This story reminds me of a theory I've had for years: that (some) people who identify with a certain group (whites, blacks, latinos, Evengelical Christians, Muslims, etc) exhibit symbols and figures to express their hatred of others or their frustration with their station in life (more perseption than reality). These symbols (or symbolic behaviors) are expressed, by many, in leau of threatening others, outright discrimination they wish were publicly acceptable or outright violence itself.
Our society is a civil one, and most of us don't wish to see it Balkanized, by I sense there are those among us who would cheer if another bloody civil war broke out or if Al'Qaeda had pulled off more 9-11s and killed more Americans. Some examples:
1. Rap artists praising bin-Laden and Al'Qaeda following 9-11, and my own personal observations (and reports I read)of US Muslims cheering as the towers in NYC fell....
2. A conservative state lawmaker (whose name escapes me) stating that McVeigh's hit on the Oklahoma City Fed. Bldg. expressed the sentiments of many on the right who hate the government....
3. Bumper stickers like "If I'd known then, what I know now, I would've picked my own cotton" next to a sticker displaying the Waffen SS emblem....or "I love Farrakahn" or "David Duke for President" obviously displayed by those who wouldn't be out protesting if the violence that both advocate suddenly broke out....
4. Hatred of American and the Stars and Stripes I personally witnessed, and tried to stop during a parade, when several Puerto Rican teens pulled down US Flags and in place hoisted their island's own flag....
5. Residents of Western NC with signs displaying their support for a fugitive who perpitrated abortion clinic bombings....I forget the guy's name....
6. And finally, as Mr. Kalajian points out, the flying of the Confederate Flag by those who espouse white supremacy or nostalgia for the Confederacy....who aren't neccesarily the same people. Hate doesn't motivate all of those who fly a symbol of their heritage...
I could bring up other examples....I wish I'd written them down....of symbols and public figures held up by people who are extremist enough to celebrate their causes, but not bloody enough to follow through on the unspoken desire for a return to institutionalized racism, fanatical religious war against nonbelievers or the destruction of the federal govt....
Okay, that's my rant (I hope this isn't taken as mud-slinging). As an observer of human nature, I have picked up this pattern of behavior in this country and others.
And to Mr. Kalajian: Not everyone who flies the Confederate Flag is a white supremist, just as not everyone who wear the black or white caps of the Nation of Islam, or every woman who wears a veil, supports Al'Qaeda. Thanks for the interesting article, it got me thinking....again.
George Orwell's Notes on Nationalism has been posted here in previous years. His theory of "transferred nationalism" is an interesting look at how some people choose a group which they don't belong to as a proxy to express their own feelings and attachments. Either they see in such a group virtues that their own people no longer possess and they use that people as a stick to beat their own group, or they identify with the sufferings or threatened position of the other nationality.
And to Mr. Kalajian: Not everyone who flies the Confederate Flag is a white supremist, just as not everyone who wear the black or white caps of the Nation of Islam, or every woman who wears a veil, supports Al'Qaeda.
True, but some of the rationales people develop to justify the use of such symbols can draw them closer to that sort of movement. If one is forever trying to explain why the Battle Flag is okay, one may give in to feelings of victimization and self-righteousness, and end up minimizing or overlooking what was wrong about the Confederacy.
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When, where and what did you do about it?