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Vote to keep or change state flag has barbershops in two camps

By JANA SALMON MACKIN/Item Staff Writer

Don't trash-talk the state flag if you visit Willie Ray Penton's barber shop. The Confederate flag symbolizes his heritage as much as the old barber pole. The worn barber chairs and old timey ambiance make men feel at home to get a haircut and talk politics.

The Picayune native and history buff who performs in Civil War reenactments, displays a poster in his shop window.

"Save The Flag. Let The People Vote!" airs Willie Ray's views about whether to redesign or keep the state flag. The state flag debate has divided communities into us-them camps of those who view the flag as a symbol of Southern history and those who view it as a racist icon of slavery and hate.

"We will win. The flag will stay like it is," said Penton, 58, a 30-year barber. "My position is we need to ... put it in the constitution so people can not vote on it anymore."

Ed Lewis, 60, a disabled veteran agrees that the flag is an inviolate part of Mississippi's history. Not only the state flag but Southern heritage is threatened by what he feels is terminal case of historical revisionism. This vote may well be the flag's last stand.

"All the other states have knuckled in and bowed to the pressure to make it new," said Lewis. "If it ain't broke, don't fix it."

Meanwhile, Donald Hart is cutting three-year-old James Darren Lee Jr.'s hair. Hart and his wife, Wornett cut men and women's hair at their Hart to Hart Barber and Style Shop.

On the wall hangs a framed picture with Martin Luther King and Malcom X in the foreground. In the background, stand the U.S. Olympic athletes who each raised a gloved hand in a black power salute from the award podiums at the 1968 Mexico City Olympics. Tommie Smith, gold, and John Carlos, won the 200 meters. They were expelled.

"I'm proud of that picture. Someone gave it to me when I opened my shop," said Hart, 35, seven years as a barber. He feels the state flag should be changed.

"People say its about heritage, not hatred; but it was about hatred," said Hart.

Hart is concerned about racial and community tensions arising from the flag debate.

"Picayune is a really good place to raise a family," said Hart. "I'm not going to let a flag dictate where I'm going to live or where I am going to work. I feel I should have the same opportunity as the next man."

As he finishes the haircut, the little boy's father, James Darren Lee Sr., said, "It's a racist flag. It's a hate flag."

On April 17, Mississippians will decide whether to change or retain the state flag. Voters can choose from two designs. They can keep the design of the 1894 state flag which shows the Confederate battle flag in the upper left corner. Or they can choose the new design which features 20 white stars on a blue field without the Southern Cross. The flag controversy has swept through the South, including Georgia and South Carolina.

The Mississippi flag vote is crucial since it is the last state to display conspicuously a Confederate battle symbol in a flag. Earlier this year, Georgia lawmakers redesigned their flag, shrinking the Confederate emblem. In South Carolina, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People led a boycott which resulted in state legislators removing the Confederate flag flying on the capitol dome. The NAACP is against the present Mississippi flag.

"Our position is that the flag does not represent all the citizens of the state of Mississippi," said Van Bolden, president of the Pearl River County Chapter of the NAACP. "We are not just separating ourselves as African Americans but as citizens here in the state."

"With all of the improvements that have been made," said Bolden, "We are always talking about a new Mississippi."

"First: Let's change our face," he said.

Last May, the state Supreme Court ruled that the state doesn't have an official flag. When the state updated laws in 1906, no flag sections were carried forward. Tradition has been flying the state's 1894 flag. Last fall, Gov. Ronnie Musgrove created a commission which oversaw public hearings before recommending the flag redesign. In January, lawmakers voted to hold the April flag election.

As the election approaches, local voters have expressed division on the flag redesign, which has raised various racial, social, historical and economic issues. The flag referendum has opened a New South versus the Old South can of worms.

"People seem evenly divided," said Picayune Mayor Woody Spiers. "There are several points of contention. One is heritage. One is the African American community being offended by it."

"The most frequent comment, I have heard is that Mississippi should do what Georgia did with their flag redesign which is to incorporate all the flags that previously flew over the state," said Spiers.

"Everybody wins," he said. "You get a new flag plus you keep certain elements of the old flag."

Statewide, several groups have formed for or against the new flag. The Legacy Fund was formed recently to support the new state flag without the Confederate symbol.

In Jackson, George Shelton, executive director of the Legacy Fund, said, "We are a political arm of the Mississippi Economic Council, which periodically takes a position on important issues like this one."

