South Carolina, tear down that flag!

[NoahFence]

It's not a racist symbol, and no flag can help how it's used or by whom. A flag is an inanimate object.

Then why are conservatives so adamant to keep it around? Can't they find another inanimate object to worship?

If Robert E. Lee or other Confederate leaders were alive today, they would be aghast that Dylan Roof used the Confederate flag and would be calling for his swift punishment.

Baloney. They'd prop him up as a symbol of all that is right and white.

 

[grunion]

Godwin alert.

From "Dispelling The Myth Of Robert E. Lee"

"...Whatever his personal or military virtues, he offered himself and his sword to the cause of slavery. He owned slaves himself and fought tenaciously in the courts to keep them. He commanded a vast army that, had it won, would have secured the independence of a nation dedicated to the proposition that white people could own black people and sell them off, husband from wife, child from parent, as the owner saw fit."

"...After the war, the South embraced a mythology of victimhood. An important feature was the assertion that the war had been not about slavery at all but about state’s rights. The secessionists themselves were not so shy. In their various declarations, they announced they were leaving the Union to preserve slavery. Lee not only accepted the Lost Cause myth, he propagated it and came to embody it.

Lee was a brilliant field marshal whose genius was widely acknowledged — Lincoln wanted him to command the Union forces. In a way, that’s a pity. A commander of more modest talents might have been beaten sooner, might not have taken the war to the North (Gettysburg) and expended so many lives. Lee, in this regard, is an American Rommel, the German general who fought brilliantly, but for Hitler. Almost until Hitler compelled his suicide, Rommel, too, did his duty."

 

[corybluefire]

Someone asked me the difference between the american aand confederate flag. Said they both have bad history.

 

[NoahFence]

Someone asked me the difference between the american aand confederate flag. Said they both have bad history.

Indeed they do. And I'm sure if the racist slaveowners had won, we'd be vilified for flying the flag of the United States today.

But as it is the south lost and the only relevant flag is the all white flag of surrender.

 

[thaiboxerken]

Someone asked me the difference between the american aand confederate flag. Said they both have bad history.

Yes, however, the United States has progressed while the Confederacy wanted to keep the status quo of the time.

Oh, and the Confederates lost.

 

[lobosrul]

Someone asked me the difference between the american aand confederate flag. Said they both have bad history.

The US also has very good history. The Confederacy was a creation to keep slavery legal. Its all bad history.

 

[ponderingturtle]

Someone asked me the difference between the american aand confederate flag. Said they both have bad history.

So what ever did the confederacy a nation founded to preserve slavery and the supremacy of the white race ever do that wasn't bad?

 

[crescent]

Godwin alert.

From "Dispelling The Myth Of Robert E. Lee"

There are a lot of pro-rebel flag things popping up on facebook and message boards lately. One of them contains this quote:

Contrarily, Confederate General Robert E. Lee freed his slaves (which he
never purchased – they were inherited) in 1862!!! Lee freed his slaves
several years before the war was over, and considerably earlier than his
Northern counterparts. And during the fierce early days of the war when
the South was obliterating the Yankee armies!

Is there any truth to that? (Not just a question for Grunion, but for ISF in general.)

 

[Mumbles]

Someone asked me the difference between the american aand confederate flag. Said they both have bad history.

Well, yes they do have some bad history. That's not the point.

The U.S. Flag toppled the Confederate flag, long ago. The Battle flag(key word, "battle") was flow as a sign of resistance to integration. To say that it's "Southern Pride" is an insult to the south.

 

[grunion]

Looks like it's not all lollipops and roses in the quest to relegate this racist symbol to the history books:

The Klan’s Vile Post-Charleston Recruiting Spree

“I didn’t even know the KKK was alive and well,” Shannon Phillips of Lake View told local news station WIAT. “I certainly didn’t know it was in our area. It disturbed me that they put Tootsie Rolls in here trying to appeal to children. I mean that’s just pathetic, sick, disgusting.”

 

[dudalb]

There are a lot of pro-rebel flag things popping up on facebook and message boards lately. One of them contains this quote:



Is there any truth to that? (Not just a question for Grunion, but for ISF in general.)

Lee appears to have had conflicted attitudes on Slavery,but in the end he was a bit like Jefferson: he moaned that it was a bad instituion but kept the slaves he owned.

 

[jimbob]

And did you know? At the time the War of 1861 -1865 officially commenced, the Southern States were actually in the process of freeing all slaves in the South.

