Black Rappers and the Confederate Flag


K

kci

New Member
I don't really keep up with the music nearly as much as I did in the past. However, I have seen Lil Jon & Eastside's "Bia Bia" video and a commercial plugging Pastor Troy's new album on BET...and in both cases, the guys are prominently showing off the confederate battle flag :eek: How do you all feel about that? Are these rappers just expressing themselves the way they want to and its no big deal, or are they maybe "disrespecting" their own?

To be honest, I'm really puzzled as to why they want to do this, but at the same time, it's not necessarily my place to think any differently of them....right? :confused:
 
A Sign of the times...

MJG, and Outcast have done simular things with the confederate flag. I think it's a subliminal protest. If true white racist bigots see a bunch of bruthas waving it around as a "plaything" then they might shed it for their identity. It's funny too see a 30 year old white man claiming the flag is his Heritage.....Im like, uhh, unless you are a 220 year old former confederate soldier I can't seeing you claiming it as your heritage.
But I think they are doing it as kind of a subliminal protest. BTW, Mississippi was the only state that put it's Confederate flag to a vote to the people....every other state that abolished it did it as a legislative body. MS put it to the people and it passed by a 70 percent margin....BTW, a good number of blacks and native americans voted to keep that confederate emblem here, which is what shocked me. But our Gov. Ronnie Musgrove and Lt. Gov. Amy Tuck had the power to keep it in the MS legislature (both Dem. by the way). But they chose to save their proverbial political hides and say let's put it to a vote. Lil Jon and dem are from The Sip by the way.
 

I read an article pertaining to the issue and the idea to aknowledge the flag is a symbol of protest. I don't recall the complete article I think it was in VIBE Magazine. Some even changed the color of the flag to red black and green but the Stars and stripes remained the same.
Some things will never change.
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I have seen those covers also and wondered why; but then I figured they were sending some type of reverse message.

If they really want to get their attention...have it burning on the ground. :rolleyes:
 
A Simular Story

I used to be a commander in the Army a few years back. The majority of my enlisted soldiers lived in the barracks. They could display all sorts of posters and the like in their rooms. But a few white soldiers put up a few confederate flags in their rooms. A lot of the Black and Hispanic soldiers complained. Now, Soldiers barracks aint nuttin like you see in the movies. They are two steps above what you see on a college campus, they are better than honors dorm rooms and only have two guys (max) per room. So if you see a flag, then you have to go into someone else's room to do it. So as a result of soldiers complaints I had to address it to the highest level (the commanding General) cuz other units had simular complaints.
So as a result not only could soldiers no longer display confederate flags because they were considered offensive....bruthas with Jamacian, African, and Puerto Rican and Mexican flags had to remove theirs as well and only the U.S. Flag could be displayed.

My point is, any argments that you have for something offensive and want abolished can be made for something you see as heritage as well.
 
Re: A Simular Story

Originally posted by Makaho Bedrock
I used to be a commander in the Army a few years back. ........ So as a result of soldiers complaints I had to address it to the highest level (the commanding General) cuz other units had simular complaints.
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What size unit did you command that an incident like that had to be elevated to the Commanding General?
 
Re: Re: A Simular Story

Originally posted by BgJag


What size unit did you command that an incident like that had to be elevated to the Commanding General?
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Captains command at Company/Battery/Troop level. I commanded a Patriot Missle Battery which was 175 soldiers. The Barracks they lived in although under my command was installation property, So the commanding General governed "quality of life issues". The Army has a very formalized and autocratic structure (you can't ask someone in corporate America to go into a cave after Bin Laden) , If I had told those white soldiers to remove those flags without benefit of notifying the chain of command ,then not only would the same thing I previously stated (everybody removing any flag but the U.S.) occurred, then I would have been in deep ISHT as a result.
 
???????

MB, did this happen after the Fort Bragg incidents? One of my Frats and felllow Alcornite had several "SkinHeads" in his Company. That stuff was National Headlines.
 
Re: ???????

Originally posted by ALCORNITE 86
MB, did this happen after the Fort Bragg incidents? One of my Frats and felllow Alcornite had several "SkinHeads" in his Company. That stuff was National Headlines.
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AS a matter of fact it happend aboout 3 months before that incident. They also uncoverd a bunch of MP's at Ft. Huachuca, NM. that had been meeting on post in a building that was laden (inside with confederate and nazi ISHT) around that same time too.
 
