RE: US people - is the confederate flag a symbol of racism?
January 14, 2021 at 6:44 pm
(This post was last modified: January 14, 2021 at 6:46 pm by Ranjr.)
When I was a kid, in the 60s and 70s, I viewed the battle flag as a symbol of the south. I didn't think about slavery or racist connotations because slavery was in the past and civil rights were on the upward trend. It was a symbol of good southern values, not the ugly ones. When southern rock bands used the flag or Dukes of Hazzard painted it on a car, I didn't see hate. When Skynyrd played Knebworth in 1976, Brits waved the rebel flag. (Paul and Lynda were in the crowd.) Of course, using the flag was MCA's idea, not the band's.
That changed over the following decade, and now there's no viewing the flag as anything but a symbol of racism and hate, especially if it has Hank Jr.'s face on it. Because I grew up in newly integrated Hope, Arkansas schools, making friends with whomever was nice and patient enough to put up with me, I thought race relations were advancing for the better and would continue to improve. Boy, was I wrong, being a stupid kid notwithstanding. I didn't know yankees were just as racist, sometimes more so, than southerners. After all, yankees were the good guys in the war, right?
That changed over the following decade, and now there's no viewing the flag as anything but a symbol of racism and hate, especially if it has Hank Jr.'s face on it. Because I grew up in newly integrated Hope, Arkansas schools, making friends with whomever was nice and patient enough to put up with me, I thought race relations were advancing for the better and would continue to improve. Boy, was I wrong, being a stupid kid notwithstanding. I didn't know yankees were just as racist, sometimes more so, than southerners. After all, yankees were the good guys in the war, right?
