Call it legal but offensive driving

Commercial Appeal ^ | February 5, 2004 | Wendi C. Thomas

[stainlessbanner]

Call it legal but offensive driving

By Wendi C. Thomas
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February 5, 2004

The Sons of Confederate Veterans is the latest group in Tennessee to get a specialty license plate, one that includes the Confederate flag logo.

The license plates remind me of a T-shirt I had in college that said: "It's a Black Thing, You Wouldn't Understand."

It was an accouterment of my militant phase, when I taped a poster of Malcolm X to my dorm room wall, when I badgered the university in a futile attempt to get it to divest from South Africa, when my friends laughingly dubbed me "Wendela."

My mom wasn't too fond of the "It's a Black Thing" shirt. She worried that others, mainly white people, would see the shirt and think I was a racist.

Any assumption would be unfair, I argued. Clearly, I'm much more than a pithy saying on a piece of cotton, and I had no time for those who would reduce me to a slogan.

I dismissed the conversation as yet another piece of evidence in the case of Wise Young Wendi vs. Woefully Out-of-Touch Mom.

After my indignation faded, as it usually did, I was left with a question.

Was this shirt and its message so important to me that I was willing to risk being labeled, at the least, indifferent to the feelings of white people, and, at worst, a racist?

I decided that no, it wasn't that important. And I got rid of the shirt. I knew it probably would make many white people uncomfortable. And while the comfort of white people wasn't and still isn't my chief concern, it could stifle any honest conversations about race between my classmates and me.

Any reaction my T-shirt provoked is tame compared with the visceral gut-punch many have at the sight of the Confederate flag.

So I have a question for the Sons of Confederate Veterans and others who will spend an extra $35 on these Confederate-flag emblazoned plates.

Is this flag so important to you that you'll risk being seen as, at the least, incredibly insensitive to black people, and, at the worst, a racist?

In the flag's defense, the SCV's Tennessee Division commander Skip Earle of Franklin told The Associated Press, "We have really changed people's minds on what people think the flag stands for."

No, commander, you haven't. When I - and most people - see the flag, it reminds them of a time when people who looked like the Sons of Confederate Veterans could own people who looked like me.

Worse, the flag has been co-opted by white supremacy groups, while those who claim the flag is merely an emblem of a fight for states' rights look away, their hands stuck in the pockets of their Wranglers.

I believe the SCV has a right to these plates, just as I had a right to wear my T-shirt.

And I have to believe that those who hold this emblem so dear are aware of the risks - the chance that others will see them, see the flag, and wonder if they're a white supremacist or a prejudiced wacko.

And that's a risk they're more than willing to take.

Contact Wendi C. Thomas at (901) 529-5896 or send an e-mail.

[Capriole]

Well, Stainless, you know I am behind you. I've posted this info before on other threads, but thought it could stand to be reiterated here:

I live in Maryland, in the most liberal county of that highly liberal state. Things might be different if I lived just a few miles away in Virginia, but I'm stuck here for the moment, and I see some of my role here as educating people. Instead of flying the Confederate Naval Jack (the so-called Battleflag), I display the First National, also called the Stars and Bars. To me this is an important symbol of pride in my Southern, Confederate heritage without creating the anger that makes conversation impossible. People of all races often ask me what those decals on my car and that flag hanging from my house mean, and this begins a conversation that often opens their eyes.

I do understand the impulse to display our beloved Naval Jack on license plates and other places, but this is the route I choose to get people feeling less threatened so that maybe in the future they won't react with such hysteria when they see us fully take pride in our rightful Southern heritage.

[Enterprise]

Janet Jackson should have used that line. "Yeah, I showed my breast. It's a black thang. You wouldn't understand."

[Blood of Tyrants]

And perhaps the worst of all, the rainbow, the symbol of God's promise to never flood the world again, has been stolen by the fudgepackers.

[MissAmericanPie]

What a simpleton. The confederate flag is symbolic of something totally different to others. Her t-shirt was a clear message to all. Why should other's who view the flag as part of their history, heritage, and hold it in rememberance of their ancestors that died in that war set it aside because she CHOOSES to be offended. Who cares what she thinks?

[thoughtomator]

Looks like the author is still a racist. And yes, "It's a black thing, you wouldn't understand" is racist.

