Confederate Flag Debate - Politics Forum.org | PoFo

Wandering the information superhighway, he came upon the last refuge of civilization, PoFo, the only forum on the internet ...

Those who do not remember the past are condemned to relive it. Note: nostalgia *is* allowed.
Forum rules: No one line posts please.
User avatar
By Tainari88
#15100456
This debate taking place in a Shawnee Mission East High School history class is quite interesting:




There is a young man there that has a black T-shirt that uses a computer that has a lot of historical information. He makes great arguments against keeping the Confederate flag flying and getting rid of it.

Do you agree or not? Why? Elaborate. Please try to avoid one-line responses.
By wat0n
#15100466
Hi @Tainari88, thanks for the video. I think it's a very nice debate, and more civil than here sometimes.

I agree with him, although I found the argument that if we apply this standard to the Union flag then it can perfectly be interpreted as a support for the dispossession of Native Americans depending on the beholder an interesting and indeed logically valid one. Do you agree with that? Do you see the US flag as a symbol of indigenous dispossession?

I also found it the opinion by this relative of Jefferson Davis to be completely valid. He's right, there are better ways to honor Southern heritage than flying a Confederate flag, given the meaning many people give to it.

Personally, being a foreigner, this debate obviously doesn't raise my passions it raises among Americans, but I do believe the Confederate flag is a symbol of slavery and hatred and would not fly it myself (although since I'm not a citizen, I don't feel comfortable flying the US flag either!).

Yet I also think that is not the main reason why it shouldn't be flown in government buildings. The main reason against flying it there is its other, most obvious meaning: It represents separatism from the United States and as such there's absolutely no reason for the government to fly flags representing the end of the Union.
#15100468
wat0n wrote:Hi @Tainari88, thanks for the video. I think it's a very nice debate, and more civil than here sometimes.

I agree with him, although I found the argument that if we apply this standard to the Union flag then it can perfectly be interpreted as a support for the dispossession of Native Americans depending on the beholder an interesting and indeed logically valid one. Do you agree with that? Do you see the US flag as a symbol of indigenous dispossession?

I also found it the opinion by this relative of Jefferson Davis to be completely valid. He's right, there are better ways to honor Southern heritage than flying a Confederate flag, given the meaning many people give to it.

Personally, being a foreigner, this debate obviously doesn't raise my passions it raises among Americans, but I do believe the Confederate flag is a symbol of slavery and hatred and would not fly it myself (although since I'm not a citizen, I don't feel comfortable flying the US flag either!).

Yet I also think that is not the main reason why it shouldn't be flown in government buildings. The main reason against flying it there is its other, most obvious meaning: It represents separatism from the United States and as such there's absolutely no reason for the government to fly flags representing the end of the Union.


@wat0n I have no idea where you are from and your ethnic background. You should clarify that for me?

Well, for me the Confederacy and the Union were about a clash of interests from two elitist groups. It is true what that young man stated--most Southerners were not slave owners in the South. Most white Southerners were poor and did not own slaves. There is Bacon's Rebellion that has to do with the early history of the USA's founding and it shaped the relationship white indentured servants had with slaves. Long story short? They united against the landed gentry and threatened the hold on power the landed wealthy class had. So the landed wealthy created codes that were made a law to prevent the unity of the white indentured servants and black slaves.

Read a bit of the history in this link @wat0n :

Please go to Wikipedia and type in Bacon's Rebellion. Copy the link. And study it. I can't do it. My computer is acting up.




Using free labor was a fairly old concept in human history. The Romans used slave labor and also Egypt and many other places. Why? Because it was a way of the ruling class to consolidate their assets, wealth, power and influence. Paying people for labor was a capitalist concept that broke the old traditional feudal relationships that were about the responsibility for a serf's family, lineage and land base with the feudal lord. In order to understand what a radical change that was? You need to study the history of feudal land relationships with serfs and servants and the tenants to feudalist concepts.

Capitalism gave a worker the right to sell his or her labor to an employer capitalist and also terminate the relationship at will and go and sell his or her labor to someone else. in Feudal relationships that was not allowed. The serfs weren't property like with slaves but they had extremely limited rights and it was within a context of rigid class structures.

You must study all that in depth to understand what motivated such a bloody civil war.
By wat0n
#15100473
Tainari88 wrote:@wat0n I have no idea where you are from and your ethnic background. You should clarify that for me?


I'm from Chile. My ethnic background is Ashkenazi Jewish on my mother's side, plain Chilean on my father's side (which I guess means there's some undetermined mix between Spaniard and indigenous Chilean, although I don't regard myself as the latter in any meaningful way).

