Stars and Bars forever! I am a Yankee from the northern Rockies and I can aprreciate the the average southererner’s struggle. I do however think the planter class was a bunch of self-serving a$$holes.
Some were, some weren’t. It’s a conflict that goes back to the colonial era. Most of the soldiers fighting really had no use for planter society and owned no slaves. But, State was more akin to Nation in that era, and honor dictated that you answer when your people call. Doesn’t make sense to very many now, but that’s how it was.