The Confederate flag is currently tied to national turmoil surrounding race and identity. But some people see it as “an act of rebellion,” reports The Washington Post. Take Greg Cler for example, a man who grew up in Illinois and has a Confederate flag hanging from his garage. He thinks the flag is a fitting symbol of white people’s shared grievances, which have a new resonance today.
“I proudly fly it like I do the American flag,” he told The Post, which writes he then nodded to the “two red, white and blue banners — representing opposing sides of the country’s bloodiest conflict — waving in synchrony above his head.”
The Confederate flag is grounded in the history of slavery and segregation in the South. Recently, there have been calls to eradicate it from statehouses, vehicle license plates and store shelves. However, the banner has been embraced far from its founding region. Some people, The Post writes, thinks that the country under President Barack Obama put the needs of minorities before theirs.
“It seemed like I wasn’t represented,” Cler said to The Post, while others “took advantage of the system.” To Cler, the flag represents 21st-century pride in a form of American identity that goes back to the white settlers of Appalachia. Others want to redefine patriotism as in the interests of white Americans.
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