’re given the chance to vote on the topic (I live in SC), that is the way I will vote.
Mjollnir wrote
Really? We have the battle flag here, too? I hadn’t noticed. :rolleyes:
(Just yanking your chain, Mjollnir.)
Actually, former Governor Zell Miller tried to get the flag changed a few years ago, in anticipation of the Olympics coming to town. (In Georgia, the battle flag is incorporated into the state flag.) His attempt was defeated in the Georgia legislature, after heavy lobbying by pro-flag groups.
I sure did admire old Zell’s courage, though. He risked his re-election to take on the flag issue (not a good way to win votes in the rural areas). And though his flag legislation was defeated, Zell did get re-elected. Sort of makes you wonder if the pro-flag zealots are really a majority, or just a very vocal minority.
Yeah there’s no doubt that if the flag comes down in South Carolina, we’ll be the next ones to feel the heat. They should have changed the thing when Zell asked them to.
Yeah, well, excuse the hell out of me.
Just got finished reading the newspaper article about the Georgia State Government putting out the word for all the mud-loving crackers to make sure to SEND IN THOSE CENSUS FORMS, otherwise all the Federal money will go up North to educate those “children in NEW YORK.”
Looking at systematized bigotry like that always irritates me, just a LITTLE…why not just come right out and say that the money would go to Jews?
So I’m just awfully sorry if your feathers got ruffled by my little jest.
Oh, and enjoy your flag.
Ukelele Ike wrote:
Where the hell did that come from??? Nobody said anything about Jews. Hell, we hate all New Yorkers, without regard to race religion or creed. 
That chip on your shoulder sure must get heavy.
Yeah, I know what you mean. :rolleyes:
You know, Ike, the sad thing is that you and I are on the same side of the flag issue, and for that matter, on most political issues (judging from your posts in GD). Why you choose to alienate potential allies with this kind of venom, I do not understand.
A parting note. I don’t know where this idea comes from that anti-semitism is rampant in the South of today. I’ve lived in Georgia my entire life, and I could count on one hand the number of even remotely anti-semitic statements I’ve heard uttered by native Southerners. (On the other hand, I hear Southerners in movies spouting off anti-semitism all the time.) Do you know any Southerners, Ike, or are you just basing your opinion on a media stereotype? No, I suppose you wouldn’t do that, would you?
The best argument I’ve heard against the battle flag over the S.C. is that they only put the flag up in the 1960’s in protest to integration. Do most people know this?
The battle flag–or Southern Cross–is a readily recognizable symbol of the American South, & of the native quasi-Anglo-Saxon ethnicity of much of the US. Removing it will mean different things to different people’s minds:
- A correction of a rude gesture, as in, “Finally! Those racists have been stopped!!”
- An attempt to remove parts of the USA’s history–to whitewash South Carolina’s image.
- A twist in the gut of Whitey.
Me, I would vote to keep it, for much the same reason I think the banning of Highland dress by the English a few centuries back was wrong. But then, I’m probably a nitwit for even making the comparison.
I was born with the Moon in Pisces!!
Leave me alone!!
SOB!!
**Uke{/b} said:
Possibly truer than he meant: Before GA became the “Peach State,” (notwithstanding the fact that SC grows more), one of its nicknames was–“The Cracker State!”
Fact.
Mjollnir** wrote:
True. And our minor league team was the Atlanta Crackers. (Negro League team: The Atlanta Black Crackers. Go figure.)
But of course, Cracker did not then have the pejorative connotations it does today. And I’m pretty sure Ukelele Ike did not intend the term as a salute to our state’s history.