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Jul. 13th, 2015 07:51 amOuting myself: I think I might have had a confederate flag shot glass set, and didn't think it was racist.
I was "raised redneck," with my first social peer group being "freaks" or "stoners" (I didn't identify as loser whether that applied or not). Our music ranged from highly complex guitar orchestra (Rush, Yes) to mteal (real metal, not hair metal) and southern twangy rock (Molly Hatchet, Skynard). I was pretty ignorant within our crowd, but as I learned it the rebel flag was about "rebellion" generally, partying (think field kegger), and freedom generally. I didn't hear it called stars and bars, but it was as meaningful as the general lee. It did not have racial connotations at all.
Only in college did I run into the debate about whether it was racist, and while I think generally my rocking friends were not (though was the n word used? Yeah, but we sort of had a subculture rivalry if you will - that would take more 'splainin) I looked at how the thing was displayed, how it was used by racists, and even tried to picture what a group of freaks waving the thing might look like to black people. So I pulled it from my vocabulary (got rid of the shot glasses).
Curiously later in college I ran into 2 different black girls who had views that also influenced me: One was from (South?) Carolina, and had the rebel flag in her college dorm. To her it just meant where she was from, and she would display it (perhaps a tad reactionary, though she was pretty timid otherwise). The other girl was returning to the south - she said sure they were racist, but up in the north it wasn't acceptable to be racist but people still were. She'd rather the person be open about how they felt (and she didn't encounter threats, and noted a kkk person would still help you change a tire) (HER WORDS) than be up here and know someone for months only to hear some stupid shit fly out of their mouths when you least expect it.
No conclusions, just recollections for the sake of perspective.
I was "raised redneck," with my first social peer group being "freaks" or "stoners" (I didn't identify as loser whether that applied or not). Our music ranged from highly complex guitar orchestra (Rush, Yes) to mteal (real metal, not hair metal) and southern twangy rock (Molly Hatchet, Skynard). I was pretty ignorant within our crowd, but as I learned it the rebel flag was about "rebellion" generally, partying (think field kegger), and freedom generally. I didn't hear it called stars and bars, but it was as meaningful as the general lee. It did not have racial connotations at all.
Only in college did I run into the debate about whether it was racist, and while I think generally my rocking friends were not (though was the n word used? Yeah, but we sort of had a subculture rivalry if you will - that would take more 'splainin) I looked at how the thing was displayed, how it was used by racists, and even tried to picture what a group of freaks waving the thing might look like to black people. So I pulled it from my vocabulary (got rid of the shot glasses).
Curiously later in college I ran into 2 different black girls who had views that also influenced me: One was from (South?) Carolina, and had the rebel flag in her college dorm. To her it just meant where she was from, and she would display it (perhaps a tad reactionary, though she was pretty timid otherwise). The other girl was returning to the south - she said sure they were racist, but up in the north it wasn't acceptable to be racist but people still were. She'd rather the person be open about how they felt (and she didn't encounter threats, and noted a kkk person would still help you change a tire) (HER WORDS) than be up here and know someone for months only to hear some stupid shit fly out of their mouths when you least expect it.
No conclusions, just recollections for the sake of perspective.
