It is time to end this madness. 14 years old I voted to keep the Mississippi State flag because I was young and dumb. I am older and a littler wiser now. I don't look at history through rose colored glasses, either. I don't tell myself pretty little lies to make myself feel better. No matter how you slice it that symbol on the Mississippi State flag stands for division, hatred, control, power, and (yes) racism. The symbol might have stood for other things in the past and might stand for other things for some people today, but that flag divides our nation just as the institution of slavery did 150 years old.
People took that flag and made it into a symbol in the 1950s that we should not want to be a part of. It was made to symbolize white control over blacks...the stoppage of Civil Rights legislation by the Dixiecrats. Today it still symbolizes control. People are fighting for control over not to change it because it represents the past....Our heritage, they say. Heritage....heritage of what dominance over another human being????? Slavery may have been over a long time ago, but the dominance of whites over blacks wasn't. Heritage of hate crimes perpetuated by cowards disguised in whites robes???? Heritage of denying basic constitutional rights to our own citizens because we might lose control????? Is this the heritage we are so desperate trying to save....to connect to the present.....to refuse to lie in the past????? Are we not willing to change an image to change our image???? to show the world the real Mississippi....the present-day Mississippi? Or is it that we haven't changed at all?????
People are saying that there is no need to change the flag because it won't change people's hearts. that statement is very true. I am afraid, judging by the comments being made, Mississippi hasn't changed all that much in the past 60 years. People are having a hard time distinguishing history from past. Myths and misunderstandings are being told as gospel truths. The under educated are vocalizing the loudest. Maybe that's why people are so against this change....has been no real change of heart in Mississippi. I really had thought Mississippi had let go of the past and put it nicely in the history books to stay. I had begun to think Mississippi had moved past the ugliest of her history, but I guess not.
There is no other way to describe this symbol or Mississippi's past, but as a heritage of hate. No matter how many Southern Rock bands try to make it a Southern Pride symbol. There is just too much history wrapped up into this to cause anything but division. But nice try, Lynyrd Skynyrd.
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