Well, we’ll have to disagree on that. I do think that Amazon and eBay are engaging in moral suasion and gentle shaming, in a very effective way. And I think the Nazi merchandise proves my point – as the culture identifies a particular issue to be addressed, in this case the Confederate flag, corporations move with it – that’s how moral suasion works.
More importantly, I agree with Left Hand of Dorkness - in cases involving long-term oppression and deeply rooted cultural beliefs, waiting for change to come from within is not effective.
Black people are certainly part of Southern culture. They are not part of what the Confederate Battle Flag represents. In fact, black people not being part of it is exactly what the Confederate Battle Flag represents. Therefore, what the Confederate Battle Flag represents is not and cannot be Southern culture.
And yet it has been effective with the Confederate flag. Shaming works. Most people these days just wouldn’t display the flag because they don’t want to offend or be perceived as racist. That was most certainly not the case in the 70s.
What happened under the Confederate flag? Explicit opposition to Civil Rights in the 60s, and support for segregation in the 50s. The shooting at a Charleston black church, and many other acts of violence against black people in the 20th century.
Further, many things happened under the US flag and not the Confederate flag: ending slavery, Civil Rights, voting rights, banning of lynchings, and much, much more.
Thank you for acknowledging your reckless hyperbole. So “hatred and racism” have now become “disapproval.” Sounds about right.
Refusing to acknowledging any other purpose doesn’t mean they don’t exist. Spoke has explained to you people some non-racist reasons Southerners display the flag; his patience has been met with a collective, “Fuck that noise–it’s racism.” So why do you even discuss questions you already know the answer to?
Yes I read your suggestions about how good southerners should show their pride. But you are not the final arbiter on what other Americans can do. More’s the pity.
The “ideals of the Confederacy” were exactly the same as the “ideals of America” except for secession. If secession offends you so sincerely after 150 years, you need to find a way to move on. (But I don’t think secession bothers you, I think you buy into the American propaganda that the south was bad and north was good. It wasn’t; the North was just as bad, but the victors write the history books.)
This is just false. The “ideals of the Confederacy”, according to various states’ Articles of Secession, and the words of its leaders, were based on the cornerstone of slavery and on the cornerstone of white supremacy and black inferiority. The “ideals of the United States” were not, even though, at the time, some states (but not all) outside of the South still supported slavery.
Further, the Confederate flag was resurrected to prominence in the mid 20th century as an explicitly racist symbol, to oppose integration and Civil Rights. Even if we ignore the Civil War, the Confederate flag is a symbol of white supremacy.
Those reasons were never sincere. They were always whitewash for racist messages, brutally racist ones.
Your attempt to make an equivalence between the U.S. flag and the Confederate battle flag shows you don’t actually know the history of the Confederacy or the flag.
The Confederate battle flag was never the national flag of the Confederacy.
Even if it had been, what makes the Confederacy different from the United States is that it was created for the sole purpose of preserving slavery. The Confederacy had no other national basis.
The Confederate battle flag became popular explicitly as a symbol for oppressing black people. It was adopted by the KKK, and later by segregationists. Accepting the later whitewashing of explicitly racist purposes on their face would allow the users any symbol of hate to assert “but I didn’t mean it that way” as a plausible claim. It’s ludicrous.
Yep – and the Stars and Stripes (or those under it) acted to end those things. Those under the Confederate flag did not. Hence, the first is far superior. Ending slavery is much, much better than not ending slavery.
Americans are prosecuting it, and Americans have acted to take down the symbol that inspired the shooter from government buildings.
So you’re agreeing with me, now? That ending slavery, as happened under the US flag, and ending Jim Crow, and ending segregation, as all happened under the Stars and Stripes, are much superior to not doing so (or in fact, at the time, supporting those institutions), as per the Confederate flag?
Or are you seriously arguing that the act of ending those things was not good, or not meaningful, or does not deserve to be honored?
Gotcha, so Union slave states didn’t believe in white supremacy? Or they did but they didn’t write it in Articles of Secession? I already conceded that secession was the one difference. Your nonsense about “cornerstones” is irrelevant; blacks were treated the same in both regions. Slavery was an atrocity, period. Slavery wasn’t MORE of an atrocity in Mississippi than in Maryland.
No, it has always been used by various groups. Racists use it just as they use the U.S. Flag. Ever seen pictures of a Klan march? They use the American flag along side the battle flag, which is very fitting.
A couple million. But it’s not like I see more than a few hundred cars a day. Anyway, unusual or not it still flies on public grounds in many southern states. So whatever people may think of it, they apparently don’t find it an embarrassment.
By literally out-yelling them? No. But nobody’s yelling here, so that has nothing to do with this situation. Do you mean metaphorically? I don’t know that I have, but I certainly have seen it happen, if by “out-yelling” you mean “speaking clearly and with passion and without a whole lot of thought for protecting the delicate feelings of the opposition.”