One of my Black colleagues shared the photo below during a recent trip to Ohio. I know I experience a visceral reaction when I see that flag flying. I can’t imagine what it’s like to be black and pass it on a holiday road trip. Like driving into enemy territory, I suppose.
The lower Midwest feels awfully “southern” at times. Between the local dialect and conservative attitudes, it would be easy to think you were in Tennessee, or Georgia. I often have to remind myself these states fought on the side of the Union. The Union, winners of the Civil War. Maybe that’s the question we should be asking presidential candidates: “Who won the Civil War?” Because the resurgence of the Confederate flag every generation or so begs the question, are we forgetting our history? As someone born and educated in the north, I learned that THE NORTH won the Civil War over the SOUTH. I’m sure the story is more nuanced as taught in the southern states, but setting that aside, I always thought kids from former Union states would have learned this too.
That’s why scenes like Confederate battle flags raised over Ohio homes break my brain. Ohio’s capital is home to a pro sports franchise whose very name is drawn from the state’s history supplying Union soldiers. Yet the Confederate flag persists in this state, as well as in its Union neighbor Indiana. I’ve been told, even here, that it represents “heritage”, which is certainly ahistorical, if not downright laughable. Whose heritage? Not those Hoosiers whose forefathers died for the Union. Not the Black and Native descendants of slaves and displaced First Nations. “Heritage” is just a romantic euphemism for antebellum white pride.
I once saw this head-scratcher of a decal on the back window of of pickup truck. So much for “These colors don’t run.” Apparently, they do run. Into treachery.
(indistinct chatter) 