Will Mississippi finally change state flag

Great Debates
41

No it’s not. Billions of people think the Devil is a pretty bad supernatural entity and live their lives fervently desiring not to meet the Devil or be sent to Hell. Why idolize and honor the Devil? Hitler ended people’s lives the Devil will torment souls for eternity.

Obviously I don’t care about others? Nice personal attack.

I think it’s counterproductive to engage in the fight of how other people interpret symbols. If Bubba likes his Confederate flag because he grew up in rural Georgia what do I care if he wears a Confederate t-shirt?

You are in Canada? I have seen a lot of Confederate apparel in Canada. What’s up with that? Mostly it was on the West coast of Canada if you want specifics.

But what exactly does a Confederate flag mean to me. Aesthetically it has a pleasing symmetry. I like the way it looks. I wouldn’t fly one though. I live in an area with a lot of minorities and I am sensitive to that. Furthermore, and more importantly, I dislike secessionists. And secession where a major factor in secession is to actually own people as property is something I’m really against.

With regards to the concepts of secession and slavery? I’d be willing to see some California cities razed if they actually acted on CalExit. Slavery? I’m not at all for that. This is not an economic thread, but I’ve advocated basic income for awhile. Maybe I’m wrong about that. But I don’t think someone who believed that slavery was good would advocate for a basic income.

Racism? I think that treating people differently based solely on skin color, gender, or religion is immoral. I think people should be treated based on what they do. And I don’t care about off-color jokes. If someone wants to crack jokes around their friends that’s their business.

Full equality would be fine by me. Wouldn’t be much women sports left though.

That speech you quoted is not at all nice. Why didn’t 1 of the men in that 100 man federal garrison do something? Well, I’ll tell. It’s because many of them were just as racist as people in the South. And as a matter of fact some of the most segregated places in the US are still in the North. So let’s not make it out like this is some great Southern crime. It isn’t.

It’s a crime that humans inflicted on other humans. Slavery was worldwide. Hell, slavery is still not eradicated and what region of the planet are you most likely to find a modern slave? Think about it.

The West spent a lot of effort leading the way to eradicate the slave trade and to spread classical liberal values. Now, some portions of the West such as parts of the US and lots of South America were behind other parts but they were still ahead of even more regressive regions. Some of which still are just as regressive today as the US and the South were 100 years ago.

Now I get that for some people seeing a symbol can be painful. But how do you think all the native Americans feel that are on a reservation? Seeing the American flag everywhere. Hearing English everywhere. Those folk were practically exterminated in the US and symbols of their oppressors are everywhere.

Now that’s sad. But hell, at some point you just got to get over it. People conquer and are conquered and that’s what humans do. As a matter of fact, the great struggle of the 21st century is going to be western liberalism vs religious folks vs whatever you want to label how the Chinese govern themselves. It’s going to be a messy and weird cultural war. And as China ascends it’s going to be interesting to see.

Anyways, the Confederate symbols in the USA are not about the Confederacy. They are used as a cleavage point to divide people. It’s cynical identity politics and it has backfired and will continue to do so until we have some real nasty political violence.

Alt-left and alt-right are getting frisky. IF the economy crashes times will get dicey.

42

Right, but there’s a brand of politics whose basic ideological foundation is opposition to change, especially social change. Here’s an example of it! :smiley:

43

You took the long way 'round in answering a pretty simple question. It remains unclear to me that you have any particular reason to be defending publicly-sponsored pro-Confederate displays.

44

Hmm. Maybe I answered the wrong question. Sorry.

I made it clear in the Pit threads. It seems people are a bit cowardly with regards to their self proclaimed principles if the outrage brigade may have them in their crosshairs. Since this board leans left and finds certain symbols troublesome, Confederate flag, and ignores other symbols, Hammer and Sickle, the symbols of the confederacy and those who like them are under attack. Quite often inaccurately. Since I don’t care what the outrage brigade thinks I defend the Confederate flag and statues as perfectly valid expressions under the concepts of freedom of speech or press and the concept of self rule.

Now, if the Hammer and Sickle was under attack I’d be defending that as well. I point out that statue of Lenin in Seattle as an example of selective outrage and hypocrisy. I don’t care if it’s there. If I were in Seattle again and it were convenient I’d check it out and it wouldn’t bother me at all. Same as if it were a state of Genghis Khan, Stalin, Darth Vader, Hitler, C’thulu, George Washington, etc.

Now there are some statues I wouldn’t like. Any statue that is like this youtube video would be bad for me. Trypophobia trigger warning!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bxG2d_XBTaQ

But political or historical statues? I don’t care. I grew up watching WWII and Civil War movies and the imagery just doesn’t bother me. What interests me more are political movements and social institutions. And I’m worried that this “moral” purity that is infecting the nation is very dangerous.

45

What’s the difference between this motivation, and a motivation based on spite - defending the symbols because disliked persons are attacking the symbols?

Besides, the symbols aren’t being outlawed. The question here seems to be whether or not public funds and public spaces will be given over to revering rebellion and treason.

Yes, your indifference has been described repeatedly.

How so?

46

Way to slink around all of this to finally say I don’t like slavery or secessionists. Still pretty lame to tell people to get over it.

47

The statue of Lenin is privately owned. It’s actually for sale or was at least. That is a free speech issue certainly. It’s different to have a public statue on public property. That’s more a case of forcing all of the residents to speak in a certain way.