Tainari88 wrote:Well, for me the Confederacy and the Union were about a clash of interests from two elitist groups. It is true what that young man stated--most Southerners were not slave owners in the South. Most white Southerners were poor and did not own slaves. There is Bacon's Rebellion that has to do with the early history of the USA's founding and it shaped the relationship white indentured servants had with slaves. Long story short? They united against the landed gentry and threatened the hold on power the landed wealthy class had. So the landed wealthy created codes that were made a law to prevent the unity of the white indentured servants and black slaves.

Read a bit of the history in this link @wat0n :




Using free labor was a fairly old concept in human history. The Romans used slave labor and also Egypt and many other places. Why? Because it was a way of the ruling class to consolidate their assets, wealth, power and influence. Paying people for labor was a capitalist concept that broke the old traditional feudal relationships that were about the responsibility for a serf's family, lineage and land base with the feudal lord. In order to understand what a radical change that was? You need to study the history of feudal land relationships with serfs and servants and the tenants to feudalist concepts.

Capitalism gave a worker the right to sell his or her labor to an employer capitalist and also terminate the relationship at will and go and sell his or her labor to someone else. in Feudal relationships that was not allowed. The serfs weren't property like with slaves but they had extremely limited rights and it was within a context of rigid class structures.

You must study all that in depth to understand what motivated such a bloody civil war.


Slavery was indeed the main reason of the war (there are others, but these are not even independent of slavery itself), although I would separate the feudal serfdom from slavery since they are not exactly the same thing. Serfs weren't slaves even if they were indeed bound to the relationship with their feudal Lord. Likewise slavery isn't a purely economic issue, it has more dimensions than that which also helped move the South towards war.

The interpretation of the war as simply a fight between elites over economic issues (common in the '20s and '30s I think) is not wrong in itself, but it's incomplete.
#15100478
@Tainari88

It's not a debate for me. Ban displays of the Confederate flag and take down memorials of Confederate political and military leaders. I say that as a descendant of a Confederate veteran who fought for the South in the American Civil War and was a Prisoner of War at Camp Douglas in Chicago. He survived his ordeal there. After the war was over, he had to pledge allegiance to the Union which he did and was allowed to return home to the South. He had to walk home primarily by foot given that the Union army destroyed much of the railroads in the South during the war. He was lice and bacteria invested and had gone months without a shower/bath. When he finally got home by walking home by foot, his wife wouldn't let him in the house.

He had to take a bath outside and she boiled his clothes in really hot water to kill all the bacteria, lice and bugs he got as a POW and walking back home. He was in pretty bad shape but he survived fighting in several battles during the war and long marches and to engage in several battles in different states. He got a pension from his state after the war which we have his pension records.

We keep watch over his grave and have an American flag by his grave. The unit he served in is on his tombstone. We don't have a confederate flag by his grave. Only an American flag. I think we also have picture (or I think it was a painting that looks like a black and white photograph but it was really a painting but it was very accurate in how they looked at that time) of him and my great great great (or should I add another great in here) grandmother of both of them together. I look very much like her.

My reasons for banning the Confederate flag is because we are all Americans and the war was long over and settled. You have to look to the future. Not to mention, politically, the South was fighting to preserve the institutions of white supremacy such as slavery and the Confederate flag is offensive to many Americans (I personally find it offensive and ignorant). So, it stands to reason because we are all Americans (well, not everybody here is American but I say this to those who are American citizens) and the Confederate flag is offensive that it should be banned. We don't need something or anybody that is going to divide our country.
#15100518
Politics_Observer wrote:@Tainari88

It's not a debate for me. Ban displays of the Confederate flag and take down memorials of Confederate political and military leaders. I say that as a descendant of a Confederate veteran who fought for the South in the American Civil War and was a Prisoner of War at Camp Douglas in Chicago. He survived his ordeal there. After the war was over, he had to pledge allegiance to the Union which he did and was allowed to return home to the South. He had to walk home primarily by foot given that the Union army destroyed much of the railroads in the South during the war. He was lice and bacteria invested and had gone months without a shower/bath. When he finally got home by walking home by foot, his wife wouldn't let him in the house.

He had to take a bath outside and she boiled his clothes in really hot water to kill all the bacteria, lice and bugs he got as a POW and walking back home. He was in pretty bad shape but he survived fighting in several battles during the war and long marches and to engage in several battles in different states. He got a pension from his state after the war which we have his pension records.

We keep watch over his grave and have an American flag by his grave. The unit he served in is on his tombstone. We don't have a confederate flag by his grave. Only an American flag. I think we also have picture (or I think it was a painting that looks like a black and white photograph but it was really a painting but it was very accurate in how they looked at that time) of him and my great great great (or should I add another great in here) grandmother of both of them together. I look very much like her.