"We see this flag issue as one of the most important votes people will make in a generation. In order for Mississippi to survive and thrive ... we are going to have to do everything possible to recruit business to Mississippi," said Shelton.

"This is our opportunity cast old myths aside and show the rest of the nation and the world that Mississippi means business," he added.

The Sons of Confederate Veterans and the Mississippi Heritage Political Action Committee are among the groups fighting to keep the 1894 flag.

In Hattiesburg, Stone Barefield, an attorney, retired member of the state legislature and a member of the Sons of Confederate Veterans Mississippi Division, said, "I do think the whole thing is revisionist history. It all boils down to an emotional fight. Some are offended by the flag. By the same token, I will be just as offended if they take it away from me.

"I love history but history is extremely dangerous if you don't get the facts right," said Barefield. "You are never going to solve your problems until you are willing to sit down and learn the truth about the past."

Whether a storied symbol of Southern heritage or an offensive legacy of hate, the flag continues to fly in Picayune and other small towns where neighbors wrestle with their consciences and prepare to vote their hearts.

To paraphrase T.S. Eliot, about the flag election.

April may be the cruelest month.

"Mississippi needs to change. Mississippi needs to move forward. People need to move forward," said Sally Bennett, one of the owners of Pirates Plunder.

"The flag hasn't got anything to do with it," she said.



-- Uncle Bob (unclb0b@aol.com), March 15, 2001

Answers

If the Rebel flag is SOOOOOO bad, then why are 75% of the Ole Miss REBELS (major college football team), black??????

Maybe a free education makes you think differently???

The flag is about heritage, not hatred.......

Deano

-- Deano (deano@luvthebeach.com), March 15, 2001.

Actually, in the case of Mississippi, you may be right. Unlike Georgia and South Carolina, Mississippi made the decision to begin flying the "stars and bars" at the end of the 19th century (on Confederate Memorial day, if memory serves), as a memorial gesture. Both Georgia and South Carolina began flying the flag after the Brown v. Board of Education decision as an act of defiance, not heritage.

-- Tarzan the Ape Man (tarzan@swingingthroughthejunglewithouta.net), March 15, 2001.

Tarzan

Little town west of here, Lake City, FL is going thru the same thing now with their city flag. Battle of Olustee (farthest south the yankees made it during the war) is depicted on the current city flag with Rebel soldiers on horseback flying their flag high and, of course (after 75 years or so), NAACP is now having problems with it.

Seems very little is sacred anymore.......

Deano

-- Deano (deano@luvthebeach.com), March 15, 2001.

Oh, I don't know about that, Deano. People change, times change, symbols change. A lot of folks were ready to spit when women were given the vote. People were sure it would be the end of the US and womanhood as we know it. They thought it was heresy, treason even. Lots of folks were mad in Georgia when they changed our flag to include the Stars and Bars in '56, but the world didn't come to an end. On a much smaller note, I'm sure there were a lot of people who were upset when the Sambo's restaurant chain changed their name. I guess what I'm trying to say is changing tradition isn't in and of itself a bad thing.

That being said, I think they should let the city, county, state, whatever entity, put it to a vote on where/how/if the Stars and Bars should be flown. Of course, the NAACP (and its members) has a right to spend their money wherever they choose, just as any other group, and the entity in question has the right to take that decision into consideration, or not, depending.

-- Tarzan the Ape Man (tarzan@swingingthroughthejunglewithouta.net), March 15, 2001.

My symbol is bigger than your symbol. Yeah but my symbol has better colors. Maybe but more people died for my symbol. But my dead died more symbolic. God is on the side of my symbol. Which God? Our God stupid! Our like in "our"? Yeah. Oh, howzit goin buddy? Not too bad, how bout you? Can't complain. Hard to tell.

-- Carlos (riffraff@cybertime.net), March 15, 2001.

The sight of the Stars & Bars sickens me.

The thought of 18th & 19th Century southerners who participated in, and/or supported the bondage, torture & destruction of human beings sickens me.

Reading crap from scumbags who cannot imagine how it is some people experience disgust hearing present-day southerners spout about pride in their ancestors who fought to protect the institution of slavery sickens me.

(And yes, I know well the Civil War was very much a war over economics. The fact remains white southerners destroyed people, thousands upon thousands of people whose lives never truly began due to the ignorance and black-hearted natures of those white southern people.)

