124
Colorado governor defends 'Don't Tread on Me' flag after student told to remove patch
(www.usatoday.com)
this post was submitted on 01 Sep 2023
124 points (91.3% liked)
politics
19223 readers
3114 users here now
Welcome to the discussion of US Politics!
Rules:
- Post only links to articles, Title must fairly describe link contents. If your title differs from the site’s, it should only be to add context or be more descriptive. Do not post entire articles in the body or in the comments.
Links must be to the original source, not an aggregator like Google Amp, MSN, or Yahoo.
Example:
- Articles must be relevant to politics. Links must be to quality and original content. Articles should be worth reading. Clickbait, stub articles, and rehosted or stolen content are not allowed. Check your source for Reliability and Bias here.
- Be civil, No violations of TOS. It’s OK to say the subject of an article is behaving like a (pejorative, pejorative). It’s NOT OK to say another USER is (pejorative). Strong language is fine, just not directed at other members. Engage in good-faith and with respect! This includes accusing another user of being a bot or paid actor. Trolling is uncivil and is grounds for removal and/or a community ban.
- No memes, trolling, or low-effort comments. Reposts, misinformation, off-topic, trolling, or offensive. Similarly, if you see posts along these lines, do not engage. Report them, block them, and live a happier life than they do. We see too many slapfights that boil down to "Mom! He's bugging me!" and "I'm not touching you!" Going forward, slapfights will result in removed comments and temp bans to cool off.
- Vote based on comment quality, not agreement. This community aims to foster discussion; please reward people for putting effort into articulating their viewpoint, even if you disagree with it.
- No hate speech, slurs, celebrating death, advocating violence, or abusive language. This will result in a ban. Usernames containing racist, or inappropriate slurs will be banned without warning
We ask that the users report any comment or post that violate the rules, to use critical thinking when reading, posting or commenting. Users that post off-topic spam, advocate violence, have multiple comments or posts removed, weaponize reports or violate the code of conduct will be banned.
All posts and comments will be reviewed on a case-by-case basis. This means that some content that violates the rules may be allowed, while other content that does not violate the rules may be removed. The moderators retain the right to remove any content and ban users.
That's all the rules!
Civic Links
• Congressional Awards Program
• Library of Congress Legislative Resources
• U.S. House of Representatives
Partnered Communities:
• News
founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
It sucks that the symbol is associated with assholes. I'm pretty left, but I've always liked the Don't Tread on Me flag.. The average person displaying this flag treads all over people's rights constantly, though.
The emphasis is on "Me"
Yeah. It's not an expression of mutual defense, it's an expression of self defense only.
It doesn't say "Don't tread on my neighbor."
It doesn't say "I won't tread on you." Snakes conveniently don't wear boots.
Hell, it doesn't even say "I'll stick up for my neighbor after they defend themselves from you."
It could be as simple as "Don't Tread on Us" but it's not. To be fair, the wording doesn't necessarily imply a selfish attitude, but the ones waving a flag definitely do,
As the French ladies used to say, I like Ben Franklin's snake better.
There is nothing inherently oppressive about saying "Don't tread on me.". Individual liberty does not beget an oppressive structure within the collective. An individual should not stand behind the flag in good conscience if the believe that their liberties trump those of others.
Being individually free does not necessitate an oppressive structure within the collective -- if all individuals are free, then the collective must also be free.
This seems like it should be true, but unfortunately game theory shows that it is not, due to coordination problems. It's possible for everyone to have individual free choice in their actions, and yet the collective to be incapable of making the choice that everyone would individually prefer it to make. The elementary example of this is the Prisoner's Dilemma.
Interestingly, real humans turn out to be better at resolving coordination problems than a purely selfish algorithm is.
The entire point of individualism is that it is opposed to collectivism.
Please consider reading for comprehension of whole sentences or paragraphs, rather than just recognizing single words. The above comment isn't about individualism vs. collectivism as doctrines.
Your original point is fundamentally flawed, though. The individual has no freedom of choice if the collective is making decisions for the individual. I am also not understanding how this is analogous to the prisoner's dilemma.
You still seem to be looking to have an "individualism vs. collectivism" fight that isn't happening here, and it seems to be that you're reading a bunch of extra stuff into my words that I didn't actually write there. I think we're done here. I do think you would do well to understand what a coordination problem is.
