But for the response to the shooting of nine people in an historic Charleston, S.C., church, the Mother Emanuel AME Church, to so quickly and heavily become a call for the flag's removal by many just seems shocking to me.
Again, it needs to come down, sooner rather than later.
But it is such a distraction for these calls to come less than 24 hours after the deaths of the church, much of its leadership, which includes its senior pastor, a S.C. state senator.
Those who defend the flag say it is a symbol of their heritage. Some even say it is a symbol of our joined heritage. Nonsense.
Even if we grant that it is a symbol of the shared history of South Carolina and all South Carolinians, why just THAT flag? Why just THAT period of our our history?
South Carolina had more military engagements during the Revolutionary War than any other state, perhaps more than all the other states combined. The defeat of the British that ended the war was of a general who had been kicked out of South Carolina by assorted small-time skirmishes and a few key battles.
Why doesn't the "heritage" crowd fly any flag of that period of our past? Why isn't a "Don't Tread ON Me" flag flying at the State House?
The heritage crowd that is such a force in South Carolina politics makes a deliberate choice, all the time, to "honor" and remember that struggle and that period of time, when South Carolina separated from the United States of America, became it's own nation again, briefly, and joined the Confederate States of America, all in an effort to preserve its institution of slavery.
It wasn't about states' rights. It was about the state of South Carolina's right to continue owning slaves. Just read the South Carolina Declaration of Secession. It is vile, and the words slaves and slavery are used repeatedly in all of its arguments.
Again, I believe the flag should come down. I am from the North originally, and ALL my people were in Ireland being repressed by the English at the time of the Civil War, so it's not my heritage.
But the shooting in Charleston, I think, makes a more compelling argument for the flag staying right where it is.
Because it is a symbol, but we really do not realize what it symbollizes.
I think most good, honest, God-fearing South Carolinians do not support it and are horrified by the shootings. Almost all would say they could never condone such a thing, nor excuse it, nor try to say it was something it wasn't. I think they do not support the flag, or do not care one way or another about it.
But the flag should be there, a symbol, and a warning, that this kind of evil exists. Evil is here, and is among us.
Leave it up, as a warning.
The flag, not just what it symbolizes, but what is actually is, is some words.
"Through me is the way into the woeful city; through me is the way into eternal woe; through me is the way among the lost people," as the words on the Gate of Hell in Dante's Inferno say, so says the Confederate flag.
Now is the time to learn about and mourn the dead, slaughtered like lambs in an act of evil.
We need to learn a little about this thing that committed the act. He wasn't born wanting to do this.
We live either in a society that teaches it, or he had some instructors in his hate.
We need to put him behind bars and hope he never sees the light of day again. I think his life should be forfeit, certainly, but in a long time.
It should be long, because I think that we should find a way to come together as a people, to be one, and to not only deny him the race war he sought, but show that he did what he did for nothing nothing that he wanted.
But that will take time, I am sure. So I think the calls for the removal of the flag should be put on hold, at least for a while.
Because that flag, while it flies, says more succinctly than anything else, one simple fact.
"Abandon all hope, ye who enter here."
ADDENDUM: I had yesterday read a column in The State newspaper about "what we can learn from the shooting" in terms of the relations amongst S.C. legislators. The suspect had barely been identified at the time and not yet arrested, and I thought, man, we already have lessons learned? The writer made a good point or two, but I thought it was just too early.
And I might come across as a bit hypocritical with my post here, except part of my point is that it is not yet a day after this tragedy, but we are already turning their deaths into a call to remove a piece of cloth.
So my post comes from the same place as my objection to that column.
Another addition, I might say that I should have known Sen. Clementa Pinckney better. I knew of him. But I never met him. He was the state representative for Allendale County when I was the editor of the late Allendale County Citizen Leader newspaper. And he was elected to the Senate while I was still in Barnwell/Allendale. We just never crossed paths.
My great former reporter Chrissy Edgemon got to know him at the paper then at Allendale County ALIVE and USC-Salkehatchie. She attests to his character and that's all I need to know.
We've lost a good man.
As for the other eight, what I know is they died in church, praying and learning about their faith.
I don't think they were targeted for their faith, but dying in the act of their faith makes them martyrs.
"Truly, this day (they) shall be with me in Paradise."
ADDENDUM: I had yesterday read a column in The State newspaper about "what we can learn from the shooting" in terms of the relations amongst S.C. legislators. The suspect had barely been identified at the time and not yet arrested, and I thought, man, we already have lessons learned? The writer made a good point or two, but I thought it was just too early.
And I might come across as a bit hypocritical with my post here, except part of my point is that it is not yet a day after this tragedy, but we are already turning their deaths into a call to remove a piece of cloth.
So my post comes from the same place as my objection to that column.
Another addition, I might say that I should have known Sen. Clementa Pinckney better. I knew of him. But I never met him. He was the state representative for Allendale County when I was the editor of the late Allendale County Citizen Leader newspaper. And he was elected to the Senate while I was still in Barnwell/Allendale. We just never crossed paths.
My great former reporter Chrissy Edgemon got to know him at the paper then at Allendale County ALIVE and USC-Salkehatchie. She attests to his character and that's all I need to know.
We've lost a good man.
As for the other eight, what I know is they died in church, praying and learning about their faith.
I don't think they were targeted for their faith, but dying in the act of their faith makes them martyrs.
"Truly, this day (they) shall be with me in Paradise."
