Dear Editor,
In light of recent letters to the editor I would like to take this opportunity to further express my feelings concerning the latent meaning of the Confederate flag.
A letter by Richard Schmid claimed that by removing the Confederate flag on grounds of its checkered past, all flags should be eliminated.
I will agree that some crime or act with negative implications was probably committed under the banner of every flag used in the world today. The difference is that these flags represent a multitude of ideas and feelings spanning a long breadth of time and they don’t have the primary negative contemporary connotation that the Confederate flag does.
The four odd years that the Confederate flag was flown was a time when the fundamentally intrinsic values of personal freedom and human moral considerability were being called into question. It was the banner of a rogue nation hell-bent on perpetuating human oppression.
The fact of the matter, is that we live in a world teeming with cultural, societal and historical meaning.
The swastika has been used for over a thousand years as a symbol of good luck and the Hindu god Ganesha. But no one thinks of these things now.
You may decide that you want the Confederate flag to represent something wholesome, but such decisions don’t accurately represent the world in which we live. If you wanted to start a national “The Confederate Flag is Not a Symbol of Hate” campaign then you would have my support, but as of now hate is exactly what this flag represents.
The two most widely used symbols of the KKK are the Nazi Swastika and the Confederate Flag.
Why do they use these? Do you think they feel there is any ambiguity in these symbols? If I were to walk around with a swastika branded on my forehead I doubt anyone would see me and think, “That guy really likes the Hindu god Ganesha!”
Symbols such as the Nazi Swastika and the Confederate Flag do have a place in our society. They should be relegated to live forever within the pages of history books.
I am very proud of being from the South, but the banner I have always flown is the Stars and Stripes not the Stars and Bars.
And one more thing, the latent hostility expressed in such comments as, “move out with your friend to California,” is exactly the sort of antiquated insensitivity I am referring to.
Joshua C. Gambrel

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