My reasons for banning the Confederate flag is because we are all Americans and the war was long over and settled. You have to look to the future. Not to mention, politically, the South was fighting to preserve the institutions of white supremacy such as slavery and the Confederate flag is offensive to many Americans (I personally find it offensive and ignorant). So, it stands to reason because we are all Americans (well, not everybody here is American but I say this to those who are American citizens) and the Confederate flag is offensive that it should be banned. We don't need something or anybody that is going to divide our country.


I think the overtones that the confederate flag has in US history is very controversial. The Mississippi state flag was the confederate flag. A scene from Mississippi Burning the movie:

Hatred is taught:

#15100527
It's time to let this sort of thing, or the celebration of it, go into the dustbin of history. General (later President) US Grant, President Lincoln, among many others in that time believed that these Southern men were traitors and rebels and that the Confederacy was an Insurrection not a true country, and I believe that they were correct to think that.

So get rid of their symbols and the symbols of their cause, with dignity and without hatred, because many good men fought for a bad cause unknowingly.
#15100545
@annatar1914

Now, I will say this. The Confederate government at that time had conscription just like the Union did. My Confederate ancestor didn't join the Confederate army right off the bat when the war started. He joined in 1863 at the time the Union Army was moving on his home county. Bear in mind, the Union Army did burn a lot of the industry down in Georgia. I can't say for sure what the Union army did in my ancestor's home county but they might have been stealing livestock and food from the local population, which is what I would have done if I were in the Union Army's shoes (forage on the enemy was a common Union army strategy at that time and a smart one).

But if I were in my Confederate ancestors shoes I probably would have been more likely to join the Confederate Army to defend home and family. After all, in order to keep the South in the Union, the Union had to invade the South. No common man likes to have his food and livestock taken from him by an invading occupying army and then his house burned down (it doesn't appear that my Confederate ancestor's house was burned down but who knows what happened during those times that the historians may or may not be aware of, some things are lost to the winds of time and history and are only known by the people who lived during those times).

Given the fact my Confederate ancestor didn't join the Confederate army until 1863 according to his records, we suspect he was likely conscripted and didn't volunteer. He was also probably willing to be conscripted and go and fight given that the Union army at the time was moving on his home county.

My Confederate ancestor had no control over whether his state seceded from the Union and I know he had a wife at the time and could have very well had children too at the time of his conscription though I can't say for sure if he had children. So, it's not so simple as to brand ALL confederate soldiers "traitors" given most had no control whether the South seceded from the Union or not. You also have to consider that if the shoe was on the other foot, Northern soldiers would have done the same thing if they were in similar circumstance and living down South as my Confederate ancestor. A lot of those Confederate soldiers ended up joining the Union army (or U.S. Army) after the war and fighting in the Indian wars out West.

You don't always get to choose which side of the war you fight on when a war breaks out. Know what I mean? Even though, politically, the Confederacy was fighting to preserve slavery, that doesn't necessarily mean ever soldier in the Confederate army was fighting for slavery. Some were, but not necessarily all of them. Some might have had different reasons for joining and fighting. Some of these reasons being simply to defend home and family from an occupying and invading Union army.
#15100604
Politics_Observer wrote:@annatar1914

Now, I will say this. The Confederate government at that time had conscription just like the Union did. My Confederate ancestor didn't join the Confederate army right off the bat when the war started. He joined in 1863 at the time the Union Army was moving on his home county. Bear in mind, the Union Army did burn a lot of the industry down in Georgia. I can't say for sure what the Union army did in my ancestor's home county but they might have been stealing livestock and food from the local population, which is what I would have done if I were in the Union Army's shoes (forage on the enemy was a common Union army strategy at that time and a smart one).

But if I were in my Confederate ancestors shoes I probably would have been more likely to join the Confederate Army to defend home and family. After all, in order to keep the South in the Union, the Union had to invade the South. No common man likes to have his food and livestock taken from him by an invading occupying army and then his house burned down (it doesn't appear that my Confederate ancestor's house was burned down but who knows what happened during those times that the historians may or may not be aware of, some things are lost to the winds of time and history and are only known by the people who lived during those times).

Given the fact my Confederate ancestor didn't join the Confederate army until 1863 according to his records, we suspect he was likely conscripted and didn't volunteer. He was also probably willing to be conscripted and go and fight given that the Union army at the time was moving on his home county.

My Confederate ancestor had no control over whether his state seceded from the Union and I know he had a wife at the time and could have very well had children too at the time of his conscription though I can't say for sure if he had children. So, it's not so simple as to brand ALL confederate soldiers "traitors" given most had no control whether the South seceded from the Union or not. You also have to consider that if the shoe was on the other foot, Northern soldiers would have done the same thing if they were in similar circumstance and living down South as my Confederate ancestor. A lot of those Confederate soldiers ended up joining the Union army (or U.S. Army) after the war and fighting in the Indian wars out West.

