Op-Ed: What's So Offensive About the American Flag?

As a six-year veteran who served America honorably, and having seen some of the darker corners of this earth, to me Old Glory represents much of what is good in the world, freedom and equality in particular. So why do so many in the US find it offensive?

UPDATE: Oak Apartments has lifted the flag ban. Way to stuff 'em, Patriots! Hope Springs Eternal :) This will be my last piece for Digital Journal for awhile, so I wanted to cover an issue that has been both making news and making my blood boil: what exactly is it that far too many Americans find so offensive about the American flag that they feel it must be removed or taken down under penalty of law, threats of job loss and even eviction? Let's start with two cases that have made the news most recently. First up, the order by the management of the Oak Apartments in Albany, Oregon to all residents in the complex that all American flags must be taken down because "the flags could be offensive because they live in a diverse community." What "diverse" residents are those, pray tell? Rabid multiculturalists and PC types? Unhappy immigrants? Communists? Marxists? Anti-American anarchists? Management won't say. Nor will they address the glaring and self-evident fact that those "diverse" residents all live under one flag. Fortunately, many Oak residents are taking a stand. Some are even risking eviction over the issue. Bravo!

Iwo Jima memorial

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The second case, now posted on Drudge, involves a Philadelphia firefighter who was suspended from his job for refusing to take down an American flag sticker off of his locker. Suspended! See, a new department rule, implemented after some firefighters posted offensive union, political and even racist cartoons on their lockers, mandates that all firefighters strip all stickers off their lockers to avoid even the appearance of offending anyone. At this time, the matter is being deliberated by the firefighters' union and the department. But because of one American flag sticker on one firefighter's locker that somebody might find offensive, Philadelphia has one less fully qualified fireman available to do his most critical job. Lives could be at risk here. Does that situation even approach the borders of sanity? What have we come to in America, that our own flag is considered by some an offensive eyesore that must be removed by whatever means necessary? For many of you outside America, I know your reasons for hating it. They're the same for many inside America who despise it as well. There is no shortage of reasons, both real and imagined. Columbus killing the Indians. Federal troops tainting Indian blankets with smallpox. Slavery. American Imperialism. Banana republic puppeteering. The Shah, as if the Islamist extremist dictatorship in Iran is any real improvement.

indymedia.org

Protesters Beaten by revolutionary guards on the Streets of Tehran.

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People will see what they want to see in it, just as the outside world is a reflection of whatever they choose to see. But my own reflection from that American flag in my mind represents the best that mankind has to offer today: near-unlimited freedoms and boundless opportunities, which Americans have sacrificed oceans of blood and treasure over our history to defend and preserve. American generosity, as so clearly illustrated in the postwar Marshall Plan to rebuild Europe, and of more recent selfless American aid to victims of the Indonesian tsunami and Pakistan earthquake victims. The list is endless. I will never apologize for that flag. Is America perfect? Far from it. What nation is? Russia? China? Germany? Japan? Cuba? Venezuela? Zimbabwe? Iran? Sudan? Name me one. But having seen some of the darker corners of this earth, I will take that flag over any other on this planet any day of the week. And I can guaran-damn-tee you, the nearly one thousand Vietnamese boat people I helped pull out of the South China Sea in 1982 as a crew member aboard the aircraft carrier USS Midway could not have been happier to see that flag coming their way.

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When I see Old Glory, I see Northern troops dying by the thousands at Gettysburg to rid our country of the blight of slavery. I see the raising of the flag on Iwo Jima as American troops fought back the pestilence of bloody Japanese Imperialism that left millions enslaved, brutalized and massacred throughout the Pacific Rim. I see the graveyards in Europe full of tens of thousands of American soldiers sacrificed to free that continent from the strangling grip of Nazism, and the armies that remained to preserve those precious new freedoms from Stalinist tyranny that blanketed Eastern Europe under a crushing Iron Curtain for fifty years. Call me a jingoistic nationalist Imperialist if you like. It doesn't change the history or the facts on the ground today as far as I'm concerned. America remains the Shining City on a Hill. Yet even as someone who loves that flag dearly, the same one that flew over my father as he landed on the beaches of Normandy during the time of the D-Day invasion, I believe it should be permissible that protesters be able to burn it. That is one of many distasteful freedoms I must tolerate as an American, if I truly believe in what that flag represents.

Jennifer Parr

U.S. flag set on fire in New Hampshire on the eve of the 2008 election

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In essence, that is what it all comes down to. Tolerance, a word that seems to have an Orwellian Alice In Wonderland-like quality to it today. After all, isn't "tolerance" the reason the Oak Apartment managers and Philadelphia Fire Department are giving as reasons to take down Old Glory? How is that tolerant? What about my sensibilities? Can't they be tolerated too? Or is tolerance an anti-American one-way street these days? Hell, I see Puerto Rican, Brazilian and Dominican flags flying all over the place where I live. Wouldn't dream of telling people to pull those down! They're entitled to their national pride. Aren't I in my own nation? I would be curious to hear the views of other Americans on this issue, both for and against. I am not saying that if the American flag offends you, you cannot speak your mind. Free country, last I checked. But the exit doors to America are wide open, and you are free to leave at any time our flag becomes so offensive you can't stand looking at it anymore. I guarantee you a lot more people will be coming the other way to fully appreciate and take advantage of the freedoms and opportunities this nation and that flag represent.

Kurt Moses

A stand at the Immigrant Resource Fair

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As an aside, I would like those of you living outside the United States to personalize the issue yourselves. What do love about what your country's flag represents? And how offended would you be if fellow citizens in your country demanded they be taken down from public view because some might find them "offensive"? Discuss amongst yourselves. I'm off to chase the American Dream. Guess under which flag?