The Daily Tar Heel
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The Daily Tar Heel

Look, I get it. You want to keep your Confederate flag. You see it as a symbol of Southern pride. You might have it placed on your bumper beside the words “Heritage, not Hate.” You may not even call it “the Confederate flag,” instead euphemizing away many of its most unpleasant connotations by referring to it as “the rebel flag,” “the Southern cross" or “the Dixie flag.”

If you do own and proudly display a Confederate flag, you ought to take it down, hide it and consider the violent and racist history of this noninclusive symbol.

Earlier this month, The Daily Tar Heel reported on an Orange County resident’s appeal of a ruling that his 400-square-foot Confederate flag raised on his property along Highway 70 violates a new flag ordinance. If it were no larger than 24-square feet, his flag would not have been ruled in violation of the ordinance.

This case hinges on the legality of the size of his flag rather than the message displayed, as the Constitution protects his right to display Confederate imagery. But whether or not the man can display a Confederate flag (of any size) is a separate issue from whether or not he should display the flag.

The Confederate flag has always been emblematic of hate. During the Civil War, Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee used it as the battle flag of his Army of Northern Virginia. Lee’s soldiers may very well have fought for states’ rights, but the most significant of these “rights” was the ability to own, sell and treat human beings like chattel.

After the Confederacy’s defeat, Confederate flags were most likely to be spotted at cemeteries and war memorials. Their public presence was rare, even after Reconstruction and well into the era of Jim Crow.

Throughout the early Twentieth Century, public use of the Confederate flag slowly increased, culminating in a political explosion in 1948 when Dixiecrats revolted over President Harry Truman’s desegregation of the military and his support of anti-lynching bills in Congress.

Today, the Confederate flag is still imbued with the same reactionary aversion to racial progress. The Anti-Defamation League classifies the Confederate flag as a general hate symbol, and various groups and individuals have used the flag for less-than-admirable ends. UNC’s campus is regularly beleaguered by Confederate groups who support the reinstallation of Silent Sam, and white nationalists prominently carried the Confederate flag during the 2017 Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville, Virginia.

It is easy to abstract away the hateful heritage of the Confederate flag, but for Black Americans in particular the flag is a potent sign of danger. According to a 2011 Pew Research Center poll, Black Americans were the group most likely to have a negative reaction to seeing a Confederate flag displayed. The flag’s usage by the Ku Klux Klan and self-avowed white supremacists like the mass murderer Dylann Roof make such reactions seem natural.

As a Black man, I personally use the number of Confederate flags displayed as a barometer for my own safety when traveling the American South. The more I see, the sooner I know to get out of Dodge.

So please, for the love of all things good, take down your Confederate flag.

opinion@dailytarheel.com

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