What does the Confederate flag represent to you?

[velcrokidneyz]

the civil war wasnt even about slavery hardly at all. it was primarily about restoring the union, its just the people who you see associated with it that give it a bad connotation, its not a racist symbol.

But it was about slavery, that is why the union was divided. You cannot deny that slavery was a driving fact in the whole war.

i am currently in a military history course and we talked about this the other day.

yes slavery was a factor but only until later in the war. it is just that the north was industrialized and didnt require them, immigrants wanted jobs so they made jobs instead of slavery. it was mainly about restoring the union. heck about 90 percent of soldiers for the south didnt even own slaves, and only a few journals ever even mentioned slavery. one big factor was the replacement of national by sectional parties

 

[ZephrC]

Look, I get that for a lot of southerners today the confederate flag is about independence, rebellion and regional pride. So I don't get pissed off at people that display it.

I just think that there are so many other symbols that can represent Southern pride. Why choose one that packs so much history of violence, racism, and hatred. People have done some horrible things in the name of that flag, not to mention the nation that was founded under it was one designed to protect slavery. My opinions aside; there are so many better options. Why this one?

I agree. In fact if you go all the way to the end of my overly long post there I conclude that it's good to call them on it when they do use it. I just don't get pissed off at people that use it, because I think most of them don't really know what they're doing.

 

[fenderstrat]

ignorance and racism.

 

[flim.geek.chic]

Banjo!


I choose you!

OT: As an Englishman, I don't really know about the civil war factions of America. I do know that a lot of awesome songs came from that era though.

Whistling dixy. Oh yeaaaah!

Certainly not the worst clip from "deleverance you could have picked

OT: well it's one of those gray area things... to me it represents a confused, Dark part of our American History but also Rebelion and the bravery it took to stand up for something you truely belive in...even if that something was a horrible crime againest humanity.

 

[Haydyn]

Let me start off by saying I am a huge redneck hater and condemn hill billies to the miserable lives they live. I make fun of white people more than any other ethnic group. And even I'm calling bullshit on the NAACP.

STATES RIGHTS was the biggest issue in the Civil War. Abolishing slavery came at the end of the war, and it wasn't the goal of the Union going into the war to end slavery. I see the Confederate flag as just another flag. I do however feel sorry for it, as rednecks have taken it upon themselves to link the Confederate flag to the uneducated.

Side note: I find it hilarious when people think I'm racist toward African Americans/Hispanics when my hatred is centered towards different groups of white people.

 

[Aur0ra145]

For those of ya'll out there, this is how I saw the war. I will say, this is how I and most of my friends (most of which are southerners) view the war. It was a disagreement that got way out of hand.

 

[springheeljack]

I think of it as a huge symbol of hate and racism
the original meaning of the flag was lost when the klu klux klan made it their symbol

 

[Icehearted]

Slavery
White oppression
Incest.... maybe?

"Our new government is founded upon exactly the opposite idea; its foundations are laid, its corner- stone rests, upon the great truth that the negro is not equal to the white man; that slavery subordination to the superior race is his natural and normal condition."

It's a symbol of racism and slavery, and nothing else.


@SL33TBL1ND
Thanks, the only time I really want to write "check em" in a post here

 

[SL33TBL1ND]

It has no significance whatsoever for me, I'm not American.

Slavery
White oppression
Incest.... maybe?

"Our new government is founded upon exactly the opposite idea; its foundations are laid, its corner- stone rests, upon the great truth that the negro is not equal to the white man; that slavery subordination to the superior race is his natural and normal condition."

It's a symbol of racism and slavery, and nothing else.

Nice post count.

 

[CleverCover]

It represents bigotry, hatred, ignorance, and fracture.

It might have meant something like freedom to one person at one time long long ago, but it's been twisted and turned into something horrible. I can't see how anyone can look at it and think "rebel" or even states' rights.

 

[Aur0ra145]

You know, now we're on the subject of the civil war. I will say that this particular scene of a movie has never failed to bring tears to my eyes.

