What does the Confederate flag represent to you?

[Tiger Sora]

Well chiefly reminds me of SC2 with The Dominion seming as they're basicly The Confederacy which they overthrew.
Than red necks and hicks.
Lastly just as a flag representing an army/nation. It's no more racist to me and such as the Union Jack or Spanish Flag could be if they're compared.

 

[timeadept]

The Union freed the slaves to destroy the economy of the Confederacy, nothing more, nothing less.

Wait a second, i need to stop you there. First of all, when the southern states were still part of the United States; Why would you do this? You're destroying your own economy right there!
Second, you can't free the slaves of another country without getting them to agree or by using force (and we all know how this ended).
So basically as a battle plan (free their slaves to starve their economy) you face the issue of having to free the slaves YOURSELF, as in, in person, as in take their land and burn and salt their fields while you're at it.
So i kinda have to disagree with your opinion that freeing the slaves was about destroying the souths economy.

There was no moral high ground to be taken by either side. Abraham Lincoln himself believed that the races should be separate and was a supporter of the idea going around at the time that all the non-whites should move to the central Americas.

However slavery never exactly sat well with him, but he did believe that the prejudices at play were too strong to overcome. So separation was the only way that both whites and blacks could live "together?". *edit* freely is probably the word i was looking for.

The economy of the southern states was, and still is, based largely on agriculture, and at the time, it wasn't automated like it is today. It was easy for the northern states to sit back and say that slavery was wrong, because they didn't have the need for large amounts of agriculture workers while also having a low population density (NOTE: I'm NOT saying slavery was a-okay, just playing devil's advocate a bit here).

I have to agree with you there.

Spoiler: -snip-

I've found it interesting to read the opinions in this thread from people who don't live in the USA. We Americans tend to be incredibly (and understandably) polarized about the Civil War. No one can say that it was about this, or that, because it meant different things to everyone who fought in it. Some may have been fighting for or against slavery. Some may have been fighting for state's rights, or for sovereignty of central government, or just because they felt like the other side was going to waltz through and kill them anyway (ahem, General Sherman...). Like any other action, the intentions behind it are what need to be evaluated. Kid Rock says he doesn't believe the Confederate flag is racist, so to him, it's not. Some other people disagree and are throwing a pointless temper tantrum.

(apparently you can't spoiler a quote?)

 

[Aur0ra145]

also, to people like the NAACP it represents Racism because if you haven't noticed, there's been a lot less of it since the civil rights movement. To the point now, where groups like the NAACP are having to manufacture most of the racism they "find" so they can still have a job . . .

remember, a soldier is only a soldier as long as there's a war to fight, or training to be done. If the very fact of war itself suddenly dies . . . they have no job left to do. The same is right for these civil rights groups. There's so LITTLE racism left ESPECIALLY in america, that they're almost out of a job.

This is a true statement. In fact, it's exactly what I thought when I read the Kid Rock article.

 

[creager91]

Racism, thats all the flag represents to me. Not trying to offend anyone here but the South seceded because of racism. I'm not saying you should be ashamed to be from those states or live in them, but to sport the flag? To me thats 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.

I dont' mind that angle entirely, but it was more the overriding question of just how much the fed controleld the states. Be it for slavery or otherwise.

and if you're going to spout drivel about how it's all about slavery entirely- as if it was all about, "is that ****** a ****** or human?" then you're not giving much thought into it.

I will say this as this would be my bias: Coming from the Dayton area in Ohio the only people I have seen proudly bear the confederate flag have also been incredibly racist and ignorant. So I stand by saying the war was about slavery but I will admit that my passion and intolerance for the group I just described (coincidentally that is my only intolerance, and I can hang out with these guys as long as they don't talk politics or race with me)

Side Note: Im white which may also be a bias

 

[KazOondo]

Rebellion. I think people need to stop fussing over the flag. It can represent good or bad people.

 

[Blue_vision]

Personally I believe it to simply represent another country (regardless of the fact that it was never considered an autonomous nation). I agree with Kid when he says it represents the spirit of the south, as southerners have a reputation for being rebellious in America. Did the confederates want to keep the institution of slavery around? Yes, but because that is what their economy was based on. Southerners were no more racist than Northerners at the time, they just saw slavery (as terrible of an institution as is was) as a means to get work done faster and at quicker pace. I also have a hard time understanding why people view the Confederate flag as representing slavery and bigotry when the Civil War wasn't even fought over slavery. The Confederate states succeeded for a multitude of other reasons (part of the reason they were never very united in their cause), and Lincoln simply used the emancipation of all slaves in union controlled Confederate states as a way to ruin the southern resolve and economy.

