Fleur de lis has troubled history - mark of supremacy

Think this one is next in the media circus?

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NEW ORLEANS -- The fleur de lis is a symbol that is deeply ingrained in Louisiana's history. Seen in architecture, the state flag and on the helmets of the Saints, it's everywhere.

But while it is now seen as the mark of our great state, it was once used to mark slaves.

"Code noir, those words are French and mean black code," said slave historian Dr. Ibrahima Seck.

The black code was a set of regulations adopted in Louisiana in 1724 from other French colonies around the world, meant to govern the state's slave population. Seck said those rules included branding slaves with the fleur de lis as punishment for running away.

"He would be taken before a court and the sentence would be being branded on one shoulder and with the fleur de lis, and then they would crop their ears," Seck said.

Seck said if that slave ran away a second time, he or she would be branded again, but with another brutality added. Their hamstrings would be cut.

To him, this symbol only brings sad thoughts.

"As an African I find it painful, and I think people whose ancestors were enslaved here may feel it even harder than I do as an African," Seck said.

Tulane history professor Terence Fitzmorris said the fleur de lis has roots in the French revolution and, similar to other symbols, was used as a mark of supremacy.

"It was a brutal way of scarring someone and also identifying someone as a particular troublemaker," Fitzmorris said.

a reply to: infolurker

Sovereign citizens are seen as the number one threat to our government and their corrupt ways. What better way to suppress us than divide us. God forbid we figure out we didn't have these problems a year ago. There will always be ignorant people but I do not think racism is a true problem. But they want to divide us.

I am a native and resident of South Louisiana and I have always been appalled by the love that these people have for this emblem. But if you try to say something about it, you hear all kinds of stupid replies.

It may have a bad past but I think everything does. Very few countries exist without expelling oppression. That being said, I could give a sh*t less about any southern flag, take them away, leave them. We are adults, and if we allow ourselves to be swayed by media to believe these are the issues than we are distracted from another corporate bought presidency, the longest war in history, and our growing debt to feed the banks. If we want people to live next to each other with no division than we have to take responsibility for our own democracy. We are the employees, they are our employees, with very cushy jobs that pay well with amazing benefits. I assure you should we take accountability about real issues the small ones will be inherently fixed.

I can just see the movement now to get the New Orleans Saints to change their logo.

Eventually everything will be found to offend everyone in some way shape or form.

a reply to: infolurker

Media circus? Why do people insist on acting as though this a media manufactured controversy that started a few weeks ago? People have been trying to get Confederate flags removed from government buildings and state flags changed in southern states ever since they began to appear in the Civil Rights era.

I grew up in Georgia for instance, and the state flag there was changed in 1956 to include the "Southern Cross" motif familiar to many from the "Rebel Flag." The flag was changed in 2001 and then in 2003 conservatives manage to get it changed back to something that is basically the stainless banner (the actual flag of the Confederacy) with the state seal in the middle.

In South Carolina, the "Rebel Flag" aka "Southern Cross" aka "Confederate Battle Flag" went up over the State House in 1961 and was immediately met with criticism. In 2000, it was moved from the State House to the soldier's memorial. Are you going to blame that on the media too as some way of invalidating the very real and decades old opposition? It's pretty clear that it's no accident that these flags started popping up everywhere after the pro-segregation Dixiecrat's 1948 convention. Furthermore, there are statements from folks contemporary to the flag's design that leave little to the imagination in the way of what the symbolism meant to many people at the time. From an interesting 2013 article in NYT by John Coski:

Bagby characterized the flag motif as the “Southern Cross” – the constellation, not a religious symbol – and hailed it for pointing “the destiny of the Southern master and his African slave” southward to “the banks of the Amazon,” a reference to the desire among many Southerners to expand Confederate territory into Latin America. In contrast, the editor of the Savannah, Ga., Morning News focused on the white field on which the Southern Cross was emblazoned. “As a people, we are fighting to maintain the heaven-ordained supremacy of the white man over the inferior or colored races. A White Flag would be thus emblematical of our cause.” He dubbed the new flag “the White Man’s Flag,” a sobriquet that never gained traction.

The fleur-de-lis on the other hand has been in use for something like 2000 years and not just by the French and very very very few people associate it to slavery. Apples and oranges.

a reply to: bg_socalif

Nobody is more offended than butthurt conservatives who rely on their own willful ignorance to maintain a delusion of being justified in their collective whining.

Just ban it already. This PC movement isn't going to stop until every material object that is viewed by some to be offensive is removed from sight and mind.

a reply to: infolurker

Oh no.

Does this mean the end of The Boy Scout Movement ?

Sir Robert Baden-Powell will be turning in his grave.

a reply to: EternalSolace

Really? Because the confederate flag wasn't banned.
Taking it off a building is not the same thing as banning it.

So your wrong right off the get go.

I've lived in Louisiana my whole life and never really knew that about the Fleur -dis-Lis.

I always just thought it was Louisiana trying to be French.

And now that I know some more history behind it, it changes absolutely nothing to me. I don't understand why it should.

I'll still keep my Saints T-shirt and the wife will still keep her Fleur -dis-Lis windchimes on the porch.

a reply to: cancerwarrior

Amen, the American flag has some bad history behind it, as does every other. It's the world we live in.

originally posted by: Sremmos80
a reply to: EternalSolace

Really? Because the confederate flag wasn't banned.
Taking it off a building is not the same thing as banning it.

So your wrong right off the get go.

Pretty sure my second sentence encompasses "Taking it off a building"...

Unless removing from sight and mind isn't what happened when they removed the condederate flag. Stop splitting hairs to justify taking a jab.

a reply to: EternalSolace

And I was addressing your first sentence, the one saying just ban it already

Not splitting hairs, nothing has been banned, so why would this flag need to be?

a reply to: Sremmos80

It's most definitely splitting hairs. I could argue the confederate flag was "banned" from the flag pole in SC. In this case, the Fleur de lis needs to be banned from the flag pole in LA.

a reply to: EternalSolace

Gotcha, the fact that no flag has been banned is splitting hairs.
Good to know.

But saying something is banned from a flagpole is not...

Holy hell mental gymnastics.

But yes, I agree that flag should not be on a state capital building either.

Funny how gold chains are so commonly worn.
Yet OTHER symbols linked to slavery are not kosher.
Selective war on symbolism going on here?
What's the deeper meaning behind this craziness?

originally posted by: EternalSolace
Pretty sure my second sentence encompasses "Taking it off a building"...

Unless removing from sight and mind isn't what happened when they removed the condederate flag. Stop splitting hairs to justify taking a jab.

People should be free to fly the flag wherever they want. A government building however should not be flying the flag of a rogue government that tried to take down the country. The only official flying of it should be in museums and major battlefields. Any other flying of the flag should be done by private citizens only.

Here's another hot potato

New Orleans Saints Fleur de Lis Logo Now Being Called Racist