🚀 go-pugleaf

crawfsh@anet-dfw.com wrote:
> 
> There are three ANTI-Confederate websites now.
> 
>   <snip>
>
> The controversy over the Confederate flag has been across the south.
> Follow up postings should be in soc.culture.african.american
> 
You'll pardon me for not trimming posts to just
soc.culture.african.american, but I don't read that group.  There are
about thirty or so news groups in my browser list and I don't have time
to even scan the subject lines of more than a dozen on a regular basis.

Yes, I took a look at those three sites.  

The first is actually a web page on Frederick Douglas which appears to
be well done, and just happens to have a couple of links to reasonable,
well-balanced articles regarding the flag logos on NC license plates,
and on the debate whether blacks fought for the Confederacy.  All in
all, I liked the site, while not necessarily agreeing with all the
linked articles there.

The second is indeed an anti-flag site.  A quote from it impeaches the
site's quality far better than I could,

                    WHAT THE CONFEDERATE FLAG REPRESENTS

            THE CONFEDERATE FLAG IS A SYMBOL, A SYMBOL OF BEING
             IMMORAL, A SYMBOL OF A SHAMEFUL HERITAGE, A SYMBOL
             OF PASS [sic] AND PRESENT MURDER AND DEATH, A SYMBOL OF
             HATE, A SYMBOL OR [sic] BEING MENTALLY ILL, A SYMBOL OF
              LAZINESS, A SYMBOL OF CONFEDERATE SOLDIERS THAT
            LOST THEIR LIVES FOR NOTHING, AND FOREMOST A SYMBOL
                          OF A BATTLE AGAINST GOD.

You'd think they could at least proof their theme statement!  ("A symbol
of laziness"?????)

The third site proclaims itself an "anti-Neo-Confederacy" site (if I
were willing to concede there is a substantial "Neo-Confederacy"
movement, I would be opposed to it, but I think believe this site
greatly exaggerates the movement's popularity and influence).  While it
does have a section on flags, the anti-flag essays there actually seem
to refute the attacks against the familiar confederate "battle flag"
more than they support them.

So, of the three "ANTI-Confederate" sites, one is a commendable
historical site about Douglas, one really is "ANTI-Confederate" and
relatively well done, but I believe it exaggerates the influence of the
movement it attacks, and the third is an inflamatory piece of trash!

So, while I find the Civil War endlessly fascinating, I am glad the
Union was preserved; I consider Lincoln to be among our greatest
presidents, along with Washington, ANDREW Johnson, and Ronald Reagan.

I believe that Carter probably ranks up there with Washington in terms
of personal integrity (with Nixon, LYNDON Johnson, and Clinton at the
other end of the scale), but may have been our most ineffectual
president ever, due to naivite and excessive micro-management.

I don't own a Confederate flag and have no desire to display one, but I
believe those who demonize it do themselves a serious injustice.  I
recognize the value of symbols, but this is one with a real positive
balance and the negative side has been largely manufactured.  

There are a lot more important issues in our time, such as finding a way
to a democratic world government before the human race self-destructs;
sorting out the real environmental dangers from the hype by
organizations like Greenpeace and the Sierra Club that are mostly
motivated to increase their own power and influence; learning what
causes so many male children--black and white alike--to develop into
violent, aggressive adults which are a constant danger to their families
and society at large, and how to prevent it; finding a way to forge a
permanent check upon the abuse of governmental power, before the new
information technology provides a means to realize _1984_ and _Brave New
World_ after all; and figuring out how to continue the gradual
civilizing of society while countering the effect of producing a
population of naive fanatics with their various "kook" causes such as
animal rights activism, anti-Confederate Flag movements,
anti-cholesteral bomb squads, etc.

		Harry Miller