Black Community News News and Commentary for Christians
[BCN editor’s note: I was born and raised in the South, and I’ve seen plenty of Confederate flags — on bumper stickers, hanging from poles, etc. Not once have I ever felt fear, intimidation, resentment, or anger.]
Image for representational purposes only.
In the days since a tragic shooting killed nine parishioners at a Charleston, S.C., church, national media outlets have seized on a peripheral conversation about the display of a Confederate flag near the state’s Capitol building.
Several reports surfaced Wednesday, shortly after slain Pastor Clementa Pinckney’s body was laid in honor inside the Capitol, pointing out that his casket was carried past that Confederate flag on the way to the viewing. While some reporters obviously saw this development as newsworthy, recent information indicates Pinckney supported the Confederate flag’s display at the Statehouse.
As a state senator, Pinckney cast a vote in favor of House Resolution 5028, which related “to the permanent placement of the United States Flag, the South Carolina State Flag, and the South Carolina Infantry Battle Flag of the Confederate States of America” and was signed into law in 2000.
Twitter users reacted to the revelation, with several contending that the Confederate flag does not have any ties to racism.
Others concluded the tragic shooting has been hijacked by leftists who intend to turn a national debate into the denigration of a particular flag and its supporters.
At least one diplomatic reader suggested a compromise that would get rid of the Confederate flag while retaining the ideals of liberty and freedom many associate with it.
“Let’s replace the confederate [sic] flag with the Don’t Tread on Me flag,” the user wrote, referring to the Gadsden flag, which in recent years has become associated with the tea party movement.
Is the Confederate flag a symbol of America’s racism? Share your thoughts in the comments section below.
BCN editor’s note: This article first appeared at Western Journalism.
eliminating the knowledge and celebration of history will cure nothing but will beget ignorance to recreate the past
Although a caucasian, I have never thought of the CF as some “racist symbol.” I firmly believe that those who fought in the Civil War, on the ‘wrong side,’ were fighting more ‘against’ some BIG government dictating to them than wanting to continue to be able to own slaves. How many suffering death and dismemberment in the South owned slaves? Slavery was, perhaps, the prime driving issue – I just don’t think that was the issue for ‘most’ who fought on the side of the South, including multitudes of black folk!
As President Abraham Lincoln proclaimed from his own mouth: “My paramount object in this struggle is to save the Union, and is not either to save or to destroy slavery. If I could save the Union without freeing any slave I would do it, and if I could save it by freeing all the slaves I would do it; and if I could save it by freeing some and leaving others alone I would also do that. What I do about slavery, and the colored race, I do because I believe it helps to save the Union; and what I forbear, I forbear because I do not believe it would help to save the Union.”
Those who ascribe to removing the Confederate Flag might consider which of the two flags, Confederate or U.S., Louis Farrakhan believes should “come down!” Many other than Louis “The Bomb Thrower” Farrakhan would also tell you that many atrocities, in addition to slavery, have occurred under the U.S. Flag than anything that transpired under the Stars and Bars! Removing our historic “symbols” leads to resolving what?