48

I don’t care about the difference in motivation. What’s it matter to the principle of free speech if some people are spiteful? Furthermore, treason and rebellion are not intrinsically bad. However, fighting solely to preserve the institution of slavery is pretty bad.

Back to public funding. If the public wants to fund the statue and pass a law protecting the statue on state land or county land then that is up to the the people of that territory. I’d like to see that money go to better schools but I only have one vote. Furthermore, the statues in place don’t need much money other than guarding them from mobs.

49

Nice loaded language. Can you try a bit of civility?

50

Well, once the mob destroys the statue - problem solved.

51

Nah. Gotta build a new one with fines levied against the criminals!

52

And telling people to get over it is civil? I don’t think you fully comprehend what blacks in this country have and still do face regarding racism. Great advice for them to get over it. Sure I will be civil to you as you seem delicate and don’t like anyone being direct with you.

I guess it is also civil to raze cities in California if they attempt to succeed. Great civility to put male and female athletes in the same field in your version of equality. Physiologically it doesn’t work, but title IX helps to make it equal. Since you want me to be civil, I will assume that this is all based on something other than sexism.

All of this is tangent to the point that Mississippi has state sponsored racism by utilizing their current state flag. That is what my original point is.

53

Probably more by neighboring tribes than by cousins, at the height of the Triangular Trade. But I’m not an expert in the history of the Gold Coast. Anyway, the countries on the western shore of Africa now largely use modern flags that were adopted after independence from Portugal and France, and not flags that date to the slave trade. (Liberia’s flag dates to the 19th Century, but Liberia and Sierra Leone were places freedmen settled, and their symbols of that era have a little different connotation. Central African Republic uses elements of the French flag in their flag, but it’s the French republican/liberal tricolor, not a slave trade flag as such.)

I find devil mascots a little weird, but Hitler mascots would be considerably sillier. At least there’s more than one interpretation of a devil mascot.

I’m fine with Bubba having a Battle Flag on his T-shirt. I’m not fine with a Battle Flag in front of the statehouse, or incorporated into a state flag.

Note that flags that merely subtly echo the Battle Flag, like Alabama’s, Tennessee’s, and Arkansas, aren’t so bad. It’s when you put an actual symbol of the CSA on a flag that it’s an egregious provocation.

American Indians do a pretty good job of getting over it, but that doesn’t mean they’ll accept another Custer to show up and slaughter them because “that’s what humans do.”

P.S.: I don’t think there is much justification for painting people as “alt-left” as if there were just automatically some symmetry with the “alt-right.”

54

I’m a snowflake!

About get over it. If a particular person has had an something illegal occur to them or there is a case for a civil suit then let the courts remedy it. If a person is a great great grandchild of a slave, yes, get over it.

Now, perhaps there needs to be some form of systematic assistance to help those in the lower classes. I’ve mentioned being open to the idea of class based assistance or affirmative action of some sort. I just think racial or gender or religious based is counterproductive and grossly unfair.

No. It’s not civil. But a serious movement of secession is cause for war in my opinion. Might be necessary in the near future. I have seen a renewed love of states’ rights among some on the left after a century or more of pretending the 10th didn’t exist. That said, the states don’t have a right to secede.

Why not? Equality is equality. It’s sexist to acknowledge differences and it’s sexist to say hell with it put them all in the same arena. What a catch-22.

I disagree with that point. I don’t think words or symbols have intrinsic meaning. They have an agreed upon meaning and that meaning is pretty vast. Listen to some rap music if you want to hear words that have multiple and diverse meanings that are highly contextual.

55

Are there any states who have placed the Hammer and Sickle on their state flags? That is the issue, not personal antipathy to any particular symbol. (There have been a couple of posts railing against the CBF, in general, but the thread was specifically addressing the state sponsorship of a particular symbol, not the perceived nastiness of the symbol, itself.)

Why are you moving the goalposts to “intrinsic meaning”?

Mississippi explicitly chose to add the battle flag to their state flag as an expression of white superiority and the “correctness” of their decision to secede thirty-three years earlier. That meaning was given for the reason of the addition, at the time it was incorporated. Georgia did the same thing in the 1950s as a rejection of the Civil Rights movement. UCBearcats did not claim, in the quoted line, that the meaning was intrinsic. However, if a person or state says “I take this action for this evil purpose,” I think it is fair to accept their declaration as the reason. That is contextual, not intrinsic.

56

The school was built and named in 1959 as the country ramped up for the centennial of the Civil War. That was also the year that Nick Adams starred in the TV show The Rebel.

Ohio certainly has pockets of white nationalists, (and did then, I’m sure), but the overall atmosphere regarding the Civil War was different in the late 1950s and I doubt that ascribing motivations to people of that era based on current attitudes is going to be accurate.

57

And during the 60s, the 70s, the 80s, the 90s and up to ,what? 2 years ago?

The rebel flag itself was considered just that, a sign of (mild) rebellion, all over the world. A symbol of ‘sticking it to the man’, just like a Che Guevara shirt.
Wearing a rebel flag patch and/or an iron cross were very popular with bikers, for instance.
You think they were all nazis and proponents of slavery or more of a ‘fuck you and your bourgeois fake sensitivities’?

58

I’d say God torments people for eternity. The Devil was cast into hell to be tormented - he doesn’t rule it at all, according to the bible.

59

Gotta, really?

60

I know a woman who could restore any damaged statues. She restored a damaged Spanish fresco and Jesus never looked so good.