Exaggerated for sure, but not surprising

04 September 2011 by The General Published in: Neo-Confederate hooey 5 comments

The city council of Lexington, VA has voted, 4-1, to ban the display of the Confederate battle flag on flagpoles owned by the city. Here’s a link to some media coverage of the issue. Kevin Levin has also had quite a bit of coverage of this issue on his blog over the past few days.

What’s important to note here is that this ban applies ONLY to flying the Confederate battle flag from PUBLICLY owned flagpoles. NOWHERE does the ordinance say that the battle flag is banned from any sort of private display. Indeed, such a restriction would be a flagrant violation of the First Amendment. However, nothing in the First Amendment says that the city has to permit the Confederate battle flag to be flown on publicly owned flagpoles.

In spite of that, and surely not to my surprise, the Lost Causers and neo-Confederates are screaming bloody murder about this, intentionally misconstruing the ordinance to make a ridiculous emotional argument. The image below demonstrates precisely what I mean:

I wish I could say that this sort of emotional, manipulative and wholly inaccurate sort of thing would follow very quickly, but I would be lying if I did. Calling for violence when locally elected officials make a policy decision is NEVER appropriate, but here we have “call to arms”. This is grossly inappropriate.

There’s no place for this sort of thing in a rational discussion, but here it is nonetheless…..

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Comments

Robert Moore

Sun 04th Sep 2011 at 5:31 pm
I won’t touch on the lack of ability to spell “Heritage” or even the fact that whoever made this fails to appreciate contractions (“can not”)… such a thing must be a Yankee invention. Ooops, sorry, I did it anyway.

In sort, this is a display of someone who is clearly out of touch with the facts. As anyone who takes time to read the details knows… those who choose to do so can still carry the flag through Lexington, and even place flags on the grave of Jackson (Lee’s is a bit more complicated considering it’s in a vault, with a gate, and on W&L property… but, of course, the statue upstairs, in the chapel, is surrounded by authentically replicated flags, on replica poles made by… the local camp of the SCV… but, of course, that’s not enough to quench the THIRST for it all, I suppose), the Pendletons, Letcher, Paxton, etc., etc.

Oh, and yes, about the “boycott” that some propose… pure idiocy. Sure, stop spending those dollars in Lexington… at the Jackson House, the VMI Museum, the Lee Museum in the basement of the chapel… to cut off those tax dollars to the town… and watch those exhibits that display the REAL items (as opposed to the print Confederate flags made in China) from the Confederacy disappear from display… as the they essentially cut off funding for the museums that display these things.

Of course, reality being what it is, such a boycott might sting a little, but people who don’t take note of the loud voices from a very few will still visit.

The town opted not to fly the flag anymore. So what!? Moving on…
Ken Hershberger

Sun 04th Sep 2011 at 8:11 pm
I am always amused when people argue that their “heritage” is being violated when a city government says that they don’t have the right to use public resources (flag poles in this case) to thumb their nose at those who are offended by the display of Confederate flags. I heartily agree with your “So What?” comment.
Dennis

Mon 05th Sep 2011 at 5:14 am
Commendations to the city government of Lexington! Welcome to the present!

Regards,
Dennis
Ulric Dahlgren

Mon 05th Sep 2011 at 9:20 am
Chances are that “heritage” is something that can only be construed very loosely in this context.
Dennis

Sat 17th Sep 2011 at 6:13 am
The fires must have cooled. There is nothing regarding the issue featured in the most recent, September 14, Lexington paper.