You need to watch this. William Flowers, a man from Georgia, came to a demonstration in Jackson, MS, as a leader in the effort to defend the Mississippi flag, which features an emblem of the Confederate Battle Flag. He leads the self-described southern nationalist group, League of the South.
This interview is not simply someone with a video camera. This is Mississippi Public Broadcasting interviewing a spokesman for the organized protest.
Cartoon posted with permission, copyright Clayton Jones. Claytoonz.com
The man speaks of the cultural attack on southern heritage as a genocide. That is the language and strategy of the Ku Klux Klan. As I mentioned in an earlier post, I returned home from Germany this August to find a message on my answering machine from a Presidential candidate arguing for a fight against the genocide of the white race. This man refers to genocide of southerners, which is novel, at least to my experience.
The argument reminds me of a powerful cartoon by Clay Jones, on right, featuring an African American man carrying a shot child, grieving silently, next to a wailing southern white man carrying his Confederate Battle Flag, in a shape resembling the child on left.
When asked about secession, Flowers openly advocates for it. He is explicitly a secessionist, who then says that he’d prefer a political solution. That sounds like a threat to me.
If you ever needed a demonstration that the Confederate Battle Flag is divisive, this fellow made it crystal clear. He refers to heritage, then dismisses any relation to slavery. He’s unhinged. We have this stuff scanned and online now. Mississippi’s first statement explaining its causes for secession says that slavery was its fundamental cause.
If you’ve visited my site before, you know where I stand on this. If you haven’t check out:
- “Sometimes Heritage Does Harm,”
- “Racism Defies the ‘Greatest Commandment’,”
- “What a Flag Has to Do with Justice,” and
- “Governor, Take Down the Flag“
But seriously, watch this first:
It’s 7.5 minutes long, but you can get the most important stuff within the first 3 minutes.
If you haven’t already, visit and “like” my Facebook author page and connect with me on Twitter (@EricTWeber).
Episode 3 of Philosophy Bakes Bread is out! It’s called “Coping with Uncertainty.” You can listen to it here, visit the
iTunes has it too, though for some reason as I post this the episodes are out of order.
“Acceptance & Happiness with Stoicism”
This first episode of Philosophy Bakes Bread presents a very personal story about how stoic philosophy can make a profound difference for the better in our lives when we encounter difficulties beyond our control.
The transcript for this episode is available here.
Check out the other episodes of Philosophy Bakes Bread here.
Finally, if you’d prefer to “watch” the podcast on YouTube, here it is:
If you prefer that format, here’s a playlist of the podcast episodes on my YouTube channel.