• whotookkarl@lemmy.world
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    1 month ago

    Colonel: You write “born to kill” on your helmet, and you wear a peace button. What’s that supposed to be, some kind of sick joke?

    Joker: No, sir.

    • leftzero@lemmynsfw.com
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      1 month ago

      Joker: I think I was trying to suggest something about the duality of man, sir.
      Colonel: The what?
      Joker: The duality of man. The Jungian thing, sir.

  • nednobbins@lemm.ee
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    1 month ago

    I’d really like to know more about this. Google shows that there are a bunch of people selling this, or similar things like a rainbow Gadsden flag but it’s not clear to me who is actually buying them or what their intended message is.

    Is it a joke? Maybe they’re just trolling everyone?
    Do they not know what one or both symbols mean?
    Do they actually support the causes behind both symbols? (I saw one post that suggested it might be a different kind of “Southern Pride”)

    • ZC3rr0r@lemmy.ca
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      1 month ago

      I mean, a rainbow Gadsden flag makes some kind of sense if you forget all the recent associations. At face value it could be as simple as saying that you don’t want the government to tread on your rights as an LGBTQ citizen. If you go one layer deeper and look at it as a symbol of the fight for freedom during the American revolution, it still works - Freedom for LGBTQ people to be who they are.

    • Anyolduser@lemmynsfw.com
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      1 month ago

      I’m gonna start and end this comment with the same disclaimer: I’M NOT HERE TO DEBATE THE MEANING OF THE FLAG, JUST COMMENTING IN THE CURRENT USES OF IT. THIS IS AN OBSERVATION OF THE BELIEFS OTHER PEOPLE HOLD, NOT MY OWN.

      Yeah, there are a lot of people who still interpret the Confederate naval jack to represent southern pride. In recent decades the nationwide interpretation changed to basically “racism”, either wholly or in part.

      This (relatively) recent change means that people who want to express southern pride but weren’t racists tended to move away from using the flag, instead opting for things like using their state flags. The other end of this is racists who specifically and explicitly leaned into the new interpretation and use the flag more.

      There is a (very much) smaller subset of people who want to stick by the older “Southern pride” meaning and reject the more modern interpretation. While these people probably deal with a lot of funny looks and awkward conversations, they exist. Apparently there’s a large enough cohort that feels that way and support LGBT rights to warrant someone printing Confederate naval jacks on a rainbow field.

      Again, before I have a dozen motherfuckers here to tell me why their interpretation of the flag is the correct one: I’M NOT HERE TO DEBATE THE MEANING OF THE FLAG, JUST COMMENTING IN THE CURRENT USES OF IT. THIS IS AN OBSERVATION OF THE BELIEFS OTHER PEOPLE HOLD, NOT MY OWN.

      • Nougat@fedia.io
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        1 month ago

        “I assert that the Confederate flag only changed to meaning ‘racist’ recently. I will not elaborate further.”

        • Anyolduser@lemmynsfw.com
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          1 month ago

          See, this is exactly what I was worried about. Now I’ve got to write a whole fucking essay because history classes never get past WWII.

          “Relatively recent” here means “in the past few decades”. There was a period of time in the early 20th century where (due to a long domestic propaganda effort that, frankly, you’re going to have to read up on yourself) the racist connotations were significantly diminished.

          During this time period, the Confederate naval jack was more broadly seen as a symbol of Southern pride. Perhaps the best example is the Dukes of Hazzard, although this was closer to the tail end of this period.

          What precipitated the gradual shift to the modern interpretation was the Vietnam war. The army was racially integrated by that time, and black soldiers were encountering the Confederate flag that their Southern, white comrades sometimes brought along. For fucking obvious reasons, the “it’s not racist” argument didn’t exactly fly with them. To almost criminally abridge an interesting and important part of history, a symbol that those soldiers may not have ever seen or even really cared in civilian life was at the forefront of their minds.

          It took years for that bad experience to move the needle of public opinion. To (again) abridge decades decades of history, that experience in Vietnam “trickled down” to the public. Over time, the mainstream view of the flag shifted from one of primarily Southern pride to one that was primarily (and later, overtly) about racism.