You don't always get to choose which side of the war you fight on when a war breaks out. Know what I mean? Even though, politically, the Confederacy was fighting to preserve slavery, that doesn't necessarily mean ever soldier in the Confederate army was fighting for slavery. Some were, but not necessarily all of them. Some might have had different reasons for joining and fighting. Some of these reasons being simply to defend home and family from an occupying and invading Union army.


I too have an ancestor on one side of my family that fought as a conscript for the Confederacy, as the saying went in the South; ''A rich man's war but a poor man's fight''. I have nothing but the highest regard for the men who did what they thought was right under difficult moral decisions that only seem clear to us who judge them from a comfortable remove in time...

I'm not speaking about them being Traitorous scum. I'm speaking about people like General Lee, offered command of all US forces to put down the rebellion early on but who refused his country's highest honor during it's greatest need for a man like him. I'm speaking about ''President Jefferson Davis'' of the ''CSA'', who was an honored US Senator, former Cabinet Official, and brilliant and talented man, who was sometimes ''personally opposed, but...'' to Slavery.... I'm speaking of his ''Vice-President of the CSA'' Alexander Stephens, who opposed secession initially for very sound reasons but who resolved in his famous ''Cornerstone Speech'' that the CSA would prevail and would build itself on the ''sure foundation'' of Slavery as a positive good for all concerned, that all men are not created equal, and possibly aren't quite as human after all (paraphrasing and contracting the main idea of the speech);

https://www.owleyes.org/text/the-corner ... ch#root-46

Harry Jaffa, eminent Historian, once said of Stephens speech;


''Stephens's prophecy of the Confederacy's future resembles nothing so much as Hitler's prophecies of the Thousand-Year Reich. Nor are their theories very different.''


Anyway, those men are the traitors, the leadership of the ''Confederate States of America''. The only main one worth a damn was Confederate General Longstreet, who became a Unionist and Republican after the Civil War and supported Reconstruction...

The rest of the Confederate leadership were no good and no longer deserve further praise or covert rehabilitation by good Southern men as if they were ''heroes''.
#15100610
The "Confederate flag" is the flag of traitors and proponents of slavery/racism. It also the flag of losers. It should only be found in a museum.

Real Confederate flag:
Image

Racist 1960's version of a CFS battle flag, used to promote racism, by white supremacists:
Image
By Rich
#15100623
Should people be allowed to call themselves "The Young Turks"?

Should people be allowed to call themselves "The Young Turks" even though for many people this is a symbol of genocide, even though that name is so deeply offensive and hurtful to many? My answer is a resounding yes. Did I support the right of people to fly the Black banner in the immediate aftermath of 9/11, most certainly. In fact I would have joyfully supported the killing of bigots in order to defend people's right to fly the Black Banner in the immediate aftermath of 9/11. Perhaps more pertinently I supported the right of people to burn the American Flag in the immediate aftermath of 9/11.

I bring this up because people on the forum, both ordinary posters and moderators continually try and paint me as some sort of right wing conservative. I can tell you for sure my message wasn't popular with Conservatives back then. After 9/11 I never gave one inch, not one inch, to the idea that Americans sensitivities should be respected. The whole of our media was taken over after 9/11, with one simple message, "American lives Matter." And my retort was "not to me they don't". No all I wanted to talk about after 9/11 was how glorious Churchill's firebombing of cities was, how attacks against civilian buildings were a totally legitimate tactic of war, and how utterly pathetic and hysterical American's response was to these pin prick attacks.
#15100636
Tainari88 wrote:This debate taking place in a Shawnee Mission East High School history class is quite interesting:

There is a young man there that has a black T-shirt that uses a computer that has a lot of historical information. He makes great arguments against keeping the Confederate flag flying and getting rid of it.

Do you agree or not? Why? Elaborate. Please try to avoid one-line responses.

I believe it is a free speech matter for individuals as a couple students mentioned. I would not prohibit any freedom of expression. It could be a Nazi symbol or a "Black Lives Matter" banner. I am from the South and don't personally have any desire to display any of those in anyway. But I believe it should be allowed for those that do. I have only displayed the standard American Flag.

I don't believe the Confederate flag was created to represent slavery anymore than the American flag was created to represent defeating the native Americans.

I believe it should be clear to most people that have taken American history that the American flag was first created to represent the 13 original colonies that became a new nation by gaining freedom from Great Britain. Of course the flag has changed over time with the colonies becoming states and as more states were added until now there are 50 stars with the 13 strips representing the 13 original colonies.