Outstanding thread. These Threads are great!

So many interesting replies, I'll miss some.

First of all,,, where Makaho Bedrock goes on this thread is great.:lmao:

It would be so amusing to see those in black society which the white southerner despises the most, embrace their most sacrid symbols in parady, hyperbole or just flat totally flip-flop things where their sacrid symbols are the latest pop culture craze! I mean,,, I can just see it now,,,,, Luke dancers at spring break in Daytona in daisy-dukes with a rebel flag in the butt area,,, or black males in baggy jeans hanging below their hips with rebel flag boxers showing(or whatever the latest fad is that the general older populace, esp white, don't like to see.),,, lol!!:lmao:

but no,,, i'm just tripping, however I don't what the story is behind this if it is true. Would someone please give me the names of the albums, URLs and such,,, i would like to research this and gain more insight into the albums.
 
Here is MJG's album cover for "No More Glory"

00049410.jpg
 
Ive been meaning to get one and use it as a sweat rag, tucked in my back pocket just to piss white people off. If it really is about southern heritage, then I should be able to roll with mine.
 
OOOH, i seen that mug.

,,, to tell the truth,, i was a bit taken aback seeing black rappers with some confederate crap on their album, but after hearing the views in this thread,, i now find it amusing and would love to hear what's going through the heads of die-hard southern whites when they walk in the store and see the album cover.

No More Glory
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??

:lmao:

classic. just classic i say.
 
Re: OOOH, i seen that mug.

Originally posted by Bartram
,,, to tell the truth,, i was a bit taken aback seeing black rappers with some confederate crap on their album, but after hearing the views in this thread,, i now find it amusing and would love to hear what's going through the heads of die-hard southern whites when they walk in the store and see the album cover.

??

:lmao:

classic. just classic i say.
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What's even funnier than that Batram....
A few months back here in MS, the Klan marched in Brandon,MS.
There were a whopping 11 Klansmen marching.
About 50 Bruthas, Myself included....lined up along the march route and yelled out White Power, and Goosestepped in front of them in jest. They tried to yell some racial stuff back, but they was snuffed by the Bruthas and other white people that hated them too. It was hella funny..we turned their march into a farce, which is what I think the Hip Hop Genere' is doing with the Confederate Flag.
 
'sup? Ok, I had heard the same thing, about the brothas showcasing the flag as a protest...this is just me, but I can see the reverse happening, which is that you may have the rednecks, unaware of the "hidden meaning" behind what's going on, using this as an example or proof that the flag is ok - else, why are there black people, who are supposed to against the flag, wearing it or using it on album covers?

Have you ever seen a Jewish person wearing a T-shirt with a swastika on it? Or, say if you were to see a white person wearing something saying NAACP, Million Man March, Malcolm X, MLK Day, support HBCUs....Wouldn't your initial reaction be positive, because you'd figure it's a white person who has respect for your people? And would it make you any less pro-black if you were to find out later that that person were actually in the Klan and doing it as a protest?
 

Hey Mak Bedrock, I hope yall were packin'

Dude,,, dang man,,, hope yall go prepaired. Wouldn't want to see yall go out like those communist/socialist activists in Greensboro that got ambushed by some local white power hoods. Dem mugz rolled up, gunz-a-blazin, and took out several protesters, but good.

kci:
I don't know. It could go either way. The difference I see in the suppositions you pose are that young black rappers are the ICON of southern whites who despise the whole rap/black culture and who cherrish the rebel flag as the emblem of the south.

Ironically they are also much like the rap culture in Negro society in that they are furvently rebellious against the ridicule and condesention heeped upon the south/rebel flag/confederacy. The more you bash the whole idea of the confederacy/rebel flag/the south/country living, the more they entrench and revel in it. A prime example is the term "redneck". They took that term and totally turned it on its head and now it is worn proudly as a badge among die-hard southern whites.

Welp, here could be a group that they despise, sending all kinds of mixed messages in association with their most celebrated symbol, and perhaps rendering it less significant in the process.
 
