That Pesky Rebel Flag

[mmcd3182]

Originally Posted by Kagan

demopolite, I have wondered why this was important, too. I mean, do I get +1 point for each CSA veteran? That would give me 6 ancestral points!

Does saddlebum get -5 for each Yankee veteran? He He, that scalawag will have negative points. What will that mean?

Can I get an infinity?

[Kagan]

Originally Posted by mmcd3182

Can I get an infinity?

If you buy a foreign car...you'll have to put a Rebel flag tag on it to cancel out the negativity of it being a foreign car.

[saddlebum]

Kagan, I have many more dead Confederate relatives than Union . North Alabama was an awful place to be during that hopeless war, small groups of southern and Union supporters roamed the area killing people with different idealogies with impunity .

My great, great grandfather would not fight against the Confederacy , but he absolutely would take up arms against the United States of America . His name was Albert Gallatin Henry from Gunter's Landing or Guntersville, much more information on him is in the state archives and "Guntersville Remembered " by Larry Smith .

[mmcd3182]

Originally Posted by Kagan

If you buy a foreign car...you'll have to put a Rebel flag tag on it to cancel out the negativity of it being a foreign car.

not that kind of infinity....

I already have a foreign car... paid for. I thought foreign nations helped both sides in the Civil War --

so I get an infinity symbol (u know... the 8 turned on its side) dealing with what you were talking about... the pluses and minuses for ancestry...

right? infinity?

[Kagan]

[quote=saddlebum;272355]

Originally Posted by Kagan

Kagan, I have many more dead Confederate relatives than Union.

Maybe a net of +1 then?
Honestly, saddlebum, I'm glad your ancestors didn't kill one another off. I would have missed growing up next door to your beautiful offspringings.

Originally Posted by mmcd3182

so I get an infinity symbol (u know... the 8 turned on its side) dealing with what you were talking about... the pluses and minuses for ancestry...

You've got 8 points? I'm envious.

Now, if I put a battle flag tag on my truck...will it give me extra points?

[Sweet Pea]

Kagan, I guess you will just be a redneck if you put a rebel flag tag on your truck. I guess that is not the only think you have to do to be a redneck, If you prop a fuse up with a stick to keep your lights on, you might be a redneck. Been there, done that, guess I'm a redneck or dumba$$ one. lol

[Kagan]

Originally Posted by Sweet Pea

I guess that is not the only thing you have to do to be a redneck

I know all the words to Hank Jr's songs...does that count?

My football defensive coordinator wears cowboy boots and a qenuine, cowhide, leather vest whenever he's coaching basketball. Does that make him a redneck?

[2lib4dem]

To me as a black person it signifies racism. I understand that the past is the past, but the past was not so great for blacks. I don't know much of my family's history because they were bought and sold, and ripped apart with no regard to family ties. I think that some whites dont understand the emotional trauma the rebel flag evokes. It is a reminder of the atrocities suffered by our ancesters.

[Mystic_Rhythms]

Redneck = a glorious absence of sophistication
According to Jeff Foxworthy..lol

Redneck = Used as a disparaging term for a member of the white rural laboring class, especially in the southern United States.

I like Jeff Foxworthy's definition better! Fits me better anyway!

[Kagan]

Originally Posted by Kagan

My football defensive coordinator wears cowboy boots and a qenuine, cowhide, leather vest whenever he's coaching basketball. Does that make him a redneck?

I think not...he's the same ethnicity as 2lib4dem.

Originally Posted by 2lib4dem

To me as a black person it signifies racism. I understand that the past is the past, but the past was not so great for blacks. I don't know much of my family's history because they were bought and sold, and ripped apart with no regard to family ties. I think that some whites dont understand the emotional trauma the rebel flag evokes. It is a reminder of the atrocities suffered by our ancesters.

Thank you! I was wasting time until someone serious came back. As a Christian, I'm aware that Christ doesn't want us to offend brothers and sisters in Christ. More importantly, He doesn't want us to lay down roadblocks for the lost.

When I quoted 1 Corinthians 10:23-24, I left it unexplained because it is EXTREMELY self-explanatory.

You're right 2lib4dem my people, for the most part, don't get it. Whenever I put Bible verses out there for them to check out what God's Word says...like Matthew 22:36-40...they say that I'm twisting the Word of God to mean something it doesn't mean. They call me a "flaming liberal," which is mild compared to what they called me when I was growing up.

I could hollar about my "Southern" heritage, but I don't. I'm most proud of my ancestor's refusal during Reconstruction to participate in the KKK. His reasoning was that God had caused the Confederacy to lose the war because they were on the wrong side of His will.

I do firmly believe that there were many things wrong with Antebellum South, not just slavery. Alabama was one of only two southern states that allowed poor white men to vote...Texas was the other. As demopolite has stated, the CSA constitution did not grant individual rights like the U.S. Constitution already had granted.