That whole wall of text is full of nonsense, but that statement goes beyond nonsense into B.S. of a particularly pure variety.

This is the kind of crap I you see from the Neo Confederates all the time.


They just cannot get over this happening:

This is from a fairly recent thread on this subject, and as you say, it doesn't imply that the South were working to free slaves and were only stopped when the North demonstrated its aggression by being attacked by the South...

<snip>
As a British person would say: "Bullocks!" Where's your source? Here's mine to counter this ridiculous claim:

1790: 697,681 slaves - 8% of blacks are free.
1800: 893,602 slaves - 11% blacks are free.
1810: 1,191,362 slaves - 14% blacks are free.
1820: 1,538,022 slaves - 13% blacks are free.
1830: 2,009,043 slaves - 14% blacks are free.
1840: 2,487,355 slaves - 13% blacks are free.
1850: 3,204,313 slaves - 12% blacks are free.
1860: 3,953,760 slaves - 11% blacks are free.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slavery_in_the_United_States

There is absolutely NO indication that "slavery would have died a natural death." At least not for another 100 years before mechanization of the farm comes about due to an efficient and small internal combustion engine. No indication whatsoever. None. This revisionist history ******** has to stop.

 

[dudalb]

Looks like it's not all lollipops and roses in the quest to relegate this racist symbol to the history books:

The Klan’s Vile Post-Charleston Recruiting Spree

Good article, but it gives the impression there is a big,nationwide organization calling itself the Ku Klux Klan. That is not true.
The Klan is hopelessly splintered;there is no major organization, but a couple of dozen small groups all claiming to be the only original,true, Klan, and often hating each other almost as much as they do Blacks, Jews, etc.
They are all a bunch of bigoted,pathetic,morons, and they are capable of violence, and need to be closely watched,but there is no huge,nationwide Klan.

 

[grunion]

Lee appears to have had conflicted attitudes on Slavery,but in the end he was a bit like Jefferson: he moaned that it was a bad instituion but kept the slaves he owned.

Do you have any evidence for this? While far from exonerating him, Jefferson was a slaveowner who freed two of his slaves during his lifetime and five others upon his death. I haven't found many accounts of how he treated the children of Sally Hemings, his slave-concubine, but I would be curious to know. Still, Jefferson owned over six hundred slaves. Despite his sincere quest that gradual emancipation be written into the Constitution, his actions can reasonably be called hypocritical.

Not so for Lee, no hypocrisy there. (source)

Lee's wife inherited 196 slaves upon her father's death in 1857. The will stated that the slaves were to be freed within five years, and at the same time large legacies—raised from selling property—should be given to the Lee children. But as the executor of the will, Lee decided that instead of freeing the slaves right away—as they expected—he could continue to own and work them for five years in an effort to make the estates profitable and not have to sell the property.

Lee was considered a hard taskmaster. He also started hiring slaves to other families, sending them away, and breaking up families that had been together on the estate for generations. The slaves resented him, were terrified they would never be freed, and they lost all respect for him. There were many runaways, and at one point several slaves jumped him, claiming they were as free as he. Lee ordered these men to be severely whipped. He also petitioned the court to extend their servitude, but the court ruled against him and Lee did grant them their freedom on Jan. 1, 1863—ironically, the same day that Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation went into effect.

 

[Upchurch]

Indeed they do. And I'm sure if the racist slaveowners had won, we'd be vilified for flying the flag of the United States today.

But as it is the south lost and the only relevant flag is the all white flag of surrender.

C.S.A.: The Confederate States of America

[/ot]

 

[TragicMonkey]

The US also has very good history. The Confederacy was a creation to keep slavery legal. Its all bad history.

And before the Confederacy existed, there was no slavery in the United States.

 

[Checkmite]

I can barely believe y'all are feeding the trolls.

You don't have to post in or even read this thread. It's a free country.

Unlike the Confederacy for instance.

 

[thaiboxerken]

And before the Confederacy existed, there was no slavery in the United States.

A clear strawman that is not helping further the discussion.

 

[Checkmite]

And before the Confederacy existed, there was no slavery in the United States.

The US managed to outlaw slavery. The Confederacy, never did - although according to the revisionists they were perpetually "about to".

 

[thaiboxerken]

The US managed to outlaw slavery. The Confederacy, never did - although according to the revisionists they were perpetually "about to".

I doubt that they would have expanded voting rights and civil rights in any other way as well.