Apparently, the "right' thing to do is endorse racist symbols.

[Buzz Clik]

Isn't it lovely?

[ayeshahaqqiqa]

1. Isn't it disgusting?

Any Southerner who flies this flag here in Arkansas gets a little lecture on history from me. This flag was used by the Army of Northern Virginia, and Arkansas troops west of the Mississippi never saw it. It was taken over as a symbol of the KKK during Reconstruction, and it is as that symbol that it is used today.

It isn't seen a lot around here. Even the Sons of Confederate memorial on the courthouse flies the Confederate Flag, not this racist rag.

[Buzz Clik]

3. Needless to say, here in Indiana, that flag has had a single purpose.

We still see it adorning pickup trucks occasionally, and the message is loud and clear.

[Orrex]

4. A few months back

I spotted a confederate flag on a coworker's vehicle, and I asked him why he didn't just drag the corpse of a slave behind his truck instead.


He didn't understand what I meant...

[Buzz Clik]

8. Slaves are hard to find. You might have suggested a homersexial, and he'd have cracked a grin.

[ayeshahaqqiqa]

7. Indiana and Illinois have had a history

of KKK activity and race riots, sad to say.

[Buzz Clik]

11. When I first arrived in Indiana less than years ago, ...

... I had the pleasure (um... horror) of seeing someone wearing a Klan jacket in public. A basketball game, actually.

:wow:

[Orrex]

14. Maybe you can corroborate something for me

A good friend of mine grew up in Kokomo, and he once told me that a nearby town had a "Welcome to" sign that included the warning:

"N****r, Don't Let the Sun Go Down on you Here."

I can't remember the name of the town, nor when the sign would have been removed (if it ever existed).

Did you ever hear of something similarly enlightened?

[Buzz Clik]

18. Linton, Indiana. Southwestern part of the state.

[Orrex]

20. No shit?

Holy moley, that's sick.

[Buzz Clik]

22. Yep. The signs were still up in the 1960s.

There were communities in the state where school kids recited some Klan pledge rather than the Pledge of Allegiance.

Indiana, particularly the southern parts, bears little cultural resemblance to the rest of the Midwest. It has a lot of nasty attributes we usually associate with the deep South.

[ayeshahaqqiqa]

19. Sadly, yes

In Illinois, ca 1909, there was a race riot in Springfield. During and after the Civil War, many towns in the state enacted "Black laws" which made it illegal for blacks to be in the city limits after dark. I know that this was the case in the small town where my mother grew up, because her older brother told me about it. Edited to add: This was in the 1920s and 1930s as far as my mother's town goes. I don't know of any town in Illinois now that would have a sign like you saw in Kokomo.

[IndianaJones]

23. don't see it so much up here in NW Indiana. nt.

[Buzz Clik]

26. No. Your neck of the woods is far more civilized.

[IndianaJones]

24. dupe. nt.

[Orrex]

2. Good grief, where did you find that disgusting thing?

Did you covertly attend a lynching? Or a GOP fundraiser?

But I repeat myself...

[Moochy]

5. Maybe at a site where he lurks

[Buzz Clik]

15. I didn't always lurk.

I took great pleasure in exploding a few heads. And one day, they took away my membership pass, and then another and another and another.

They really don't like hearing how despicable they are.

[Buzz Clik]

6. You don't have to go too deep into the belly of the beast to find it.

The true knuckledraggers really snuggle up to the Stars and Bars -- and why not? It makes such a statement when you can show your despise for minorities and piss off "libruls" with a single gesture.

Stupid is as stupid does.

[ayeshahaqqiqa]

9. Slight correction

The Stars and Bars is not the Battle Flag of the Army of Northern Virginia. The link is to a webpage that correctly names all the "rebel flags".

http://unitedstatesamericanflags.com/rebel_flag_wallpaper.htm

And here's the Stars and Bars itself.

[Buzz Clik]

12. My ignorance. Thanks for the history lesson (we're keeping you busy!)

[krispos42]

10. Can I show my Tibetian good-luck symbol, then?

:eyes: :eyes: :eyes: :eyes: :eyes:

[Buzz Clik]

13. That one hasn't always been lucky. Maybe in Tibet...

[ayeshahaqqiqa]

21. Native Americans use this symbol as well

for the four winds, I believe.

[CottonBear]

16. I see it every day here in GA. I saw a guy w/ a flag logo belt at the tire store today.

Heck, it's part of the Georgia flag. Frat boys, college graduates, poor working class folks, hunters, gun freaks and evangelical types all sport the flag in ways ranging from hats and clothing, accessories, tattoos, license plates, bumper stickers, business logos and actUAL flags flying at their homes, businesses and sometimes at their frat houses.

Ask any of these people what the flag means and they'll say it's "Southern heritage" but it really stands for racism. (I am a native Southerner by the way and I abhor the flag and its supporters.)

The "flaggots" in the state are mad at Governor Sonny Perdue because he wouldn't allow a vote on the flag issue (whether or not to go back to the racist 1950s flag)

[Virginia Dare]

17. South's gonna rise again baby!....n/t

[IndianaJones]

25. scary. nt.