 

[Divine Miss Bee]

aaron sorkin said it best, through the mouth of rafiki from the lion king (it was the best show on TV in 199-2000): "in the history of the south, there's much to celebrate. and that flag is a desecration of all of it. it's a banner of hatred and separatism. it's a banner of ignorance and violence and a war that pitted brother against brother, and to ask young black men and women, young jewish men and women, asians, native americans...to ask americans to walk beneath its shadow is a humiliation of irreducible proportions. and we all know it."

there's nothing inherently wrong with a confederacy of states working under a loose federal government. i can't honestly say that it wouldn't work better than what the US has going now. but that flag that represents the ugliest time in US history has, in my opinion, no place anywhere within its shores. i'll tolerate anyone who wants to wave it, because this is a free country. but i will find it difficult to hold respect for anyone who says they stand for what it stands for.

 

[CptDan314]

Fighting for what you believe in.

While yes, the topic they were fighting to protect was rather awful, the thought that they were willing to fight for it is something to be commend.

 

[Elexia]

I have an outsider's point of view of the Confederate flag. I only see it in Dukes of Hazard and in some movies based in the American South (like the setting, accents and subtitles explaining the location isn't enough). I gather the flag isn't banned in the U.S. like the Swastika is in Germany.

I don't think it means anything as bad as a street lined with black and white Swastikas on red banners or anything.

 

[PinochetIsMyBro]

Dukes of Hazard, of course. Also white southern pride(Texan here).

Not trying to offend anyone here but the South seceded because of racism. You're flying the flag of the soldiers who fought and died so they could keep "ownership" of another human being. I know many Southerners try to say the Civil war was not really about racism and I don't know what your education has taught you, but slavery was the driving force behind the South Confederacy.

Is that what they're teaching in schools these days? So very, very sad. I think a quote from Ulysses S. Grant is in order. "If I thought this war was to abolish slavery, I would resign my commission and offer my sword to the other side"

The war arose out of cultural differences and issues of secession. The only person you're kidding is yourself if you think the average Northerner cared about slaves in the South. It also had very little to do with why the South fought(it was merely one of the many irreconcilable differences between the two sides). It was widely known on both sides that Lincoln had no intention of banning slavery. Abolitionists were a radical fringe minority at best.

 

[Troublesome Lagomorph]

When I see the Confederate flag, I think of what the Confederacy [really] fought for: State's Rights.
It wasn't really about slavery until Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation.
There's nothing wrong with State's Rights.
There is nothing wroth with the Confederate flag.
Sadly, though, many morons fly it. However, that isn't to say that an educated, intelligent person cannot fly it. Hell, my US history teacher proudly flies the Confederate flag, next to the US flag and Virginia's state flag, and I can assure you that he is not a bigoted moron. After all, he DOES teach online courses at a college and is married to a hispanic woman.
Edit:

Not trying to offend anyone here but the South seceded because of racism. You're flying the flag of the soldiers who fought and died so they could keep "ownership" of another human being. I know many Southerners try to say the Civil war was not really about racism and I don't know what your education has taught you, but slavery was the driving force behind the South Confederacy.

WRONG. They suceeded because of the idea of States Rights. Southerners, who were rural in their lifestyle didn't want to be ruled by Northerners from an industrial society. They felt like they weren't understood. The idea was that the South should rule the South and the North should rule the North. You know... kind of like what the Colonies declared Independence because of - They did not want to be ruled by the English, who were living a world away in Europe. Now, It seems to have been spinned to be racism. That, my friend, is bullcock.
Also: The northerners were racist as hell also.

 

[Troublesome Lagomorph]

They suceeded because of the idea of States Rights.

Nobody takes such a step for such a nebulous concept. The southern States seceded to save slavery and said so, over and over and over again. Until they lost.

If they abolished slavery in one fell swoop, what would it have done to their economies? One HUGE reason they seceded was because the press kept pushing that Lincoln would abolish slavery, no questions asked. That's why the South didn't vote for Lincoln. However, there were WAY more Northerners alive, so Lincoln got in. The South figured that their economy was going to the shitter because Lincoln would abolish it right then and there (although he denied this). In the spirit of States Rights and to preserve their economy (and way of life), they seceded.

 

[MrDumpkins]

The confederate flag represents the south. Contrary to belief, the south didn't represent slavery.