Was slavery the only issue for going war? For the majority, no. For the powerful, yes! Both the North and the South implemented a military draft during the war. In the North, a draftee could get out of service by paying/hiring a replacement. In the South, a draftee could get out of service if he owned 10 slaves. That law meant that the CSA government was making the war about slavery. In Sam Watkins' Company Aytch, the author lamented that he wished that he owned slaves, so he could go home. He began to become more and more imbittered toward the CSA government as the war went along. He began to realize that he was fighting for the rich folks to keep their slaves. Most Southern whites have never read the Southern history they claim that they so much love. I've never met a Southern black who has read Company Aytch.

I have on several occasions before now taken Biblical and, yes, harsh stances against even perceived racism. We have a problem called racism that has been passed on to us. Even the people in this thread who claim that they are NOT passing it on to their children and grandchildren...ARE passing it on. You may not be teaching racism, but you are not fighting to end it either. It has become our eternal Southern inheritance from our forefathers. Maybe someday, we will have enough intestinal fortitude to throw off that inheritance by rejecting it and all that goes with it.

As a teacher, I'm well aware that actions speak volumes more than words. When you say that you are not racist, but you do things that are perceived as racist; people will hear one thing and see another. Either they will call you "two-faced" or they will call you "racist."

2lib4dem, don't get frustrated because white people don't get it. Believe me, I have enough frustration over that for the entire Black Belt region. Even "liberal" whites argue with me, so I always know that I'm alone. When geigerlass and Dad go home to be with the Lord...it will just get a little lonelier. But by simply reading the Word of God, as my great-great-grandfather did, I realize that the "family tradition" he started was the best: repent of the past, vow not to shake my fist in God's face again, work to make the world a better place, and never take crap off those who oppose the will of God.

[saddlebum]

Originally Posted by saddlebum

Kagan, I have many more dead Confederate relatives than Union . North Alabama was an awful place to be during that hopeless war, small groups of southern and Union supporters roamed the area killing people with different idealogies with impunity .

My great, great grandfather would not fight against the Confederacy , but he absolutely would NOT take up arms against the United States of America . His name was Albert Gallatin Henry from Gunter's Landing or Guntersville, much more information on him is in the state archives and "Guntersville Remembered " by Larry Smith .

[mmcd3182]

Originally Posted by Kagan

...
As a Christian, I'm aware that Christ doesn't want us to offend brothers and sisters in Christ. More importantly, He doesn't want us to lay down roadblocks for the lost.

When I quoted 1 Corinthians 10:23-24, I left it unexplained because it is EXTREMELY self-explanatory.

You're right 2lib4dem my people, for the most part, don't get it. Whenever I put Bible verses out there for them to check out what God's Word says...like Matthew 22:36-40...they say that I'm twisting the Word of God to mean something it doesn't mean. They call me a "flaming liberal," which is mild compared to what they called me when I was growing up.

We really do "Just Don't Get It." We never will -- there's no way that we, as European / Indian / Whatever descent can understand what the Africans who suffered Slavery went through, we can't understand what those who suffered the somewhat worse treatment (insult to injury) in post reformation -- dealing with Jim Crow, the KKK, all of the racism of the 20th century leading up to a law of equality, but not a law of equal treatment -- you can't put a law on people's actions like that.

We can't understand what it's like.

Originally Posted by Kagan

I could hollar about my "Southern" heritage, but I don't. I'm most proud of my ancestor's refusal during Reconstruction to participate in the KKK. His reasoning was that God had caused the Confederacy to lose the war because they were on the wrong side of His will.
..........
I have on several occasions before now taken Biblical and, yes, harsh stances against even perceived racism. We have a problem called racism that has been passed on to us. Even the people in this thread who claim that they are NOT passing it on to their children and grandchildren...ARE passing it on. You may not be teaching racism, but you are not fighting to end it either. It has become our eternal Southern inheritance from our forefathers. Maybe someday, we will have enough intestinal fortitude to throw off that inheritance by rejecting it and all that goes with it.

As a teacher, I'm well aware that actions speak volumes more than words. When you say that you are not racist, but you do things that are perceived as racist; people will hear one thing and see another. Either they will call you "two-faced" or they will call you "racist."

OR BOTH! A Two-Faced Racist... the most common type.

Originally Posted by Kagan

2lib4dem, don't get frustrated because white people don't get it. Believe me, I have enough frustration over that for the entire Black Belt region. Even "liberal" whites argue with me, so I always know that I'm alone. When geigerlass and Dad go home to be with the Lord...it will just get a little lonelier. But by simply reading the Word of God, as my great-great-grandfather did, I realize that the "family tradition" he started was the best: repent of the past, vow not to shake my fist in God's face again, work to make the world a better place, and never take crap off those who oppose the will of God.

