The True Crime Of The Confederate Flag
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Ever since the Confederate Flag walked into Emanuel African
Methodist Episcopal Church and shot and killed nine people it has been under
tremendous scrutiny.
Within days of the shooting the state of California banned
the flag’s display and sale on state property and South Carolina removed it
from their capitol. Georgia, Tennessee, and Virginia all stopped the display of
Confederate Flag license plates, and Alabama ordered that four Confederate
flags be removed from a monument on their capitol grounds. Facebook announced
that its ban on any posts containing The Confederate Flag that would go into
effect the week after Independence Day. Walmart, Amazon, Sears, and eBay all stopped
selling The Confederate Flag. Then they stopped selling merchandise that
displayed contained, mentioned or slightly resembled The Confederate Flag.
None of this is surprising considering the horrible nature
of the crime that The Confederate Flag has committed, and by week’s end many
more would exact their just and much deserved punishments upon it.
The same Confederate Flag that committed the horrific
murders in Charleston, South Carolina was painted on the roof of an orange Dodge
Charger in the 1970’s TV show "Dukes of Hazzard" and for that reason TV
Land pulled reruns of the show and Warner Bros. stopped making and selling
"Dukes of Hazzard" merchandise. Golfer Bubba Watson who owns the
show’s original car the “General Lee”, announced that he will repaint the car’s
roof to remove the offending symbol. NASCAR announced its plans to limit The
Confederate Flag’s presence at its tracks (best of luck with that one) and Fort
Sumter, where the first shots of the Civil War were fired, has taken down its
Confederate Flags under a directive by the National Park Service. Gettysburg
National Park also removed Confederate Flag items from its bookstore. This
makes a great deal of sense because the last place we need to see The
Confederate Flag is in a book about the Civil War.
During this same historic week North Charleston police Sgt.
Shannon Dildine was fired for posting a picture of himself wearing Confederate
Flag boxer shorts on his Facebook page. His termination letter said the photo
undermined the officer’s “ability to improve trust and instill confidence when
working with our citizens.” Chuck Netzhammer walked into a Walmart bakery in
Slidell, Louisiana and ordered a cake with an image of The Confederate Flag and
the words, "Heritage Not Hate" on it. His request was denied. As you know, cakes are
now a leading barometer of the political and social climate in this country.
Yes, the Confederate Flag has been getting more bad press
than Donald Trump hosting a Cinco DeMaio pageant, and I think its treatment demonstrates
a true need for us to reflect on who we really are as individuals, as a culture,
and as citizens living in a nation of laws. What does our response to this tragedy
say about our principles and our collective character? Where do we go from
here? I have some ideas.
First, this is another glaring example of the need for
sweeping changes in our gun control regulations. How does the Confederate Flag legally
purchase a 45-caliber Glock handgun in the first place? Did they DO a
background check? I know, some of you
are still saying guns don’t kill people, flags with guns kill people, but I
think that the problem here is obvious and needs to be addressed.
Next, we need a drastic rewrite of our history. If the
National Park Service sees the need to pull down the flags that flew over Fort
Sumter and stop the sale of certain books at Gettysburg, well what more do we
need. Just remove The Confederate Flag
from history. How hard can it be? In just one week we have removed it
from most of our culture. There is already a detailed design of how to do this
in George Orwell's 1984. In the book Winston Smith spends his days at Ministry
of Truth "rectifying" historical records to conform to Big Brother's
most recent pronouncements. I’m sure that our President would have no problem
using his pen one more time to create a Ministry of Truth for us, and our new
and improved history will fit right into federal Common Core education
standards.
Further, in light of our legal system’s embrace of hate
crime legislation, a jury will need consider what motive the Confederate Flag
had in committing this crime. What was it thinking? What was it standing for at the time?
It has been said that the Confederate Flag stands for many
things to many different people. Some say that the flag stands for slavery, others
say it stands for southern heritage, there are those from the north as well as
south that say it stands for state’s rights. I think we can be sure of one
thing here. If the Confederate Flag is truly tied to state’s rights they need
not consider the death penalty. The flag
will be dying of natural causes very soon anyway. This should help the jury
during the penalty phase of the trial.
Seeing what is happening to The Confederate Flag should have
a great influence on keeping other flags on the straight and narrow. If there
is any debate left on what the Confederate Flag stands for it should be pretty
obvious. It stands as an example to other flags that they better not get out of
line. I heard a rumor recently that the state flag of Colorado has a drug
problem. Don’t say anything..
Over the last several weeks The American Flag has been taking a
beating in this country as well. It has been burned and stomped on in the
streets and public squares across our nation by people telling us that black
lives matter and gay pride matters and others that are just really pissed off
but have not assigned themselves to a popular cause yet. I am not sure what
horrible crime the American Flag has committed. I know over the years it has
been accused of many. I think back before prohibition it robbed a liquor store
or two. Anyway, I am sure it deserves the punishment that it is now receiving.
Perhaps it’s time that we went out and got a new flag. One
with less baggage. Maybe the flag of Greece. I hear that we could get a pretty good
deal on it about now.
Buddy Walker
Special thanks to Phil Valentine for leading me to this
concept. Thanks Phil hope to meet you someday.