Yes it did. It represented a nation founded on the idea blacks were ment to be slaves to whites, and plainly said slavery was the main reason for the civil war by the Confederate vice president.
http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/18.268963-What-does-the-Confederate-flag-represent-to-you?page=4#10313988

Since when did one man represent an entire nation? Using that logic I can assume that all Americans hate soldiers and they all believe that God intends for them to die. Slavery may be the reason the upper class rich politicians wanted to secede, but it certainly wasn't the reason most Southerners wanted to. They wanted freedom from a nation they viewed as oppressive. They see the North as taking advantage of them and stepping on them every chance it got. I explained this in my post, did you even read it? Or did you see "The South didn't represent slavery" and immediately pull out something ONE PERSON said. It doesn't even matter that he was Vice President. People have minds and they think their own ideas. An entire nation isn't going to unanimously agree with something someone says, no matter their position.

They viewed it as oppressive because every news group in the south labeled it that way, the common man had no say when they decided to break apart from the north. And saying that the common man didn't support slavery is ridiculous, the entire economy was based on slavery. The common man didn't want to see people they thought of as inferior to them gain rights. To them, it was like seeing a monkey get the same amount of rights as a them, to them, slaves were just like cattle.

People that fly the confederate flag like to love the southern way of life, they just like to "forget" about that whole slavery part

 

[similar.squirrel]

Rednecks and Pantera, who were rednecks.

 

[Comrade_Beric]

the Civil War wasn't even fought over slavery.

Bear with me here, this is a long one, but I think you need to read this.

A Declaration of the Causes which Impel the State of Texas to Secede from the Federal Union.

Spoiler: Some other slavery passages

"In all the non-slave-holding States, in violation of that good faith and comity which should exist between entirely distinct nations, the people have formed themselves into a great sectional party, now strong enough in numbers to control the affairs of each of those States, based upon an unnatural feeling of hostility to these Southern States and their beneficent and patriarchal system of African slavery, proclaiming the debasing doctrine of equality of all men, irrespective of race or color-- a doctrine at war with nature, in opposition to the experience of mankind, and in violation of the plainest revelations of Divine Law. They demand the abolition of negro slavery throughout the confederacy, the recognition of political equality between the white and negro races, and avow their determination to press on their crusade against us, so long as a negro slave remains in these States."

"For years past this abolition organization has been actively sowing the seeds of discord through the Union, and has rendered the federal congress the arena for spreading firebrands and hatred between the slave-holding and non-slave-holding States."

"They have, through the mails and hired emissaries, sent seditious pamphlets and papers among us to stir up servile insurrection and bring blood and carnage to our firesides."

"They have sent hired emissaries among us to burn our towns and distribute arms and poison to our slaves for the same purpose."

"And, finally, by the combined sectional vote of the seventeen non-slave-holding States, they have elected as president and vice-president of the whole confederacy two men whose chief claims to such high positions are their approval of these long continued wrongs, and their pledges to continue them to the final consummation of these schemes for the ruin of the slave-holding States."

"We hold as undeniable truths that the governments of the various States, and of the confederacy itself, were established exclusively by the white race, for themselves and their posterity; that the African race had no agency in their establishment; that they were rightfully held and regarded as an inferior and dependent race, and in that condition only could their existence in this country be rendered beneficial or tolerable.

That in this free government *all white men are and of right ought to be entitled to equal civil and political rights* [emphasis in the original]; that the servitude of the African race, as existing in these States, is mutually beneficial to both bond and free, and is abundantly authorized and justified by the experience of mankind, and the revealed will of the Almighty Creator, as recognized by all Christian nations; while the destruction of the existing relations between the two races, as advocated by our sectional enemies, would bring inevitable calamities upon both and desolation upon the fifteen slave-holding states."

All of these passages are pulled straight from the Texas Declaration of Causes [http://sunsite.utk.edu/civil-war/reasons.html#Texas] for secession without editing or removal from their context. The American Civil War was fought explicitly for the protection of slavery and slave-states by the South. There has been a concerted effort, since the civil rights movement of the 1950s and 60s, to rebrand the civil war to be more, or exclusively, about states rights than slavery, but I'm afraid the facts simply do not bear this out at all. While the North may not have been fighting at first to remove slavery, at most, any "States' rights" being fought for by the Confederacy were about the rights of a state to decide if it should allow and promote slavery.

The confederate flag is about Southern fear of, and resistance to, outside interference with their racism. "It's about states' rights/history" are the lines invented to give an excuse to fly it, but it's no more true than "teach both sides/we're a theory, too" is for teaching religious creationism (aka Intelligent Design) in science classes.