Of the books I've read lately, Clay Shirkey's Here Comes Everybody had some interesting notes on how the internet and easy connectivity has changed how society reacts to, well, everything
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Wow. I've seen similar photos of trucks in VA or WV that were covered in racist anti-Islamic bumper stickers, but that mural+plane combo is pretty extreme.
Except for a brief foray in China, I've lived in the South all of my life. Those flags are everywhere, and owners argue that they are for pride in one's "cultural heritage" - that's actually the new cover message of a lot of white power groups. It's not that they hate black/brown people, they simply have an enormous amount of pride for being white... ugh.
I have no problem with being proud of being white. I'm white, after all. That's not the issue.
The Battle flag, though, celebrates very specifically a pride in descendants who maintained their "pride" (or dominance) through forced legal separation, legal denial of rights and all the violence attendant thereto between the white and Others, specifically black and brown people. (IIRC, the reds and yellows don't fair too well under this "culture".)
Ah, but since the losers of wars are supposed to feel the shame of the defeated, one must fly the flag of pride to deny this shame, mustn't one? Otherwise one is a loser, almost by definition.
The problem with pride: It doesn't exist. It is only the opposite of shame. "White pride" groups exist to bolster their literally shameless support of past atrocities, actions that should have been decided after they lost a Key War.
There is a lot of really twisted mythology which has grown up around the Confederacy. Jeff Davis talked and wrote a lot after the fall of the Confederacy. He wrote a re-write of history. He claimed that most slaves were "happy" and "content" to be slaves. Modern wavers of Confederate flags talk like Jeff Davis' rants were actually true. That seems scary to me.
Old news here, but then again, Northern Virginia is practically in our back yard. (This made the Washington Post last week. :)
Yeah, when I moved down here (DC area) from upstate New York, the change in attitudes was jarring. White elementary schoolers comfortable using The N Word at people, in person. YIKES.
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Except for a brief foray in China, I've lived in the South all of my life. Those flags are everywhere, and owners argue that they are for pride in one's "cultural heritage" - that's actually the new cover message of a lot of white power groups. It's not that they hate black/brown people, they simply have an enormous amount of pride for being white... ugh.
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The Battle flag, though, celebrates very specifically a pride in descendants who maintained their "pride" (or dominance) through forced legal separation, legal denial of rights and all the violence attendant thereto between the white and Others, specifically black and brown people. (IIRC, the reds and yellows don't fair too well under this "culture".)
Ah, but since the losers of wars are supposed to feel the shame of the defeated, one must fly the flag of pride to deny this shame, mustn't one? Otherwise one is a loser, almost by definition.
The problem with pride: It doesn't exist. It is only the opposite of shame. "White pride" groups exist to bolster their literally shameless support of past atrocities, actions that should have been decided after they lost a Key War.
That's just my take, for what it's worth.
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Yeah, when I moved down here (DC area) from upstate New York, the change in attitudes was jarring. White elementary schoolers comfortable using The N Word at people, in person. YIKES.
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