The flag of the Confederacy can be INTERPRETED to be a racist
symbol, but in and of itself, it is not. The flag of the Confederacy
is a symbol of an ATTEMPT by a section of the country to establish
it's own IDEAS about the sovereignty of states. The truth of the matter
is that most scholars of the period believe that had the Confederacy
won the war, they would have shortly abolished slavery anyway once they
entered the modern world of the 20th century.
The Confederate flag has been used by INDIVIDUALS as a symbol of white
superiority. It is a holdover of some southerners' anger about the defeat
of their goals.
People who equate the Confederate flag with the Swastika are doing a
long stretch. The Swastika is a symbol of death and destruction and
world wide conquest. The Confederacy had no desire to conquer the world
or to kill people in concentration camps just because they belonged to a
particular race.
Dean should be ashamed of himself for his cowardice. If ever I would
have voted for him, now I will not. Once again, the Democrats have shown
that they have no viable candidates. Neither have the Republicans. I'll
have to wait until Giuliani runs before I vote in a presidential
election. Maybe the law will even be changed to allow the upcoming
governor of California to run.
Subject: Re: DEAN DOESN'T DESERVE TO BE PRESIDENT
Date: Sat, 8 Nov 2003 10:33:53 -0800
Hi there!
> The flag of the Confederacy can be INTERPRETED to be a
> racist symbol, but in and of itself, it is not.
> People who equate the Confederate flag with the
> Swastika are doing a long stretch.
> The Swastika is a symbol of death and destruction and
> world wide conquest.
Respectful but very vehement disagreement.
The Swastika has thousands of years of history of peaceful spiritual
meaning among a number of civilizations around the globe and was
co-opted in only the last 100 years by a a group of men as a symbol
under which they attempted death and destruction. The Stars & Bars was
the symbol of a nascent nation separating itself from the rest over a
conflict of States' Rights which has in the last 100 years been co-opted
by a group of men as a symbol under which racial prejudice and
discrimination have been taken to violent extremes.
If you can erase the horrific things that were done first in the name of
slavery and later in the name of racial prejudice then you must be
capable of erasing the horrific things that were done in the name of the
Aryan race.
Frankly, even though I am Buddhist and technically the swastika is the
official symbol of my religion in the lands of its birth, I find it hard
to separate it from the acts that were done under its auspices by the
Third Reich. In the same manner, I find it similarly difficult to
separate the Stars & Bars from the acts of discrimination and
destruction that have been committed under its auspices by people
dedicated to the causes of racial prejudice.
The relative body count of the two co-opting groups is moot. Both
symbols began meaning one thing and have since come to be identified
with groups whose purposes are not benevolent in the least. If you can
separate one from the group who co-opted it, then there should be no
problem separating the other from the group that co-opted it as well.
With all due respect, anything else is hypocrisy.
Namastè!
Marlyn
To: "Marlyn Bumpus"
From: "King Solomon"
Date: Sat, 8 Nov 2003 11:50:39 -0800 (PST)
Subject: [new46] Re: DEAN DOESN'T DESERVE TO BE PRESIDENT
Hi there.
Unashamedly I must admit that yours is the best
rebuttal I have gotten so far.
AND or BUT - I CAN separate the Mazi swaistika from
the Far Eastern one because they don't look the same.
They face in opposite directions. But the Nazis always
turned things around. Mussolini got his left arm
salute from the ancieant Romans. The Nazis took it and
substituted the right arm in the salute.
Even symbolically I separate the original swastika
from its use in Germany. Many people cannot. The same
cannot separate the Confederate flag from its use by
some people in this century. That is not even the
major issue here. The issue is DEAN and his hypocrisy.
It is his refusal to stand up to opportunistic blacks
like Sharpton that is the issue. It is his inability
to say "I am interested in getting as many votes as I
can including the type of people who carry the
Confederate flag in their cars, and believe me, I am
sure that those same people would not like me for who
I am. But I don't care if they like me or not. I might
not like them. But I like the Sharptons of the world
less.
Marlyn, many people are down on me just because I am
in the middle, neither left nor right, but simpatico
with the best that each has to offer.
The man had the right to say that he is courting as
many people as possible, EVEN the Confederate flag
wavers. It is his right as an American.
I know that if I were running for president I would
not win because I would say what I think. I would say
that I don't believe in the Christian god and if
elected will do everything possible to separate God
from the Consitution. It's my right as an American to
say that. And it's the right of the people to not vote
for me. At the same time, as president, I would grant
full rights for people to wave the Confederate flag or
the Nazi flag. I would also state that this country IS
fighting a crusade againts Islam because I don't think
a president sould lie like Bush does and like Dean
would.
Frankly we need Ed Koch or Rudy Giuliani for
president.
This country is too goddam politically correct for its
own good. That's all. But thanx for your input.
Shlo
Date: Sat, 8 Nov 2003 14:52:36 -0800 (PST)
From: "Dan Kliman"
Subject: Re: DEAN DOESN'T DESERVE TO BE PRESIDENT
To: "King Solomon"
--- King Solomon wrote:
> The flag of the Confederacy can be INTERPRETED to be
> a racist symbol, but in and of itself, it is not.
Every symbol in and of itself can be interpreted in
any way. Just look at all those loons who intepret
the Star of David as a hate symbol.
The fact is, the Stars and Bars were but one of the
symbols of the Confederacy, and it was the flag of the
KKK. You don't get much more racist than that.
I lived in a Confederate state for 3 years, and the
racism was palpable. When you saw a Confederate Flag,
you knew what it meant and you understood the
motivations behind the people flying it. If it were
just a neutral flag of rebellion, then why are black
people not welcome in bars that fly the flag? Why
don't you see black southerners flying the flag or
putting it on their cars.
Quite simply, it is a racist symbol and one whose
meaning can not be whitewashed so easily.
In a similar vein, kids in England started wearing
swastikas as a symbol of their allegiance to punk
rock. They had no racist intent and were wearing the
symbol as an anti-establishment/anti-patriotic move
for shock value. Despite their motivations, one could
not distance the racist meaning of the swastika from
the symbol, despite its centuries of use as a
non-racist symbol. In roughly one year, the punks
abandoned the swastika to the racists who appropriated
it and its racist symbolism with great relish.
> It is a holdover of some southerners' anger about
> the defeat of their goals.
The goal was preservation of their "peculiar
institution" of slavery -- a practice that had been
abandoned in the entirety of the civilized world by
the early 19th Century, except the USA.
Dean has every right to court the Confederate flag
flying voter, and Sharpton has every right to
criticize him for it. I am still undecided about my
choice for candidate in the Democratic primary, and as
a Californian, my vote matters little as we have a
late primary, but I doubt if Dean will get my vote,
and certainly Sharpton will not.
Shavuah Tov,
Dan
"What is anti-Zionism? It is the denial to the Jewish people of a
fundamental right we justly claim for the people of Africa and freely accord
all other nations of the globe. It is discrimination against Jews, my
friend, because they are Jews. In short, it is anti-Semitism." --
Martin Luther King Jr.