The Civil War ended over 154 years ago. The Confederacy was on the wrong side of humanity. The Confederate flag and other displays represent "heritage, not hate" ignores the near-universal heritage of African Americans whose ancestors were enslaved by the millions in the South. It trivializes their pain, their history and their concerns about racism -- whether it's the racism of the past or that of today.
And it conceals the true history of the Confederate States of America and the seven decades of Jim Crow segregation and oppression that followed the Reconstruction era. There is no doubt among reputable historians that the Confederacy was established upon the premise of white supremacy and that the South fought the Civil War to preserve its slave labor. Its founding documents and its leaders were clear. "Our new government is founded upon ... the great truth that the negro is not equal to the white man; that slavery subordination to the superior race is his natural and normal condition," declared Confederate Vice President Alexander H. Stephens in his 1861 "Cornerstone speech."
This flag and park must be removed. It's only celebrated by hypocrites, bigots, racists and other small minded people. It's also beyond question that the Confederate flag was used extensively by the Ku Klux Klan as it waged a campaign of terror against African Americans during the civil rights movement and that segregationists in positions of power raised it in defense of Jim Crow.
Our public entities should no longer play a role in distorting history by honoring a secessionist government that waged war against the United States to preserve white supremacy and the enslavement of millions of people. It's past time for the South - and the rest of the nation - to bury the myth of the Lost Cause once and for all by removing all of these symbol's of oppressions, hatred, white supremacy, and the idea of people owning enslaved labor.
This flag, nee, "park" in general needs to be removed as well as the Sons of the Confederacy & Daughters of the Confederacy be listed as a for of hate group whose only concern is preserving white supremacy, hatred, discrimination, pain, and that the "negro" isn't equal to the white man. It's time to accept you lost the war and were on the wrong side of humanity that denigrated human life just because they came from another place and had different skin. It's the most SHAMEFUL part of American history as are the people whom celebrate it. read more