I live in a small town, high desert plateau, not far from about 10,000 humans, but very far from all the rest of my species. And flags are something that kind of get under my skin.
As a baby geezer, now 60, I bristle when I see people altering the flag to use it as a billboard for whatever their pet cause happens to be. There is the washed out, desaturated version, grays and white, which I’ve been told by my son is a message to law-enforcement: if you mess with me, you will die. There is the thin blue line across the center of the red and white stripes or a red line, if you want to let people know that you are moved by the fire department more than the by police department, or the line that is half of each. There are depictions of the American flag, tattered and burned, displaying how real Patriots are rising from the flames of lesser Americans’ assaults on their supposed traditions. Trump flags the size of pickup trucks fly in front of homes and businesses alike. And in front of two or three properties, there is the American flag with the rainbow instead of red and white stripes.
I try to reconcile my pleasure at seeing the latter, with my explanation for displeasure at all the former examples: I feel like we’re not supposed to defile the flag by altering it, like a middle schoolers notebook, having been raised with the flag code in my midst. But I’m probably, to a large extent, more reacting to the content than the means of expressing the content. I probably don’t really mind when the flag is cheerfully altered to support me and my people; I do mind it for everybody else’s selfish expression of their favorite cause. Yes, I reckon I’ve got some hypocrisy running through me.
In all honesty, in a vacuum, I don't give a damn what people do to a flag. It's a flag, it's not a person, it's not an animal, it's not a holy relic. What does irk me, and drove me to work on this photo project, is the cognitive dissonance of folks who do things that really are disrespectful to it from their perspective but then attack others for doing the exact same thing, albeit from a stance diametrically opposed to their politics. I fucking hate double standards.
I guess, come down to it, I really agree with you, Ty. I’ve wondered about my own double-standard corner that I’ve painted myself into.
I think my motivation, my caring, isn’t about the frickin fabric or the graphic and colors on it. It’s the cow people have. It’s what they then do as they give it all this wacked-out meaning. Deep down it pisses me off how so many have all these feelings and rules (and cows) about a symbol, feelings that most often feed the justification to do material harm.
Someone who expressed desire to befriend me told me with prideful fervor about how, on the heels of 9-11 NY cataclysm, she went right out and bought herself a flag, and I didn’t know why at the time, but suddenly I felt sick.
Thanks for your thoughts, your words. All those flags where I live frighten me. Maybe it’s time to see if I can walk from my ugly little corner, across my drying paint and get past it all.
Thanks for this.
I live in a small town, high desert plateau, not far from about 10,000 humans, but very far from all the rest of my species. And flags are something that kind of get under my skin.
As a baby geezer, now 60, I bristle when I see people altering the flag to use it as a billboard for whatever their pet cause happens to be. There is the washed out, desaturated version, grays and white, which I’ve been told by my son is a message to law-enforcement: if you mess with me, you will die. There is the thin blue line across the center of the red and white stripes or a red line, if you want to let people know that you are moved by the fire department more than the by police department, or the line that is half of each. There are depictions of the American flag, tattered and burned, displaying how real Patriots are rising from the flames of lesser Americans’ assaults on their supposed traditions. Trump flags the size of pickup trucks fly in front of homes and businesses alike. And in front of two or three properties, there is the American flag with the rainbow instead of red and white stripes.
I try to reconcile my pleasure at seeing the latter, with my explanation for displeasure at all the former examples: I feel like we’re not supposed to defile the flag by altering it, like a middle schoolers notebook, having been raised with the flag code in my midst. But I’m probably, to a large extent, more reacting to the content than the means of expressing the content. I probably don’t really mind when the flag is cheerfully altered to support me and my people; I do mind it for everybody else’s selfish expression of their favorite cause. Yes, I reckon I’ve got some hypocrisy running through me.
In all honesty, in a vacuum, I don't give a damn what people do to a flag. It's a flag, it's not a person, it's not an animal, it's not a holy relic. What does irk me, and drove me to work on this photo project, is the cognitive dissonance of folks who do things that really are disrespectful to it from their perspective but then attack others for doing the exact same thing, albeit from a stance diametrically opposed to their politics. I fucking hate double standards.
I guess, come down to it, I really agree with you, Ty. I’ve wondered about my own double-standard corner that I’ve painted myself into.
I think my motivation, my caring, isn’t about the frickin fabric or the graphic and colors on it. It’s the cow people have. It’s what they then do as they give it all this wacked-out meaning. Deep down it pisses me off how so many have all these feelings and rules (and cows) about a symbol, feelings that most often feed the justification to do material harm.
Someone who expressed desire to befriend me told me with prideful fervor about how, on the heels of 9-11 NY cataclysm, she went right out and bought herself a flag, and I didn’t know why at the time, but suddenly I felt sick.
Thanks for your thoughts, your words. All those flags where I live frighten me. Maybe it’s time to see if I can walk from my ugly little corner, across my drying paint and get past it all.