In a similar manner of freedom, the Confederate flag was created to represent the new nation of the Confederate States of America in the South that seceded from the North. It also contained red, white, and blue with stars in a circle representing the states and was called the "stars and bars." Those stars increased quickly from the original 7 to 9 to 11 to 13 as more states joined. On the battlefield, it looked too much like the Union Flag of the North, so a battle flag was created with cross bars that was never the national flag of the Southern Confederacy. Today, it is that battle flag that so many people object from being flown in public or painted on racing cars in NASCAR.

It has gotten so crazy now that they want ban showing reruns of "The Dukes of Hazard" because they have a car with that Confederate Battle Flag painted on their car. The history teachers must be teaching the young people a lot of crazy stuff for them to want to try to erase history by destroying everything they think is racist.
#15100639
I'm from Europe. And until recently, this flag was associated with rebellion, monster trucks and hot chicks like Daisy Duke. No one ever really thought about anything bad when they saw this flag on the Dukes of Hazzard or somewhere on the market. Whatever it may have meant in the past, a new meaning was given to this flag.
#15100646
Tainari88 wrote:Do you agree or not? Why? Elaborate.

Generally, the entire debate is a misdirection (and thereby a massive time waster) to prevent people from addressing real issues, like unemployment, broken families, drugs, health care, etc. A lot of the political establishment has been reduced to creating emotional distress and resolving it based on issues that generally do not add any substantive value to people's lives. A related issue is the effort to rename military bases like Fort Bragg, because Bragg was a confederate officer. I'm sort of a military history buff, and I did not know that. When I think of confederate officers, I think of Robert E. Lee, J.E.B. Stuart, Thomas "Stonewall" Jackson, Nathan Bedford Forrest, P.G.T. Beauregard, and James Longstreet. I never once studied Brixton Bragg or John Hood. It would never have even occurred to me that Fort Bragg or Fort Hood were named for confederate generals, and I don't think people who are bothered by this are altogether very sincere since these are not really substantive issues that make a material difference in people's lives. So it is, in effect, a ploy by the establishment to say "We hear you," and make a basically meaningless change while sustaining policies that depress wages and outsource jobs while making people feel like they have a real voice in policy matters when they don't.

Wat0n wrote:Personally, being a foreigner, this debate obviously doesn't raise my passions it raises among Americans, but I do believe the Confederate flag is a symbol of slavery and hatred and would not fly it myself (although since I'm not a citizen, I don't feel comfortable flying the US flag either!).

It generally doesn't raise passions organically in Americans either. It is a manufactured passion to direct people away from addressing substantive economic issues. Generally, the stars and bars don't specifically represent racism or white supremacy. It represents the states that seceded from the union during the Civil War.

Why the US Civil War matters is that it was the first modern war. It is to this day the bloodiest war America has ever fought. A lot of why Europeans lost so many lives in WWI is that their generals didn't study the US civil war. Additionally, union tactics employed by people like William Tecumseh Sherman are considered war crimes today. So the union was not blameless and covered in glory. They did some pretty shameful things too.

Consider Arlington National Cemetery and the Third Amendment to the United States Constitution--the Bill of Rights. What is Arlington? It was Robert E. Lee's house and plantation. Did the union army quarter troops in someone's house? Yep. They not only did that, they took his property and made it a national cemetery and didn't compensate him for it in violation of the Fifth Amendment. A lot of the Civil War amendments were passed by Southern legislatures at the point of union guns, not popular will.

Have you ever missed a deadline? Do you know where that term arises? Civil War prison camps. They didn't have the resources to put up walls or palisades for makeshift prisons, so they had lines. If you crossed the line, there would be consequences. If you crossed the "dead line", they simply shot and killed you. We use terms today like deadline without thinking of the US Civil War.

A lot of people participate in Civil War battle re-enactments as well. As much as General Lee was revered in the South, he was not as modern and forward-thinking a general as someone like Thomas "Stonewall" Jackson. There are a lot of Civil War firsts that are worth exploring if you are a history buff.

Wat0n wrote:The main reason against flying it there is its other, most obvious meaning: It represents separatism from the United States and as such there's absolutely no reason for the government to fly flags representing the end of the Union.

So now you understand why some people want it flown.

Tainari88 wrote:It is true what that young man stated--most Southerners were not slave owners in the South. Most white Southerners were poor and did not own slaves.

This is why arguments about white supremacy and reparations are basically a lie. The overwhelming majority of white people did not own slaves, and with the huge influx of immigration from Europe in the late 19th and early 20th Centuries, most white Americans have no connection to slavery at all.

Tainari88 wrote:So the landed wealthy created codes that were made a law to prevent the unity of the white indentured servants and black slaves.