I'll agree with this. I see the Confederate Flag as a flag for the south and its culture, and it doesn't really connote racism to me. But then again, I'm not American so I may have some sort of bias or lack of knowledge.

 

[mercertheblack]

It represents traitors, oathbreakers, and the triumph of the desires of the affluent over the interests of the common man and shared humanity. Any other ideas are unsupported by the facts.

 

[Double A]

I believe it represents States Rights. Slavery was bad, but not as bad in the US as in other countries. Technology was making slavery inefficient, so it would have died out on its own.

What's worse, a few decades more of slavery (at the most), or a huge civil war which results in states losing so much power there's hardly a point to their governments?

 

[Athol]

It is simply the flag of a nation that no longer exists.

 

[krugerrand123]

It represents the southern USA and rednecks.

 

[LeeHarveyO]

Southern Heritage, not racism. It is all that is left of the old south which was far different from what it is today.

Edit: the people that say the flag is racist are the ones that dwell in the past and need to move on not the respectable southerners who fly the flag.

 

[Something Amyss]

tl;dr: Confederate flag doesn't mean slavery. Go read history before you speak.

Yeah, it only represents a way of life propped up and sustained through slavery.

Unless you count revisionist southern apologetics. Then it's a symbol of rebellion.

But that takes a lot of revisionism.

Perhaps you should say it doesn't just represent slavery, though it depends on how honest you want to be about the history of which you speak. Outright rejection is completely false. the notion that the Civil War wasn't about is as true as the notion that it was. Slavery was a key factor behind the scenes of the war, especially since it would have a serious economic, social, and legal impact.

Though honestly, I've never got why people bother to rationalise why it's okay to use a contested symbol. Just wear it.

 

[DaJoW]

In some context, the flag of a "dead" country.

Most of the time though, it's rednecks, racism and what I've heard referred to as "hick towns" in the American south.

Since I'm Swedish it's pretty much only portrayed in American movies and comedy shows around here though, and the American Civil War isn't covered in history class.

 

[aashell13]

Racism, thats all the flag represents to me. Not trying to offend anyone here but the South seceded because of racism. I'm not saying you should be ashamed to be from those states or live in them, but to sport the flag? To me thats 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.

1. Yes, slavery was the driving force of the southern economy. That's why the state governments got their collective shorts in a wad when it looked like slavery was on its way out.

2. Slavery had ceased to exist in the north by that time mostly because it wasn't economically viable there. If one reviewed primary source documents; letters, newspaper editorials, and the like, one would find that the absence of slavery did not mean the absence of racism in the north.

3. The vast majority of confederate soldiers had never owned slaves, they were far too expensive. So to say that they personally were fighting for slavery isn't true.

To say that the civil war was only about slavery is only about half right. If there hadn't been disagreement over whose authority it was to deal with slavery, there would not have been a war. take the case of Brazil; they abolished slavery even later than the US, but they did so without a civil war because there was no disagreement over the authority of the national government to abolish slavery.

In conclusion, the confederate flags (yes, there were more than one), doesn't represent racism per se any more than the US flag does, and if you look at the level of racism in each country then the US flag has much more simply because the CSA only existed for ~5 years.

 

[RamirezDoEverything]

I think of the grey-clad soldiers, that's about it.

 

[Verlander]

Snip

Urgh I cannot stand the nationalist movements in this day and age, I am under the belief that we should be working towards a unified world government and intermingling of cultures etc.
(what other way will we deal with the murderous aliens lol)

That's completely 100% my opinion as well. It's almost like people didn't see Independence Day!

I think the refusal of the identification of British is the fear of the loss of the further identification as English, Scottish, Welsh, etc.

EDIT: Also I find it funny that it's considered a country made up of countries. Mad stuff

Oh for sure, but those identities are borrowed at best. I think it's one of the things that makes Britain so great is the melting pot of cultures and our fairly erratic history. It's all opinion though

 

[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.

 

[crimson5pheonix]

Southern heritage. As to the Confederacy itself, seeing all the "South was racist" posts (thus implying the North was not) is hilarious.

Now then, we all know that Lincoln was racist. This is fact. We know that Jefferson Davis (president of the Confederacy) was a slave holder himself. This is also fact. How many of you know how Jefferson treated his slaves? He taught them to read and write. He also let them judge each other when any of them broke the rules. He figured slavery would end soon in any case whether or not the South succeeded. So he wanted black people to integrate on equal footing with white people.

Another fun fact. Most slave holders were not plantation owners. Most were poor farmers and could only afford 1 or 2 slaves. And they would work in the fields with the slaves, eat the same food, live in the same standards.