That flag is a symbol of many things. Pride in ancestry is one. It also symbolizes hatred, torture, rape & death. It symbolizes some of the most vile actions humanity has ever perpetrated on itself. To not see this, to not feel compassion for those who suffered under the foot of white southerners, to desire to see that flag wave in the faces of people whose ancestors were held as chattel, raped, split apart from families, tortured, robbed of dignity...I try but can’t imagine what it might have been like to be white or black during those times. Thank God for that.

The sight of the Stars & Bars sickens me. Get rid of it. Not for my sake, but for those whose ancestors were destroyed in its name.

-- Rich (howe9@shentel.net), March 16, 2001.

Rich-

The flag we know today as the "Confederate Battle Flag" is actually only one of several flags used by the CSA (Confederated States of America). Another is the St. Anderw's Cross, which is the state flag of Alabama. So far, no one has said anything about it.

I have a lot of respect for you, but I found your post to be rather provocational. I'll have to think about it some before I respond further.

-- Tarzan the Ape Man (tarzan@swingingthroughthejunglewithouta.net), March 16, 2001.

Rich

Wow. Tell us how you really feel. The flag can stand for whatever I choose. To me, it's about Southern Heritage and pride in my ancestory as you put it. To me, it's never symbolized hatred.

I bet if you check some history books out you'll find that the South wasn't the only area of the country that practiced slavery.......

Stars and Bars forever my friend.

Deano

-- Deano (deano@luvthebeach.com), March 16, 2001.

The flag can stand for whatever I choose. To me, it's about Southern Heritage and pride in my ancestory as you put it. To me, it's never symbolized hatred. I agree. Flags don't cause hatred, people cause hatred...

-- Uncle Bob (unclb0b@aol.com), March 16, 2001.

fyi

This is the Confederate Stars and Bars:

This is the Confederate Battle Flag, a.k.a. The Southern Cross:

And this is the Confederate Navy Jack:

-Buddy (Amateur Civil War Historian)

-- Buddy (buddydc@go.com), March 16, 2001.

Learn somethin' new every day......

Thanks Buddy!

'people cause hatred' - very well put UB!

Deano

-- Deano (deano@luvthebeach.com), March 16, 2001.

Buddy-

FWIW, I'm a native Southerner (with a big "s") and I've always heard the battle flag referred to as the stars and bars, as opposed to the stars and stripes. The Atlanta History Center as well has an excellent Battle of Atlanta installation that, if I remember correctly, also makes reference to the stars and bars. So maybe we're talking popular usage here?

-- Tarzan the Ape Man (tarzan@swingingthroughthejunglewithouta.net), March 16, 2001.

damn...you can see the racism and hatred just oozing from those flags. i'm a-gonna git my gun and go kill me a-sompin'...

-- Uncle Bob (unclb0b@aol.com), March 16, 2001.

Deano: The flag can stand for whatever I choose.

Couldn’t agree more. A flag is a piece of material. Burn it, fly it, pick your nose with it, ignore it. My argument is for compassion. Look past your nose and consider the significance of that symbol for others. This is no little thing, like “should I or shouldn’t I hang fuzzy dice from my rear view mirror”. That flag symbolizes a whole lot of bad shit in a significant number of people’s minds. Think about it.

Tarzan, I spilled my guts. No manipulation or provocation intended. Our country’s long history of (local, state & federal) government- approved abuse, supported by the citizenry, makes my skin crawl whenever I think about it.

UB, I agree completely.

-- Rich (howe9@shentel.net), March 16, 2001.

Uh, upon re-reading my initial post I see I used the term scumbag rather indiscriminately. I assure you if I meant to direct it towards anyone here I would have attached a name to it.

-- Rich (howe9@shentel.net), March 16, 2001.

Here, check this out:

http://www.civ ilwarhome.com/confederateflags.htm

and

http://www.civilwarhome.com/csa.htm

and

www.civilwarhome.com

-- Buddy (buddydc@go.com), March 16, 2001.

Should be:

http://www.civilwarhome.com/confederateflags.htm

text wrapped when I was making the link

-- Buddy (buddydc@go.com), March 16, 2001.

Every time I see this I think of the brutality and racism towards my ancestors in the United Kingdom. I want this flag removed immediately because it offends me and reminds me of the loss of kin, all lined up in straight rows and wearing bright red uniforms, at the hands of the heathen unwashed Americans. God Bless the Queen!

-- Uncle Bob (unclb0b@aol.com), March 16, 2001.

Anybody hugged a Taliban recently?

-- Carlos (riffraff@cybertime.net), March 17, 2001.