I would very much like to understand where my misinterpretations are. I aspire to improve my conversational skills. I apologize if I have offended you in some way -- offense is not my intent.
Would you mind elaborating?
One must still not forget that their liberties do not trump the liberties of others. Freedom is something we enjoy as a collective. If there is inequality in this then the collective is no longer free, but is, instead, oppressive.
In short, the Gadsden flag is not about one being free to trample on the rights of others, but, instead, upholding the freedoms of the collective by respecting the liberties of each unique individual. Inequality in freedom is oppression.
I really wish there was a campaign to take back the flag before it goes the way of the swastika. Although, Gadsen himself was a terrible racist and heavily involved in the slave trade, so might be tough to claim the flag with his name attached to it.
The fact that you have stated this shows that there is a grassroots desire for this movement. If you truly wish to restore the flag -- as I do -- then you mustn't wait for someone else to do it for you, but, instead, you should take action yourself; stand up for what you believe in.
The American flag is also at risk of being overtaken by insurrectionists and other morons. Time to take the American flag back from these fools.
Same in Canada. Traditionally we aren't as flag waving as our southern cousins unless its Canada day or international sporting events but the anti-jab and the Convoy types took over the Canadian flag to be displayed with F*ck Trudeau and Trump flags to make displaying the Canada flag mean you're with them.
Canada does have a tradition of voting governments out, not in, so some of it is understandable when many blame their personal woes on the current government of the day but this was beyond the usual BS.
I totally feel this way too. Because of the dukes of hazard even the confederate flag did not seem to bad back when the kkk seemed dead and you would think no one would be actually proud of what the flag represented but then the world turned upsidedown.
Yeah I get it. Seemed like the “confederate flag“ was just a southern pride post civil war thing. Hell the damn flag wasn’t even really part of the confederacy and was just a battle flag. The stars and bars, which was more of a flag of the confederacy, like like a cross between and early Tennessean flag and the original flag of the US.
But somewhere along the way it came to symbolize racist pieces of shit that wanted slavery to return.
Yeah there are so many things I thought pretty much gone in the world and woa suddenly they are back and folks are actually serious about it. Next up phrenology being a thing.
Well at least you're in good company. The swastika/whirling log is noted as one of the oldest complex symbols in use by human cultures. 10s of thousands of years as a symbol of good tidings in the Americas/Europe/Asia. And 20 to 30 years in the hands of fascist bigots tainted it globally for at least the next hundred years.
It's not uncommonly used in Buddhism. I don't see it all over the place, but seeing it is completely unremarkable. Just from anecdotal experience I can still say pretty confidently that nobody gives a fuck.
It's a symbol that was regularly used in human cultures around the world that had no contact. Even the Navajo in the United States had a version of it. But in the Modern Age if you display it openly people are only going to tend to view it one way. And they will give a fuck. And it won't be based on your viewpoints.
The many histories of the symbol pre Hitler are deep and interesting. But his regime tainted it for most people for at least the rest of our lives and probably our children's lives if not further.
I have seen it in Thailand, however where I did see it was on much older stuff I noticed. So you got a point, even cultures not really involved in WW2 or the aftermath of it seem like they don't want to touch it.
The Navajo Nation here in the Americas who are on the other side of the world and came up with the symbol before recorded history on their own. And even fought with us many times against the nazis. Dropped the use of it for many of their cultural things. Hopefully someday it will outlive the stigma and be something that can be used culturally as it should be.
I don't doubt that they did. It just seems like something anyone drawing would randomly come up on. I am just saying what I saw there.
Fascists tend to ruin things.
I would suggest rewriting this statement as follows:
"It sucks that the symbol gets associated with assholes."
This does, of course, depend on which "assholes" that you are referring to; however, the bottom line is that the Gadsden flag is a symbol that represents ideas of individual liberty, and resistance to authoritarianism. If it gets mistakenly co-opted by individuals that do not share these values, that does not change what the flag fundamentally represents, but, instead, that which it gets associated with.
It depends on how you are defining "left-wing" but I would that the Gadsden flag's symbolism is not mutually exclusive with being "left-wing". At a fundamental level, the Gadsden flag represents ideas of rejecting authoritarianism and supporting individual liberty. So long as one's beliefs align with this, then they can fly the flag without compunction.
This statement is pure conjecture.
Cry cry cry