Right. Think of the extant riots. Trump threatened to invoke the Insurrection Act. What constrains him? The Posse Commitatus Act. It requires the governor of the state to consent to using federal troops in a state. It was passed to thwart the federal government from using US troops in the South. Do you know why the response to Hurricane Katrina really got botched? It wasn't George W. Bush. It was Louisiana governor Kathleen Blanco's refusal to consent to having US federal troops in Louisiana. FEMA could not deploy until she gave consent. That's why the response in Mississippi and Alabama went so much smoother than in Louisiana.

Tainari88 wrote:The serfs weren't property like with slaves but they had extremely limited rights and it was within a context of rigid class structures.

Not unlike illegal aliens.

Tainari88 wrote:You must study all that in depth to understand what motivated such a bloody civil war.

Yes, and when you do, you come to realize why Donald Trump won the presidency. He took the side of working class voters. That's why the establishment cries "racism" to try to divide the working classes against each other.

Politics_Observer wrote:My reasons for banning the Confederate flag is because we are all Americans and the war was long over and settled.

So kill off freedom of expression, huh?

Politics_Observer wrote:So, it stands to reason because we are all Americans (well, not everybody here is American but I say this to those who are American citizens) and the Confederate flag is offensive that it should be banned.

If you are opposing freedom of expression under the First Amendment, you are basically opposing classical liberal values and the underpinnings of democracy--pretty much the very foundation of America. If you cannot express certain views, democracy becomes pointless. That's more or less what the establishment wants.

Politics_Observer wrote:We don't need something or anybody that is going to divide our country.

Banning freedom of expression is definitely going to divide the country.

annatar1914 wrote:It's time to let this sort of thing, or the celebration of it, go into the dustbin of history. General (later President) US Grant, President Lincoln, among many others in that time believed that these Southern men were traitors and rebels and that the Confederacy was an Insurrection not a true country, and I believe that they were correct to think that.

With it goes some of the memory of the sins of the Union too along with core American values like freedom of expression and freedom of thought. If you don't know your history, you are doomed to repeat it.

Politics_Observer wrote:Bear in mind, the Union Army did burn a lot of the industry down in Georgia.

They also burned peoples homes, stole their food, etc. Sherman's march is considered a war crime today.

Politics_Observer wrote:I can't say for sure what the Union army did in my ancestor's home county but they might have been stealing livestock and food from the local population, which is what I would have done if I were in the Union Army's shoes (forage on the enemy was a common Union army strategy at that time and a smart one).

... and it's also considered a war crime.

annatar1914 wrote:I'm not speaking about them being Traitorous scum. I'm speaking about people like General Lee, offered command of all US forces to put down the rebellion early on but who refused his country's highest honor during it's greatest need for a man like him. I'm speaking about ''President Jefferson Davis'' of the ''CSA'', who was an honored US Senator, former Cabinet Official, and brilliant and talented man, who was sometimes ''personally opposed, but...'' to Slavery.... I'm speaking of his ''Vice-President of the CSA'' Alexander Stephens, who opposed secession initially for very sound reasons but who resolved in his famous ''Cornerstone Speech'' that the CSA would prevail and would build itself on the ''sure foundation'' of Slavery as a positive good for all concerned, that all men are not created equal, and possibly aren't quite as human after all (paraphrasing and contracting the main idea of the speech);

Right. This is why we should not be asking children to 1) be hopelessly ignorant of the war and its consequences, and 2) telling them that giving up their first amendment rights is some sort of virtue when clearly it is not. If the Southern states want to change their state flags, they should do it. However, people should not lose their first amendment rights in service of political correctness. Once gone, we will have to kill one hell of a lot of people to get it back.

Mark Dice does a wonderful job of showing how stupid young people are:


Rich wrote:Should people be allowed to call themselves "The Young Turks" even though for many people this is a symbol of genocide, even though that name is so deeply offensive and hurtful to many? My answer is a resounding yes.

My answer too. Yes. It's classical liberalism.

Hindsite wrote:I don't believe the Confederate flag was created to represent slavery anymore than the American flag was created to represent defeating the native Americans.

Right. The debate and the gravity with which people hold it is a sad illustration of how stupid our young people are today.

Hindsite wrote:It has gotten so crazy now that they want ban showing reruns of "The Dukes of Hazard" because they have a car with that Confederate Battle Flag painted on their car. The history teachers must be teaching the young people a lot of crazy stuff for them to want to try to erase history by destroying everything they think is racist.

Right. It's as I say just a ploy to keep people from talking about substantive issues and dividing the working classes.
#15100689
@blackjack21 wrote:
Right. It's as I say just a ploy to keep people from talking about substantive issues and dividing the working classes.


