My soap box: The Confederate Flag

Once again on President's weekend we headed up to Dumont to spend the weekend with Jeremy's family. As we pulled into camp I once again noticed his neighboring trailer had a confederate flag flying high.
Well there are a few things in this world that REALLY urk me the wrong way and this is one of them. The kind of thing that makes your blood boil, that makes you feel SO passionate about things. This is one of them. It strikes a nerve with me.
ESPECIALLY since it was hanging under the American Flag. Ironic. The American Flag stands for one nation under God, indivisible. Yes. Ok and the Confederate flag is a pure symbol, a reminder, a declaration of the South wanting to break free and be independent of America. It is a symbol of them, divided, and standing for their beliefs and way of life.
So how does that make sense.
You can argue many things but plainly as I see it, it's wrong.
So I spent the weekend cringing every time I saw that flag flying behind dune buggies, and quads, on trailers, and in the shops.
Well it hit my limits when I saw a man I respected flying it on the back of his truck. I was in the truck behind him and made the mistake of saying that it made me mad. Now to most people and most families and most humans it would not be a mistake to state your beliefs. However, I was in the truck with the one person who will fight anything you say, who will argue anything you argue, who will purely talk to piss you off, who is more opinionated than anyone I have ever met, and mostly is completely wrong in everything he says, is uneducated and spits out anything he thinks without regard to who it is in front of, or whether he is right or wrong. So yes I made a mistake because usually I keep my mouth shut and let him go on and on. Well this time I messed up. Ooops. Now luckily I have been brought up to respect my elders and hold my peace so I sat silently and took it, but now blog world I am ready to unleash the pure FURRY that ran through my bones as I listened to the most ridiculous words I have ever heard.
--- the idea that the slaves were better off being sold to Americans, and had a better life in America and that we did them a favor.
Oh. My. Word.
For the educated world you probably just gasped with me once again.
I spent four years of my life studying American History which is why some things hit me so hard.
I literally wanted to vomit.
Did he know what slavery was like? Has he ever read a book in his entire life? I for some reason have always been drawn to war, crime, etc, and love to study it. I think I like to see how people can come out of the most horrible situations and how they survive anyway back on topic.
Does he know what really happen in the South? Now I am not saying the North was any better, the industrial revolution and child labor, etc was horrible. There were many horrible conditions that immigrants and children went through but this rant is about slavery.
Does he know what the middle passage was like? How hundreds of slaves were chained together, shoved into the hull of the ship, so crowded they could barely move, standing in their own feces, starving, sick, covered in only things your brain can imagine. This is how the trip started off. Once they got to America and were literal property they were separated from their families, denied an education, and forced to work in circumstances that are completely inhumane. They were hated, thought of as less than, as property, because that is what they were. They were beat, many times to death, they were whipped, they were miserable. And if they tried to escape? They had their feet cut off, their ears, their heads, to make an example to the rest. And more than that when slavery was finally abolished the country was left with an obscene amount of racism. Of hate crimes so violent it makes me sick. The KKK and many other racial organizations did things that are so heart wrenching that the very though of them makes my stomach turn. Lynch mobs, child killers, beatings, segregation, and pure hatred.
So what does the confederate flag mean to me? It is a reminder of the South wanting to break away from America. It is a reminder of the hundreds of thousands of Americans who died, it is a reminder of a war so bloody, a war that turned brother against brother, it is a reminder of racists, of a part of our country who wanted to buy and sell people, it is a reminder of the horrible atrocious crimes that were committed against blacks, it is a reminder of a nation once divided. It is something that as I read earlier, could be preserved in a museum for teaching purposes, but how dare you fly it, and worst of all next to an American flag.

In my rant I made a very bold declaration and I said to me it is similar to flying a Nazi flag and I stand by what I said. Similar, not the same, at all because the holocaust is a painful and horrible atrocity that is so wrong it is hard to believe.
And to the man who dare yell at me and tell me that that comparison is ridiculous and uncalled for I ask you this. Why?
Both are groups of people with hate for another.
Both attacked and killed many in hate.
Both committed hate crimes.
And yes I will compare the KKK to the Nazis.
They both attacked a group of people out of hate. They both killed many. They both hurt children, tortured human beings. Slaves were hurdled into ships, chained together, forced from their homes, separated from their families. Jews were hurdled into train cars, chained together, forced from their homes, and also separated from their families.
Both flags to me show hate. Both flags to me show a group of people who believed strongly in something but were ethically wrong. Both flags bring memories that sicken me. Both flags make me want to vomit.

So to the man who said that slaves were blessed by being brought to America. I ask you how you would have liked to have your family taken and sold to an owner? How you would have liked to see your children taken from you? How you would have liked being tied to the whipping post and being beaten until your bloody body fell to the ground in pure excruciating pain? How you would have like to do hard manual labor all day for your life? How you would have liked to have worshiped in secret? How you would have like to be lynched and hang lifeless in that tree after enduring a torture so brutal that you would have prayed and begged for death?
Now go ahead and tell me you would have chosen that life over the life you had in Africa. I dare you.


And an article I found that says what I believe more eloquently

http://ecarson.wordpress.com/2007/12/05/the-confederate-flag-symbol-of-culture-or-racism/

( And I do understand the other argument, I have read for those who defend the confederate flag, but these are my thoughts and my reactions to it. I understand that it just represented who they were as the South and it was their battle flag. But one main reason they were divided was because of slavery and to me if you divide bc you want slavery and then make a flag to represent you then that flag represents slavery.)

(And finally even if you take slavery out of the picture completely, do we need to fly a flag that represents the separation of America? Are we not one nation? We are united. That is what our flag with 50 stars represents. The confederate flag represents a break away, a wanted independence. So even without the issue of slavery should we be supporting and flying a flag that stands for separation?)