Today's Civil War

I've recently joined a writer's group. This is a segment from a book that is currently being written by one of the other members, and will probably conflict with many people's political standings and ideology. What do you think?

August 7, 2005

Chapter Seventeen, Toothpicks and Rebel Flags

Guess what! The Civil War is over. As great, as tragic, as marvelous, as wonderful, as memorable as it was: It is over. Let’s move on.

Think about whom you know today that displays a rebel flag; actually, as a rule, you see, as I understand it, the Confederate Battle flag. Where do you see them? What kind of people displays them and where are they displayed?

Yes, I was born in the south and the Confederacy is a part of my heritage. So are typhoid, small pox and racism. Today when you see the rebel flag, it is in many, if not most cases, a symbol of racism.

When this argument first came to light I was somewhat up in arms too, so to speak. I then did what I am asking Americans to do. I gave it some thought. The argument is right on target. The rebel flag when displayed today is done so as a symbol of racism in almost every case. If you think I am wrong, and some of you will, look at the people displaying it. Look where it is displayed. Yes, I know a state or two still has it as part of its official stuff. I hope that too will pass.

I drive a pickup truck, without stickers, I own guns, not in the back window of the pickup and I occasionally use a toothpick in private rather than in public. That is a stereotype, no question about it. Think about it.

What was the Confederacy about? What was the Civil War about? Who knows? Oh my goodness! Almost everybody knows, or thinks he/she knows what the Civil War was about. States’ Rights, right? Slavery, right? Please remember that history can be wrong too. Some history, I suspect, was written from the perspective of the writer and in some cases with more opinion than fact. I grew up believing that the Civil War was about state’s rights. My black friends would tell me in a heartbeat that I was full of crap; the Civil War was about slavery. I don’t know and I am proud to be able to admit that.

I do know: The civil war was a tragic occurrence in our country’s history and it demonstrated a total breakdown in the principles on which this country was founded. It proved that people operate on their beliefs without regard for others and without much thought about rightness or consequences. Seems to me the US has done the same in Iraq.

Things haven’t changed much in those regards. Today, we still see people operating on their beliefs without much thought or regard for others. Albert Switzer supposedly was asked “Doctor what is wrong with men today?” He replied: “Men don’t think”. Amen.

Of course, in those days, the male dogma was used. I would say today that men and women don’t think.

Abraham Lincoln said, “The dogmas of the quiet past are inadequate to the stormy present”. I believe this statement to be as true today as when he said it over a hundred years ago.

We can’t possibly deal with this stormy present until we stop fighting the Civil War. The north won that one; the union was preserved. Get over it.

If you want to fly a flag today other than the Stars and Stripes try one that says, “bush lied and people died”. (I still can’t bring myself to capitalize that word when referring to W, the shrub.)