          • Nougat@fedia.io
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            1 month ago

            I’m going to go out on a limb here, and say that the Confederate flag was always racist, but the people who rightfully had a problem with it only started to gain the power to say or do anything about it during the Civil Rights Era, or (as you aptly point out) when Black men became armed soldiers in an integrated military.

            Perhaps it only “recently” became popularly understood to be racist, but it has always actually been racist.

  • Jo Miran@lemmy.ml
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    1 month ago

    Translation: Bottom ISO cut BWC

    I used to live in Louisiana. There were a few black men with confederate flags. Stupidity knows no bounds.

    • Nuke_the_whales@lemmy.world
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      1 month ago

      I live in Canada and there’s trucks here that I see with Confederate flag and even Trump decals. It’s actually not that surprising when you realize Canada took in all the Confederates fleeing, including Jefferson Davis

      • sigmaklimgrindset@sopuli.xyz
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        1 month ago

        Canada took in all the Confederates fleeing, including Jefferson Davis

        HUH???

        You’re telling me slaves fleeing using the Underground Railway could have come to Canada and then MET THEIR SLAVERS WHO ALSO RAN AWAY?

        • Nuke_the_whales@lemmy.world
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          1 month ago

          Yup. It’s fucked but Canada was claiming neutrality as part of the British Empire meanwhile they were letting in Confederates, who were using Toronto as a northern base. The English built boats for the Confederate navy. After the war Jefferson Davis was given a place to live in Toronto where he retired. There are many plantation style properties built along the Canadian border through southern Ontario, many built after the civil war by “refugees”.

          A lot of Canadians also fought in the civil war, though to be fair it was on both sides, as there were many Canadians who saw a moral need to fight against slavery as well

    • wizardbeard@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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      1 month ago

      There’s a decent amount of southerners that bought into the idea pushed in the 20th century that the flag was emblematic of southern pride instead of emblematic of racism.

      Modern conversation about the US has generalized half of the country as poor, racist, mean, idiots who are stuck in the past. It’s gone so far that people have started to describe impovershed areas worldwide as the global south.

      While I would never choose to rally under a racist symbol because of it, I can understand wanting a shorthand way to show pride for the place you are from if you feel like public opinion just labels it as a backwards shitpile by default.

      And if modern discourse is so wrong about how much of a shithole where you live or where you are from is, maybe they’re wrong about this symbol meaning racism too? Spoiler: they aren’t wrong about that, but that is the general thought path.


      Similar sort of thing that drove a concerning amount of young men towards shitheads like Andrew Tate while the news media was going apeshit with articles about how all men needed to be taught not to rape.

      • AstralPath@lemmy.ca
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        1 month ago

        People taking pride in being born in a specific place to a specific religious ideology and political opinion is part of the problem though.

        The people I see flying confederate flags are more likely to be people that I highly doubt have ever contributed to society in a way that they should be proud of.

        Big deal, they were born in the south. Why are they proud of that? What exactly are they proud of? History does not favor them with much to be proud of and the one icon they use to show their pride is the banner of a failed state that fought against its own countrymen; a state that built its foundation on slavery…

        You get to be proud if your country or your people are a force for good in the world; doing things worth being proud of. Being proud that your parents were from Alabama and hooked up one night and you just so happened to be their spawn makes no sense. This applies no matter where you’re from.

      • ShinkanTrain@lemmy.ml
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        1 month ago

        It’s gone so far that people have started to describe impovershed areas worldwide as the global south

        That’s not where that comes from, but that misconception is a great example of US defaultism

    • Frog@lemmy.ca
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      1 month ago

      We all know what the Confederate Flag stands for but remember that in 1967 some Black Panthers created a coalition with the Young Patriots (white lower class group) and used the flag to further their cause together.

      This group of Black Panther members fought for equality but the problem was they saw not all white people were treated equally. So they decided to fight for the white lower class too.

      Maybe they don’t understand where the flag really comes from. Maybe they have a story to tell.