I do agree with this statement. The problems I have with you is your love of dodging the purposes of capitalism in creating class systems Blackjack21. For me what is the purpose of creating class systems within a capitalist framework? Why do the elites create laws that consolidate their positions and dedicate themselves to divide and conquer tactics within the working class? For you, it is a natural system that nature has. No, it is not. It never has been. It is based on economic and social constructs that over time lose their flexibility and adaptability as human societies evolve and change over time. They have to be discarded and replaced. Replacement is about what the context is for the human practices at a specific historical time period. It uses the purposes of the production methods that are in place and changes according to the needs of that society. Needs and wants are two separate things.

Anyway, I disagree with your nationalism Blackjack. I think you are class conscious, a snob, and much worse than that. So your suggestions for human society are not based on empiricism. It is based on class privileges. It will be horrific for African Americans, Latinos, and others who are not from your background. You think humans are about self-serving crap. That is your value system BJ. It is horrific to think a society can be run by narcissistic selfish hijos de su madre who only think about themselves. Imagine a society run by a bunch of self-centered drug addicts and no one going to work every day and making the society productive? A horror.

Human societies are actually functional due to the majority of human beings wanting cooperation, wanting to serve and wanting to help and wanting to do a good job and be useful to their fellow human beings. If it weren't for our communal and great need to connect to each other in a meaningful way? The world would be terrible and dysfunctional for human societies.

Alienation is something that many human beings suffer through in many human societies. Have you heard of the Man-boo cafe people in Japan? ALIENATION in a big city. It is not good BJ. One has to have connections or one suffers in human societies all over the world. Big cities and alienation go hand in hand many times. Smaller towns have much less of that.



In terms of the confederate flag? Again Bacon's Rebellion. Look it up BJ. It stated that indentured servants and black slaves in the 17th century in colonial-era America was about preventing the unity of white and black bonded or slave servitude. Slavery existed for thousands of years in many societies. It was not about skin color it was about the need for the elite to have access to labor without having to lose power, control, or wealth in the process of it. It has not changed that much. The plutocracy in the USA now in 2020 doesn't want to lose power, wealth, or control. So they throw up the bullshit distractions as usual.

If I believed your 'standards' about my genes and my family's ethnic group? Never get out of poverty and never get educations is what would result. You are horrible in that BJ. Do you know how many people who are African or racially mixed or Latin American or Asian or Indian are wasted due to some foolish crap about your race and intelligence is all homogenous and your 'group' is destined to lose in a hierarchy made up by some plutocrats who control laws and feel threatened by these 'minorities'?

No, I will never agree with such limited and unjust thoughts. NEVER.
#15100690
Code Rood wrote:I'm from Europe. And until recently, this flag was associated with rebellion, monster trucks and hot chicks like Daisy Duke. No one ever really thought about anything bad when they saw this flag on the Dukes of Hazzard or somewhere on the market. Whatever it may have meant in the past, a new meaning was given to this flag.

White supremacists and black people don't seem to agree with your assessment :lol: .

The stupid flag has no role in any official goverement/federal-sponsored building or activity. It is as if we started raising the Nazi flag on our city concil or the ISIS flag in the state capitol. Putting that stupid flag in the proximity of the United State's flag is an insult.

That being said, whatever the individual wants to do in their private property, so long as they are not harming anyone else... as despicable as it might be... should not be prohibited.
If xenophobe/racists/supremacists wants to put their stupid flag in their front porch, go ahead. Let him show the whole world what a fucking bigot he is, that serves as a warning for the rest of the human beings not to interact with said assholes.

As for big companies/events... same shit applies. If Elton John (some hypothetical random dude) wants to fly the stupid flag on his concert, so long as it is not sponsored by US goverment money, he should be able to.. That does not mean that fans have to accept it.

Same shit with monuments. If you want to put a stupid statue of someone that fought for slaves, a traitor/enemy/etc in your porch, go fucking ahead. But don't use fucking federal money paid by taxes, by citizen of the UNITED STATES, to fund the creation and/or maintenance of statues of people that fought against the united states to keep blacks as slaves....
#15100735
Tainari88 wrote:The problems I have with you is your love of dodging the purposes of capitalism in creating class systems Blackjack21.

Capitalism isn't about creating class systems. I point out regularly why communism devolves into class systems of party members, non party members, party elite and so forth. That is human nature. The Communist Manifesto clearly calls for an end to what communism pretty much always produces, because pecking orders are inherent in nature. Capitalism isn't about creating rigid class structures. The US Revolutionary War and the US Civil War were about abolishing classes, not creating them.

Tainari88 wrote:Why do the elites create laws that consolidate their positions and dedicate themselves to divide and conquer tactics within the working class? For you, it is a natural system that nature has.

Where do you see in The Wealth of Nations that it is an ideal to create a class system? I don't disagree with you on the empirical aspects, but on the ideological aspects. Capitalism does not call for creating a caste system.

