The
roots of the Stars and Stripes run deep in the African Diasporaic experience.
Long before the first Confederate Battle Flag was stitched black
slaves landed in New Amsterdam, then a Dutch settlement on the
tip of what is now Manhattan in 1626. When Mrs. Ross sewed the first U.S. flag
in 1776 the English slave trade was over a century old. From 1776 to the end of
slavery in North America, the flag, originally designed by George Washington,
flew proudly for eighty-nine years as a sponsor of slavery. The U.S. ended the
Confederates’ brief four year history as a slave nation with the Emancipation
Proclamation in 1864. Slavery was finally made illegal in all of the United
States and territories with the passage of the 13th Amendment in
1865, only to have an American Apartheid legal system take its place. A
segregated culture prevailed until 1954 when the United States’ Supreme Court
ruled in the Brown v. Topeka Board of Education that ‘separate but
equal’ was a contradiction in terms, and unequal treatment under the 14th
Amendment. Of course, the struggle for equality for all citizens under the law
did not end with that, but it gave momentum to the Civil Rights Movement and
those movements that followed.
Times
have changed, but a lot remains the same. Both European Americans and African
Americans have called me a nigger. I have been followed in stores. I have been
told, "you don’t sound Black." I have been asked on several
occasions while shopping in K-Mart, Wal-Mart, or some other store if I worked
there, when I did not have a red vest on, or a smiley face, name tag or anything
else that would identify me as working in the store. I guess I just have that
sales associate kind of look. I have been asked to leave a bar, because "we
don’t like your kind hanging around here." I have been ignored and then
watched as a person with white skin was promptly helped. I have watched people
cross the street to avoid walking near me. I have been told "no
vacancy" in an apartment complex when I knew one existed. People I had
never met, full of condescension, have called me "boy". Fortunately
my brown skin has not brought me physical harm. But the constant stories seen
and heard of African-American men being stopped and killed by the police, or
attacked by white supremacists, causes me to pray to be kept safe from criminals and those sworn to protect me. Since I have dealt with living in
America as a "Black" person all my life I have gotten used to it.
Yet
through the beating of Rodney King, the dragging death of James Byrd, the
killings of Amadou Diallo and Patrick Dorismond, the murder of Matthew Shepard,
the rapes, domestic violence and overall societal oppression of women, and the
indifference to children, somehow freedom bleeds through. In my mother’s house
we were taught God, family and country. We were taught to not to be ashamed of
our slave heritage, but to feel the strength of our ancestors and see how that
power lives on in us. Our mother taught us to respect human dignity and fight
for freedom. As a consequence, I am an American patriot. I believe in our basic
ideals of freedom: self-government, constitutional democracy, and inalienable
rights. My actions as an American patriot are not centered on defense of borders
and United States’ political interest. Creating a more perfect union that
mirrors our stated ideals of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness for all
people drives my patriotism. I expect to see our nation act in ways that support
these principles and I resist actions that do not.
I
have been told by some of my Brothers and Sisters that I have been brainwashed
by the "White" man to believe in his system. They tell me I am stupid
to believe in a country that has caused so much pain in the lives of dark
skinned people. They chastise me for defending a system that today treats me,
and so many others, as less than equal citizens. I share these feelings of anger
and understand why many around the world and here at home see the United States
flag as a symbol of oppression.
The
two flags vividly illustrate DuBois’ thesis: "One ever feels his
two-ness, -an American, a Negro, two souls, two thoughts, two un-reconciled
strivings; two warring ideas in one dark body, whose dogged strength alone keeps
it from being torn asunder." My anxiety is born of this dual
relationship. The naked truth that the freedom of the United States was born on
the backs of my ancestors, both First Nation People whose land was conquered and
African slaves who made the land agriculturally productive. The story of the
United States of America is one of great achievements and untellable horrors. It
is a nation that has afforded tremendous blessing to some people and at the same
time damned others to a life of unconscionable evil. The anxiety I feel is with
the near truth of Pax Americana and all the good and bad that goes along with
it. For when all is said and done, I am an American.
So
how do I reconcile the horror of genocide and slavery to be proud I am a citizen
of the United States of America? Ask any immigrant, no matter what the color.
With all our problems and dysfunctions, we live in a nation of opportunity and
promise. The United States shines in the world as the beacon of freedom. It is
my duty to honor my ancestors’ sacrifices by ensuring that the nation that was
born in their blood and built on their bones continues to grow towards that more
perfect union. I have no choice. I count myself as one of the brave.
FYI:
A Confederate Battle Flag now flies on a 30-foot pole directly in front of the
Capitol at the South Carolina Soldier Memorial.
Confederate
Battle Flag facts
U
S Flag facts