In talking with you in PM on this subject, I think we kind of agree. I can completely understand and feel for you when you said this:
"Don't be worried aboutus not getting it. Believe me, I have enough frustration over that for the entire Black Belt region."

One of the main problems is that most of us don't want to admit that "we don't get it."

I'm glad the Christian-objective-perspective has been brought into this.

Maybe it will make some look at the issue in a different way -- not a social one, but a social and a religious issue.

[Kagan]

saddlebum, thanks for confirming that you are indeed part Yankee. Proud to know one. Even though my great-great-grandfather fought for the South, anyone who has been around teenage boys will understand why he did. The oldest of 11 children, Freeman Sanders Jenkins was born September 9, 1847. His dad, granddaddy, and four of his siblings died of small pox when Freeman was just 15 years old. To help make some money for the family, he signed on as a horse-handler with the same Confederate unit into which he later enlisted in September 1864...one week after his 17th birthday. He joined for both "the glory of war" and to support his mother and younger siblings.

His unit was engaged heavily in action near Marion Junction and Plantersville during Wilson's Raid. I still own his Enfield rifle; however, Freeman broke the hammer off of it himself upon becoming a Christian. Although he never told, my grandmother and I are convinced that he had killed a Yankee (or Yankees) in battle because he told the rifle, "May you (the rifle) never be used again for what you were used." He was only 21 when he vowed that neither he nor his offspring would ever belong to the KKK. According to old church records, he never missed church from the time he became a Christian until the few weeks before he died in 1924 at age 77. Hopefully, this explains why my great-great-grandfather is such a hero of mine.

Originally Posted by mmcd3182

We can't understand what it's like.

I have dared to ask on numerous occasions. Interestingly, they keep up with their family trees a lot better than most white people do. However, whereas I can trace back to before the American Revolution, most blacks cannot trace family any earlier than the 1866 Freedman's Bureau records. Many today are still living with the psychological negativity of what grandparents and great-grandparents suffered under Jim Crow. Poverty is an endless cycle unless it can be broken. Many of them see the welfare system of President Johnson's Great Society as the "Second American Slavery." By design, the welfare system destroyed individual initiative among many poor blacks and shattered what had become of the black family system. Remember, the welfare system was the brainchild of white U.S. Congressmen, liberal and conservative alike. As a race, they don't have many reasons to trust our race. We have been extremely crafty at putting ALL the blame upon them.

OR BOTH! A Two-Faced Racist... the most common type.

I did leave that one out didn't I?

In talking with you in PM on this subject, I think we kind of agree. I can completely understand and feel for you when you said this:
"Don't be worried about us not getting it. Believe me, I have enough frustration over that for the entire Black Belt region."

This year, my football team has talked a lot about hopes and dreams for this season. My team captain dared the other day to ask me, "Coach, what is your dream?" I turned my back to him and started walking off. He said, "Coach! Did you hear me?" I turned and said, "Yes, son, I heard you, but my dream will never come true. That's why I'm working my butt off to help your dream come true." I turned away again only to have him say, "Coach, tell me." I couldn't face him that time I just stopped knowing that tears were welling up in my eyes and I said, "Son, my dream is for white people and black people to put aside centuries of hate, and do what Jesus said to do." The silence was so loud that I could hear him breathing...then I continued walking away. My team captain is a growing Christian young man; I'm convinced that he put that on his prayer list.

[books_24]

To Kagan and others, for most of my life I have felt alone in my feelings. Even friends of mine in high school have shown that their feelings have changed as they have gotten older. I feel much better now, seeing that others feel the same way I do. And I know it is right! If you really look at the past in perspective, isn't it just stupid? Did it make ANY sense whatsoever???? NO! And many of us still believe there are some differences there, that some are better than others.
2lib, I also see that flag as a sign of racism. Whether the person holding it says it is or not.
I do not feel that my way of living is better than anyone else's, nor that it is the only way to go. However, it is equal. My family is much the same as the next one's.

[AUFAN]

Originally Posted by 2lib4dem

To me as a black person it signifies racism. I understand that the past is the past, but the past was not so great for blacks. I don't know much of my family's history because they were bought and sold, and ripped apart with no regard to family ties. I think that some whites dont understand the emotional trauma the rebel flag evokes. It is a reminder of the atrocities suffered by our ancesters.

If a black man or woman killed one of my ancesters should that make me hate all black people and everytime I saw one should that make me upset? People in my generation had nothing to do with what happened back in the civil war. As a matter of fact my generation has helped with all americans to go to school together and also church together. I went to church this morning where there was blacks and whites sitting next to eachother and singing and praising god as one. Now, has anything changed? Yes I would think so. Now this too was a place at one time that a black person could not walk the streets or even live in the town. Times have changed and people are more loving than they use to be towards eachother. Yes I take credit for helping this part of the USA change for the betterment of our nation when blacks and whites love eachother for who they are and not by the color of their skin.