People love to fight, that is what I have learned these past few months on Facebook. There is now a huge controversy about what people are calling the Confederate flag. It’s not actually the flag of the Confederacy, it is actually the battle flag of Tennessee. Not sure when it became the symbol of the whole Confederacy, I would have to look back into history and figure out that mystery.
My family fought on both sides, the Testermans were staunch Union supporters, the original Testerman came her to help form that Union. No way were they going to see it go down in flames. The Hammonds’, Finchers’ and Kemps’ were famously Confederate, even owning plantations and of course slaves. How these families managed to meet and marry is a story unto itself.
I can see both sides, I have both sides in my bloodline, taking away a symbol is not going to take away racism. But here’s the thing, there’s always a thing, there is no way I would fly what has become a symbol for the KKK in my yard. That battle flag belongs in history books and museums, the history of the Confederacy, the Civil War and everything that Southerners were trying to hold onto belongs in our history.
We must learn from our history, all of us, no matter the pigmentation of our skin, we have to look back and study it. So it can never happen again, we, as a country, have to come together and realize that none of us did the things our ancestors did.
I sincerely hope none of my friends judge me based on my family history, just as I do not judge them based on the history of their family. We all have things in our lineage we are not proud of, a crazy great-great-uncle who chopped up his wife (yes, that is in mine as well), that one relative who tells inappropriate stories to children at family gatherings. The one who drinks too much, the one that eats too much, the one that ends up in the penitentiary.
Let’s put this thing to rest and remember we are Americans, we are not our ancestors, we have to move forward. The media and the politicians want us divided, are we really going to allow them to do it over a flag? We have to take a stand, we have to remember that this is not the past and we have to stop blaming each other for the perceived failures of each other. The time is now, action is called for, stop burning flags, stop being disrespectful to each other. We are all human, we are all Americans, let’s send a message to the media and the politicians that we are standing together. Undivided, focused, on making this country great, on respecting our history, not repeating it, and we will no longer be easily distracted from their agenda.
Divide and conquer is their motto, ours should be a house divided is a house doomed to fall, together we stand, one for all and all for one. Clichéd sayings, this I know, however in this case incredibly apt.
Angie World 