No but anything invented or made during that era could be racist? That's insane. And you tied that together...
also,A person of color today has no more connection to slavery as this white guy from Ohio..that ancestors fought to free the slaves....yet since the union army was around during slavery...it too is racist? Im Irish, but i have no connection to the IRA? Just as no white person today or black person has a connection to slavery...unless of course you are colin
There was slavery...the US ended it. The confederacy was succession....There is nothing connecting the US to slavery....only a succeeded state of states. The Confederacy.
I'm very proud to be Southern. I love my heritage, the people, the traditions, the food, the music, the stories, the songs...
I'm also very defensive of the South. If you're not from here, you don't get it.
Just because a black person today may not have actual connections to slavery does not mean that black people today do not still have very real connections to oppression w/ roots very close to the Civil War. The Civil Rights Movement was not that long ago. Racism didn't end w/ the Civil War. Hate didn't end w/ the Civil War.
I'm white. I cannot say what it feels like to be a black person, because I don't know. I don't know what it feels like to have slavery in my ancestry, to have grandparents that weren't allowed to drink from the same water fountains as the white people. I don't know how that feels or how it reverberates down through the generations.
I can imagine any sign of white supremacy is very much looked upon w/ loathing, anger, &, even, fear. And, because of that, once I learn about something like the "okay" sign, I try to do better.
I think Robert E. Lee was a gentleman w/ a lot of wisdom & honor But I don't fly or display a Confederate flag & never will. Some people say, "Heritage not hate," but, for some, that flag will never be anything but a symbol of hate. I don't get to say that it's not really hate, because I, while I share history with black southerners, I don't have the same ancestry. Last weekend, we were driving through north Georgia along some back roads to get to an apple farm. Along one stretch, I counted about 5 Confederate flags on a few different homes & businesses. I said to my husband, "If I were a different color, I definitely wouldn't feel welcome around here," & I felt shame. If you know that flag stands for something much, much different for others, why fly it? It's just not very kind or gracious to me.
A couple of months ago, I was eating brunch in a lovely new restaurant in our town in an area that's been "gentrified". The restaurant boasts "modern Appalachian" cuisine. There was something about the restaurant that I found offensive to actual Appalachian people... I don't know... I just didn't feel comfortable... I felt like the restaurant owners were trying to capitalize on something that wasn't authentic to them. Apple butter was served w/ their fancy pancake dish, but the owners & chef probably didn't know or understand about the Appalachian grannies making apple butter in their little kitchens over their old stoves for decades & decades...
Anyway, while at the restaurant, I was curious about some of the local history as it's located next to a very well-known bridge. I grew up here & have been here my whole life. Up until that morning in the restaurant, I didn't know that, where this new restaurant & attached boutique hotel is now, used to be a "blacks only" area & that, on the bridge, there had been 2 separate lynchings of black men.
My mother's family comes from poor, country dairy farms in Alabama, & my father's family comes from poor dirt farms in north Georgia. We didn't have slaves. But, still, I'm connected to that history - but in a very different way that a black person is.
And, as an aside, while slavery was a big part of the Civil War, it was not all of the Civil War. The Civil War was about states' individual rights. The North benefited very much from slave labor. Those Union soldiers weren't heroes. Abraham Lincoln freed the slaves to end the war - it was a tactical move.
Slavery is an ugly part of United States' history - not just Southern history.
(Oh, & the Betsy Ross flag being racist is absolutely ridiculous.)
And, after I typed all this out, I was really hesitated to post it because there are some on this thread that are so quick to label people racists just because we may think about something or look at something a little differently or may not be quick to jump right in w/ the popular agreement. But I decided to go ahead & post it because I feel strongly about this issue, especially as it relates to southern history.
