Lol. Your ancestors picked a stupid fight, over a stupid cause, and got their asses handed to them. And because they chose to attach some legitimate issues such as state's rights to something vile such as slavery, they screwed over future generations. The same way that the post war South screwed over the concept of free association through segregation and led the charge on gun control and the WoD with Jim Crow laws. They were a bunch of losers who significantly reduced the freedom in this country through their stupidity. Get over it dude.
It must be hard being so *excruciatingly* correct on every single topic that crosses this forum. What a burden you must bear.
Yes, the invasion happened because of the secession, the secession happened over slavery.
"States Rights" to preserve slavery.
Issues of representation and control of congress, and the presidency to maintain slavery.
Admissions of new states as slave or free, and how it would affect congressional seats and the electoral college.
Economic disputes between the agrarian exporting Slave south, and the immigrant/industrial north.
Slavery Slavery Slavery. It was over slavery. It happened because of slavery. All the "other causes" are one step removed from slavery, and were also because of slavery.
The "founding documents" of the Confederacy themselves state it over, and over, and over again.
I don't know why this is so hard for some in the South. You today didn't own the slaves, you didn't fight to keep them either.
For all I know some of my ancestors fought for bad causes in Europe, beat their spouses, or were criminals. I have no idea. But what they did, or what they were doesn't define me.
It's as if you guys are unable to separate Moon Pies, RC Cola, Sweet Tea, and ladies in hoop skirts saying "Ah do declare!" etc. from slavery or the Civil War. Nobody's claiming the North is some paragon of righteousness. We're all aware the Emancipation Proclamation didn't cover the slaves in Union states. And Lincoln's words on preserving the Union, whether it meant freeing slaves, or leaving them in bondage.
And all of America killed or displaced a ton of Indians to get the land, or passively benefited from the epidemics from European contact that decimated them in the 1400's and 1500's before most of them even met a European colonist.
The "It was complicated" and "There were lots of reasons" arguments are shoddy.
I get that you can't separate the political issues, and the cultural memories of the war. And I appreciate that you aren't advocating taking the flag down. The whole point of my original post was attempting to articulate, clearly and without undue emotion, *why* the South separates those two issues. They are directly related to the destruction and humiliation of the war. And the fact that the South believes that, refuses to apologize for the war, and refuses to accept Northern superiority (I am speaking of American Academia and Media here) is the reason the debate, and cultural memory, are STILL ongoing.
Can I say it again? I AM NOT A CONFEDERATE APOLOGIST. But there are a lot of people in this country, and apparently a few on this forum, who are ignorant of the implicit connection and bolstering effect that Southern Culture and the War have on each other.
Not the Confederacy. THE WAR. And so many people do not realize that in the Southern mindset they are NOT the same.
If you don't get it, that's OK. That means you don't understand the South. That's OK too. Just keep it in mind when discussing these issues.