I think they are more or less saying to "L" with the confederate flag... Alot of blacks do not believe there is real racism... The flag is a symbol of the Jim Crow past, as well as the suit and tie wearing racist of today... I personally wouldn't care to put the image on my album cover, but how soon we forget Willie D had the KKK on his album cover "Controvercy".. I hope it brings awareness to those who think that the civil rights movement abruptly ended when Johnson signed the Voting Rights Act, or when Martin Luther King was assassinated...
 
Well here is my view.....

I personally don't have a problem with the actual flag of the Confederacy! If these Southern white folks want to claim their heritage I am not mad. I love my heratage as an African American and I embrace it 100%. I study and learn as much as I can about the history of my people from Africa to present day! Hereitage is fine, and the true confederate flag may be all about heritage....


But the Confederate Battle flag is all about hate. The stars and Bars as it is known was broughtback from its death bed during the Cival Rights Movement. Letme repeat this one more time. Th stars and Bars(the flag commoly seen) was not flown as proudly as you see it now until the Cival Rights movements. Governers and myaors of some Southern states(I think Bama was 1st) decided to raise the flag in opposition to the freedom riders and marcgers who were entering their rowns. They decided to raise the flag to "show the activist" that they were in the south and they were going to be in for a "battle". Now if that isn't a legacy of hate. So don't let anyone tell you that this flag has been flying all the time. It hasn't...it began in the 50's and since then has become some type of fashion piece if you are white and from the south. Hell mostof these white boys who are wacing and wearing the flag don't know the diference between the two.

I'm not mad at these rappers. To me it is a sort of rebellion to the flag, and I think it diminishes some of the power it holds...
 
Re: Re: OOOH, i seen that mug.

Originally posted by Makaho Bedrock



A few months back here in MS, the Klan marched in Brandon,MS.
There were a whopping 11 Klansmen marching.
About 50 Bruthas, Myself included....lined up along the march route and yelled out White Power, and Goosestepped in front of them in jest. They tried to yell some racial stuff back, but they was snuffed by the Bruthas and other white people that hated them too. It was hella funny..we turned their march into a farce,
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This is what I preach Makaho. Mental Warfare. Man I get so tired of hearing blacks talk about how if someone calls them this or that, they are going to crack somebody across the skull. You are accomplishing nothing. I work in an environment with nothing but these beer drinking, pick up driving(well I drive one too, but that isn't the issue), rebel flag waving, proud to be a redneck white boys. And I have to deal with stereotypes all day long. But I attack them with my mind. Sure I could hall off and slap one of these white boys...but what good am I doing. I am serving a greater purpose by getting back at them mentally, and legally!
 
im tha type of ni99a dat dont care , ill do it too, i mean i wouldnt do it jus to be stupid but ill jus do it 4 fun an make an let the "WHITE FOLKZ" feel stupid like wha they be tryin to do when they sport that flag, an even when i see it, i dont get mad or say anything i jus be like it wasnt even there'
 
Originally posted by kci
'sup? Ok, I had heard the same thing, about the brothas showcasing the flag as a protest...this is just me, but I can see the reverse happening, which is that you may have the rednecks, unaware of the "hidden meaning" behind what's going on, using this as an example or proof that the flag is ok - else, why are there black people, who are supposed to against the flag, wearing it or using it on album cover.
Click to expand...

I would have to agree with Kci on this one. I have been thinking about this topic since I saw the video the first time, and as a Black woman my first reaction was disgust. Perception is EVERYTHING and I don?t think that these artists thought about the initial perception that Blacks (especially older Blacks) would have once seeing the flag in their videos. Let?s really think about this? do you all REALLY think that having Black folk dance around with the ?Stars and Bars? is going to dilute it?s meaning to a racist Redneck??? My answer? NO. Here is why?

Let?s look at the word n-i-g-g-e-r. Now we all know that the ?N? word is a derogatory term that racist folks used back in our history and to this day. However, Black folks decided to get cute and used the word n-i-g-g-a as a term of endearment. Now let me ask you? has the fact that Blacks use the ?N? word to talk about each other diluted the meaning of the ?N? word with a white person uses it? NO.

The situation with the ?Stars and Bars? is the same thing. They (White folks) will be flippin? through the channels and will see the Lil? John video and will just shake their heads and say, ?look at these ignorant n-i-g-g-e-r-s.?

At least on the MJG CD cover the flag is burning. :redhot:
 
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