Tainari88 wrote:I think you are class conscious, a snob, and much worse than that.

Indeed, but it is primarily because of some fiction you created in your head.

Tainari88 wrote:That is your value system BJ.

That is my observation, not my value system. It wouldn't occur to you that I paid $200 to a medical doctor today for someone else's medical needs who could not afford it, because that is not the little cartoon of me that you created in your head.

Tainari88 wrote:If I believed your 'standards' about my genes and my family's ethnic group?

IQ simply talks to a central tendency, not an absolute. You may choose to ignore it, but it doesn't go away if you do, nor does it become absolute. It's merely a central tendency.
#15100758
@blackjack21 , when I said that these Rebel's statues should come down and the memory of the Rebellion forgotten except as something to learn never to do again, you replied;


With it goes some of the memory of the sins of the Union too along with core American values like freedom of expression and freedom of thought. If you don't know your history, you are doomed to repeat it.


I do not believe in unrestricted ''freedom of expression'' or ''freedom of thought''. This to me once again shows why American political categories make no sense, and I say that as an American. Is your position truly ''Conservative'' or ''Right-Wing'', or in the world outside the USA is it something an Anarchist might say? (or someone close to Anarchism in political thought)


And when I said;

''annatar1914 wrote:
I'm not speaking about them being Traitorous scum. I'm speaking about people like General Lee, offered command of all US forces to put down the rebellion early on but who refused his country's highest honor during it's greatest need for a man like him. I'm speaking about ''President Jefferson Davis'' of the ''CSA'', who was an honored US Senator, former Cabinet Official, and brilliant and talented man, who was sometimes ''personally opposed, but...'' to Slavery.... I'm speaking of his ''Vice-President of the CSA'' Alexander Stephens, who opposed secession initially for very sound reasons but who resolved in his famous ''Cornerstone Speech'' that the CSA would prevail and would build itself on the ''sure foundation'' of Slavery as a positive good for all concerned, that all men are not created equal, and possibly aren't quite as human after all (paraphrasing and contracting the main idea of the speech);''


You replied;


Right. This is why we should not be asking children to 1) be hopelessly ignorant of the war and its consequences, and 2) telling them that giving up their first amendment rights is some sort of virtue when clearly it is not. If the Southern states want to change their state flags, they should do it. However, people should not lose their first amendment rights in service of political correctness. Once gone, we will have to kill one hell of a lot of people to get it back.


Insurrection, sedition and conspiracy to secede, is not covered in my opinion under the First Amendment, or should not be. And so sympathy with the same implies a second attempt at some future date ''if need be'' by persons who'd love to set up a later-day regime with the CSA as an honored historical antecedent. History shows that this is not an impossible scenario, even after over 150 years, and so I do not believe it is covered by the First Amendment and is a violation of the spirit if not the letter of Article Four Section 4 of the US Constitution;


''Article 4 - The States Section 4 - Republican Government The United States shall guarantee to every State in this Union a Republican Form of Government, and shall protect each of them against Invasion; and on Application of the Legislature , or of the Executive (when the Legislature cannot be convened) against domestic Violence. ''


Mark Dice does a wonderful job of showing how stupid young people are:


Most people are stupid, whether they are good or evil, and young people are always stupid almost by definition. I was. Hard times cures people of the worst excesses, as long as they are under a strong government that has their better interests at heart.
#15100768
annatar1914 wrote:Is your position truly ''Conservative'' or ''Right-Wing'', or in the world outside the USA is it something an Anarchist might say?

It's more conservative than right wing. Leftists think "right wing" sounds more scary and deranged so they use that a lot. Apparently, NBC activists contacted Google to get advertising banned on The Federalist (a conservative outlet) and ZeroHedge (a libertarian outlet) by characterizing them as "far right wing," when they are anything but that.

annatar1914 wrote:Insurrection, sedition and conspiracy to secede, is not covered in my opinion under the First Amendment, or should not be.

Secession is allowed under the constitution, it just takes 2/3rds of the state legislature and the federal legislature. So campaigning for secession is firmly within freedom of thought and freedom of expression. Insurrection is not. Sedition is more of a gray area.

annatar1914 wrote:History shows that this is not an impossible scenario, even after over 150 years, and so I do not believe it is covered by the First Amendment and is a violation of the spirit if not the letter of Article Four Section 4 of the US Constitution;

The confederacy was a democratic republic. It wasn't totalitarian at all. It was just classically racist, which was nothing novel or unconstitutional at that time.

Oh, so now you don't believe Amit Soussana, @Pant[…]

Oh please post those too :lol: Very obvious p[…]

No, it does not. It is governed by the rather vagu[…]

@KurtFF8 Litwin wages a psyops war here but we[…]