[Iwo Jima]

Can I get me a tee shirt which says "it's a southern thing, you wouldn't understand"?

[Criminal Number 18F]

Why do these people yearn for a time when "insensitivity" will be against the law?

Bud, I don't see her arguing that it should be illegal. She's arguing that it's in poor taste -- like her t-shirt. (I've seen a t-shirt that's in even worse taste, which was a backlash against the one she had in school).

You can agree with her or not. (I don't think I have a vote in this, I am a Yankee whose ancestors were all still overseas in 1865, so the deep feeling on both sides over the confederate battle flag doesn't really connect). But she isn't calling for a law against the plates, or the flag, for that matter. I think he's being pretty reasonable.

A lot of people are unaware of just how bad slavery really was. As Clayton Cramer points out, only one state passed a law against masters raping their slaves. Mississippi. In 1859. And, oh, yeah, that was only if she was under 12. In the rest of the slave states (including Union Maryland for example), and at all other times, raping your slaves, even children, was droit du seigneur. A peculiar institution indeed.

I don't think I'm indulging in political correctness here. It's morally wrong now, but it was morally wrong then. And I have to believe that in their hearts even those who defended it knew it.

For the flag ever to mean anything, the SCV and others that would display it need to find a way to separate the inspiration of Lee and Jackson, and the heroism of the Southern soldier, from the institution that was at the core of all the war's issues.

d.o.l.

Criminal Number 18F

[Jeff Gordon]

re: Confederate Flag

It is White Thing. You would not understand.

[stainlessbanner]

There are plenty in the pc crowd who would like to outlaw symbols, words, flags, etc. Some laws exist already: hate crime, hate speech.....

The author injected race into the license plate issue where it not need be. It is a piece void of historical facts or reason - just filler based on emotion. I'll bet she couldn't tell you many stars are even on the flag.

[MissAmericanPie]

I'm tired of this rediculous behaviour on the part of the mentally insane liberals. What? Entire swaths of history are to be erased to appease a few cry babies via Federal fiat?

Alot of Americans don't like to see the German swastika, but they don't attempt to enforce their view of it by bullying those that want to wear it. But you can bet if patriotic Americans demanded the Fed erase it from our sight we would be called intolerant and attempting to deny someone their free expression. It's time to throw down this double standard that seeks to strip Americans of every vistage of their culture and history.

[MissAmericanPie]

College is just something standing between you and your future. Get through it. Many kids come out of their stupor the first time they get a paycheck and see what a bite was taken out of it in taxes.

You are not alone, but you are rare. Most people you will encounter don't even vote or think about politics or where the nation is heading. Join a conservative group and work for change, one issue at a time.

[Sonny M]

Whats the difference between the different confederate flags?

If you could post a link showing the different confederate flags, I'd really appreciate it.

[Capriole]

Sonny, I don't have a clue how to post pictures, let's ask Stainless to do it. Briefly, what is called "the Battleflag" and is the source of so much anger and division is the flag we all associate with the Confederacy--the diagonally-crossed bars bearing the seven white stars representing the seven states of the original Confederacy. However, the First National flag of the Confederacy was actually pretty similar to the US flag: a blue canton with stars on it for the states, and three horizontal bars, red and white and red. Trouble is, this flag was too easily confused with the US flag on the battlefield, with some unfortunate results. So there were subsequent modifications--the Stainless Banner, the Third National (which hardly got used), some folks used the Bonnie Blue (a blue flag with a single white star), etc.

[PistolPaknMama]

Hatchet?

What's with that little hatchet thingy?
That little "hatchet thingy" is a labyris, a double-bladed axe supposedly carried into battle by ancient female warriors. It has close associations with the Greek goddesses Artemis and Demeter and with the Amazons, a tribe of women renowned for their fearlessness in combat. Today, lesbians wear labyrises (labyrii?) on chains or earrings to symbolize power, strength, and female unity. Oh, and to tip off other lesbians about our sexual orientation.

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/lesbian_issues/89854

[PistolPaknMama]

See post 37. :-)

[doodad]

Ok thanks. I have never seen that despite the climate around here. Lots of pink triangles and that = sign thing, but no hatchets. I guess I haven't been down to Little Five Points in a long time.

[PistolPaknMama]

Go here....tons of info for you!

http://www.confederateflags.org/