The Elephant in the Room

There are very few human symbols that find absolute approval or, in the alternative, disapproval. Symbols are called that because they represent something far larger than themselves. An unknown symbol is an oxymoron. At present, the symbol that is seemingly most under attack in this country is the Confederate battle flag albeit other flags that represented that short-lived, tragic nation, the Confederate States of America are also under assault—especially those that contain the battle flag in their canton.

But the battle flag in particular is under attack by the politically correct because they say that it is a symbol of “racism”—a Trotskyite term invented to sow discord between the races in the United States. Because of the power of political correctness these days, the claim of racism is far stronger than any claim that the flag represented a standard for treason. That claim together with the claim of the flag being “racist” are untrue. The battle flag represented neither racism nor treason, but a struggle by the People of the South for independence from a tyrannous central government, a struggle that was little different from that waged eighty-five years earlier against the British Empire. From that struggle came the American flag against which an actual claim might be made regarding the institution of slavery. For no flag of the Confederate States of America ever flew over a slave ship but the Stars and Stripes most assuredly did—and that on ships from northern ports!