The Confederate flag

[hippie_hunter]

The abolitionists were considered radicals. Most non-Southerners simply opposed supporting slavery. They didn't care much what went on in the South.

Most were the way you say, it's exactly why Abraham Lincoln was able to get elected. But the Abolition Movement was dominated by the more radical members. And then you had people like John Brown making the image of Abolitionists even worse in the South. As the saying goes about movements: "You're only as good as your worst member." Southern views on the Abolition Movement were not based on the typical moderate opponent of slavery like Abraham Lincoln, they were based on John Brown, William Lloyd Garrison, Henry David Thoreau, Harriet Beecher Stowe, etc.

The South expecting the rest of the country to support their wicked laws was just another example of Southern refusal to compromise in any way.

But again, the American Abolition Movement, hardened them to the point of no compromise. And again, the Abolition Movement was also, just as uncompromising. The uncompromising argument works when one party doesn't want to compromise. It doesn't work when both parties are equally uncompromising.

Just because the Abolition Movement was in the moral right, doesn't change the fact that what they demanded of the South, is essentially what you're criticizing the South for.

Lincoln's administration even pitched compensated emancipation to the loyal slave states, and they said hell no. Lincoln also gave similar terms to the Southern states, and they didn't even respond.

By the time Lincoln came to power, it was too little, too late. Restitution would have worked in the 1830's and 1840's. By the 1850's, the Civil War was pretty much inevitable.

Also, the South and slave owners had no reason to trust Lincoln. Even though Lincoln was a moderate on the slave issue, he was guilty by association for being a Republican. The Republican Party doomed its image in the South due to John C. Fremont and other Republican politicians.

The South was even more intransigent than it is now.

Intransigence is created for a reason. People just aren't intransigent for no reason at all. When you're treated like an *******, you're not going to be very receptive to the person who is doing that. In a lot of ways, the South is doing the exact same thing today because progressive elitists just enjoy looking down upon the South without actually understanding the South.

 

[Thundercrack85]

I have no sympathy for the South. It has always been contrarian for the sake of being contrarian. They acted like children in 1860. Rather than admit the game was up as was apparent to everyone, they turned over the board and pitched a four year fit that cost 600,000 American lives.

And the kicker is that they learned nothing from it. Cut to 1964, and the rest of the country had to force them to do the right thing at gunpoint again.

Only now, in 2015, are some Southern states taking the damn flags of treason down.

 

[hippie_hunter]

I have no sympathy for the South.

I'm not expecting you to have sympathy for the South. Their reasons for secession and war were absolutely abhorrent. Frank Underwood says it best in regards to the Confederacy: "Avoid wars you can't win and never raise your flag for an asinine cause like slavery."

But what I am saying is that you can separate the reasoning from the awful ideology behind it.

It has always been contrarian for the sake of being contrarian. They acted like children in 1860. Rather than admit the game was up as was apparent to everyone, they turned over the board and pitched a four year fit that cost 600,000 American lives.

No, the Civil War wasn't fought because the South was being contrarian for absolutely no reason. People are rational and the rationality will always overcome the few bad irrational apples.

The fact is that the Civil War was inevitable by the 1850's. The North and the South were politically, economically, and culturally so different and they kept on provoking one another. The South also saw that the game was indeed up. The balance of power between Free and Slave states tipped heavily in favor of the North and they feared that their way of life was in danger of being dominated by the politically dominant and economically superior North.

And the kicker is that they learned nothing from it. Cut to 1964, and the rest of the country had to force them to do the right thing at gunpoint again.

Maybe if the North handled Reconstruction a bit better (Lincoln's way as opposed to the Radical Republican way), 1964 probably wouldn't have needed to happen.

Only now, in 2015, are some Southern states taking the damn flags of treason down.

Ummmmmmm......no. I would say that your attitude is pretty much the exact reason why the South acts like the South. When a group of people are persistently looked down upon in the most smug and condescending way, it doesn't create an ideal situation. People tend to resist change when they're being told to change in the rudest way possible.

 

[MydnightPhoenix]

As a black person I am insulted by the flag. But as an American it also angers me. It does seem anti American in some ways.