Sorry about the all caps kinglizard.

I've looked over the linked thread and will bone up on ABOUT ATS: General ATS discussion etiquette

Thanks for bringing it to my attention.

I have always loved the stars and bars, its a piece of history and a really beautiful flag, something that brave men carried into battle and rallied around. I also love our American flag, I fought for her and almost gave my life for her in 69, and she is a real beauty as well...

The real thing here is, people need to get over themselves...

I sing a song of the Civil War
most folks don't know what it was for,
It's obvious to me,
as it be should to you
that it's a complex history,

The South still claims that the North
in its antagonistic haste
laid a pure civilization to waste
Where racism was unknown
and it was the evil North where
it's head was shown

That the slaves were guests that loved their work
and abolitionists meddlesome jerks
Lincoln, that tyrannical bastard
Over our sainted Davis, mastered,

Preventing our beloved C.S.A.
To strangle Uncle Sam-and save the day.

-There, did I get the gist of it?

Violence is a characteristic of the human species. It's how we began, it is (for the most part) how we continue.

In the beginning we fought over food resources and hunting territories, and when one group wins there are two basic options:
1) Kill the losers
2) Enslave (place in captivity) the losers

Is exterminating the losers (as some theorize "we" did to the Neanderthal) any more humane or civilized than enslaving them? Really?

Slavery in one form or another continues to be practiced in the modern world, it just doesn't necessarily occur along racial lines.

Not so long ago US citizens were drafted into the military, whereupon they became the property of said military. How is this *not* slavery? Try to argue with me if you wish, but first explain this: When, once upon a time while I was in the US Navy, I managed to acquire a sunburn so bad that I couldn't work, I was written up and punished for damaging military property.

In other countries around the world, forms of slavery continue to exist. If you can honestly deny this, please crawl out from under that rock and PM me, I'll try to help you find a better place to live.

Human history could easily be expressed as a list of horrors and atrocities perpetrated upon one group by another. We seem to focus on the Holocaust and American slavery, but a list of human atrocities including slavery, torture, sacrifice, persecution, and the extermination of whole tribes/countries/ethnic or religious groups, and etc. could go on for pages.

Instead of continually pointing blaming fingers at each other and digging up the past as a way to justify being judgmental of others in the present based on their race, ethnicity, religion, national origin, etc., why can't we just agree that we are what we are (human beings), we evolved through violence and atrocities, and we're all trying to do better now that we're "civilized"?

Why can't we cherish whatever heritage, traditions, and symbols we wish and allow the other guy to do the same without having to judge and criticize their choices?

My own husband, being from Kansas City originally, has a fondness for the Confederate flag. To him it symbolizes independence, noncomformity, a "don't mess with me or you'll regret it" attitude, and "traditions" ranging from great barbecue to hunting for your own food. The modern "Southerners" (also called rednecks) I know cherish their individuality, independence, determination (also called "stubbornness"), creative problem-solving (also called jerry-rigging), and love of family and community.

I don't see anything to hate in any of these values.

I generally avoid people that get too emotionally polarized by flags. The US civil war might be a good place to learn how TPTB saddle and ride the masses though. When it gets right down to it being a sheeple is just another form of slavery. The military leaders from both sides went to school and graduated together from West Point military academy, so obviously there must have been some kind of Pearl Harbor used to create the split. It is interesting to read the post civil war pro and anti Tom literature spins.

Being a racist really boils down to a matter of equality. It's pretty hypocritical to get so bent out of shape over someone using a flag other than one you personally choose to stand behind, or endorse the beliefs that may be behind it.

Everyone is entitled to believe whatever they wish. Using a flag as a representation of those beliefs makes it a natural extension of a protected universal right.

Originally posted by Violater1
The stars and bars represent mans enslavement to man, greed, prejudice, and unlawful prosecution. If your for that kind of thing, then this flag is for you.
My Flag has 50 Stars and 13 Strips. My other flag says, "Don't Tread on Me."

Oh, you're flag doesn't say 'enslavement to man, greed, prejudice, and unlawful prosecution'?

How about this, Lincoln "Free'd the slaves" in southern states in the event the North won, but not in border states. Do you think the North didn't have slaves? Who do you think imported them into the south?

Lincoln, DID NOT CARE about slaves, in his first innagrial address he said "I have no purpose, directly or indirectly, to interfere with the institution of slavery where it exists. I believe I have no lawful right to do so, and I have no inclination to do so."

THE ONLY reason slavery even became an issue during the war of northern aggression was because, England was going to side with the south, and it was a political strategy Lincoln used to keep England out of the war! He knew England couldn't and wouldn't side with slavery.



How about greed? Let's ask some Native American's about how ungreedy and caring you're flag was to them.

Unlawful prosecution? Just ask the American Japanese during WW2 if any of that ever happened under your flag.

YOU ARE BRAINWASHED!! Everything you know was written by northern propaganda after the war.

The 'civil war' was in fact our 2nd War of Independence; states rights to avoid a tyrannical government.

Lincoln's stated purpose in the war was to destroy the principle of the Declaration of Independence that governments derive their just powers from the consent of the governed. Southerners no longer consented to being governed by Washington, DC, so Lincoln waged total war against them for four long years. Of course, he didn't put it this way but instead sugarcoated his objective with language about "saving the Union." At the time many Americans — including dozens of Northern newspaper editors — considered the act of compelling a state to remain in the Union at gunpoint to be destructive of the voluntary union of the states.

The reason that people do not use the confederate flag is that, even if you know that it does not simply stand for slavery, you should exercise common sense and realize that most people think you are just being racist. Unless of course you are being racist, in which case you would not care.