The Confederate Flag

I do not want to start a huge flame war or get to controversial but I do want to bring up some points people seem to miss when talking about the racism with the confederate flag. Also I am not stating any of my personal opinions towards this matter just bring facts to the issue.

1. Did you know only 3% of Confederate Soldiers owned slaves?
2. In fact there were plenty of Union Soldiers who owned slaves as well
3. For example, Did you know that the Robert E Lee, (The General for the South) released all his slaves before the Civil War but Ulysses S Grant, (Head of the Union), waited until the war was over until he released his slaves.
4. In fact Robert E Lee's birth family never owned any slaves, it was his wives family who owned slaves so he just merely was married into having slaves.

The main point I am trying to make isn't that the confederate flag is okay but the South weren't the complete bad guys in the Civil War. Schools now a days just teach it to show the Union as the heros and the south as the villians.

 

I agree, (with what you said, I'm adding onto it) the Confederate Flag started a lot of controversy over literally nothing.
The flag itself is a rebel flag, (and a battle flag) and this was the flag of the Confederacy when it capitulated:

I will bring facts to this POV to this also.
The Confederate Flag was not even the C.S.A's national flag (albeit it is included in it).
It was the battle flag the soldiers' carried into battle.
It does not represent racism, that is my point, infact, none of their flags symbolize racism or slavery.
That is all, really.

 

I actually have to disagree with you there. It represented a deep racism. I don't really need to sit here and simply explain that the south fought for slavery, now do I? Instead, I'm going to highlight the treatment of these slaves by referencing books written about the subject during the time. Take some good reads such as "Uncle Tom's Cabin", "Narrative of The Life of Fredrick Douglass", and "Twelve Years a Slave". In summary, the slaves were treated like animals. When a society treats a race as inferior, they believe themselves to be superior, creating racism. You can't really sit there and say that the confederate flag doesn't represent racism when the CSA fough for slavery. A slavery where the slaves were treated as inferior, which regurgetates my point above.

The confederate flag does represent racism. The CSA fought for slavery, which the behavior from said slavery created racism. I just wanted to point out that incorrect statement.

 

No, that is the ideology of the people. The flag itself isn't racist. I never said that I endorsed the C.S.A. (I'm not saying that you said I did, but I wanted to point that out)

You stating facts that I already know, I'm just pointing out a misconception.
But people are still going to have a biased opinion against me, but at this point I don't care. *cough:*

 

The south were pretty convinced the North were fully set out to destroy their way of life. Slavery was what their nation thrived off of (because of cotton) and racism wasn't set in there then.

When Lincoln was elected president, the South seceded. Lincoln actually did his best to avoid war, talking to the South as basically "close friends."

But actually the south started getting ready for a war. Despite Lincolns efforts, the South had a big hand in the start of the war (other than the thousands of Northerners who were against their "way of life" [Abolitionists])

 

Wrong wrong more wrong.
The south fought over State's Rights.
And other conflicts led up to the tensions between in the North and South.
No flames but the states should have been able to seceded. It's called liberty. Something the Nation was founded on.
Uncle Tom's Cabin was based more over emotions than facts.
Fredrick's book was fact and true, all slaves around the world then and now has felt the brutality of it.
I do not know much about the 12 years book.
And you are right. Slaves in any society with Slaves has the Superior/inferior dynamic.
It was fueled by economics. That is the reason why they had them. They wanted them because indentured servants were running out of supply and able to be free. So they turned to the Dutch/other slave traders for slaves for life. This was pure economics with prejudice mixed in most likely and more so post-slavery.

The Confederate flag =/= Slavery

It means a far more Libertarian society vs an Authoritarian society = CSA vs Union

Racist/Racism was also created by Bolshevik Revolutionists to bully the locals of the Areas they targeted into complying with their Communist regime. Which country afterwards caused mass genocides IE halodomor. Which was the forced and planned starvation of millions of Russian lives.
It was not a word used before hand.

I do not endorse the CSA but they should be able to seced if they are able to.

 

Yes the slaves were treated terribly and in unimaginable ways but you see you are wrong to think it was ONLY the confederacy that owned slaves. They didn't fight only because of slavery. That just seems to be the highlighted point of view in today's schools but in fact that wasn't the major point of conflict.

 

The thing for the South was, the Civil War was a poor man's (most people) fight and a rich man's (plantation owners') war. In addition, there was a draft. The poor people were therefore forced to fight for the rich people. I think the Confederate flag demonstrates their diligence despite disgusting circumstances.

 

The 1-3% eternally fugging us

 

Well 5 union states did permit slavery in addition to the bigger wealth of the Union soldiers.

 

The confederate flag wasn't a "racist" flag. It doesn't even symbolize slavery like people are saying, lets be real here for a second ... If the flag was shown to symbolize slavery they would put a white guy cracking a whip at a black man, or something like that. The flag was just to symbolize the south and how they lived. Yes the slaves where treated awful but it still doesn't symbolize slavery.

 

Your logic is terrible . So just cause the Nazi symbol doesn't have a picture of gas chambers and piles of dead people, it can't represent the Holocaust and all the terrible things the Nazis did?

 

No it doesn't represent the holocaust its the Nazi armys symbol not what they did to the jewish and many more.

 

Yea it's the army symbol. And the army did many bad things including attempted genocide. How in the world can the army symbol not represent terrible racism and not be a reminder of an attempted genocide?

States rights were the issue that caused the Confederate States to exist and that issue was mainly based on Lincoln's known agenda to end slavery. The southern states didn't want the government to tell them how to live their lives, and by that they meant take away their slaves they needed to have a functioning plantation. So yes the Confederate flag represents a counter view to ending slavery.

Wholy crap man, please go around with a swastika on your arm and just tell people you're only just a fan of the Nazi army not the murdering that went down. I'm sure people will be fine.

 

Okay I can see how some may find the Confederate Flag to be offensive but please explain to me why anything named after Robert E Lee is trying to be taken down. Washington and Lee University has had some dispute on wether or not to remove Robert E Lee's name and call it just Washington University. That is just one example but what is so bad about Robert E Lee? His family didn't own slaves and he let his wife's slaves free before the Civil War evan began. And Ulysses S Grant had slaves until the end of the Civil war but gets his head on the $50 bill. So why is Robert E Lee so bad??

 

I agree with you there. It's not bad at all

 

I am a southerner and I think the confederate flag is the symbol of the south. Not a symbol that blacks are inferior to whites or a symbol slavery is right when its clearly not. Here's an example okay? You seem to be a bit confused. The us flag represents the united stated that shows pride and honor of the country. The confederate flag shows pride and honor of people in the south. I know many black people that fly the confederate flag in their yard.

 

Okay I can respect and understand that. Though you should know that not all people use the flag the way you do. Though what you said about the Nazi symbol made no sense. Gonna stop there because the thread's not about that.

 

Im saying it symbolized the army not what they did. Like the confederate flag symbolizes the south not what they did to slaves. Get what I mean?