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I've just discovered something that made my day, while reading Wes Browning's older
columns. If you don't know, Wes Browning is a rather sanctimonious ex-homeless
ex-Cornell graduate. If you don't understand how some Cornell grad could end up
homeless you probably haven't read all the words.
Predictably, Wes is a flaming liberal, in the US sense of that term. Consequently, and still predictably, he sees the issue of burning flags, and more specifically burning the US flag in the US by US citizens as an issue of free speech, quickly resolved along the lines of free speech trumps all. Presumably, the burning of the US flag by other peoples in other countries he wouldn't see as an issue of free speech, mostly because, as we all know, other countries don't do the free speech thing. Presumably one step further, he would still regard the burning of the US flag in the US by people that aren't US citizens as an issue of free speech, but would rather not discuss the matter, at least not in public. I always wanted to ask one of them rabid liberal folks if it were okay to burn the flag of the squirrel party, or the women's suffrage amendment, or Susan Sontag's effigy as a matter of free speech. Not just to embarrass them, but out of sheer curiosity. I always suspected the flag burning issue is simply bred of miscommunication, namely the people who don't burn it don't burn a different thing than the people that do burn it. Because, let's face it. A flag is a strip of colored cloth just as much as an apple is the word "apple". And since the part of the flag that makes it a flag is a political construct, and the people on the two sides are on those two sides for political reasons, it wouldn't exactly surprise to find they look at the same piece of cloth with different eyes, now would it ? Having taken it that far, the issue begins to fascinate the hermeneut in me. How, exactly, could we experimentally expose this gap ? And here's Wes, opposing cross-burning : I think if cross-burning is to be protected speech, then gun-pointing should be protected speech. They both mean the same thing. So then. Burning the US flag is okay. Burning the cross, not okay. Because this group of people has skipped the classes of patriotic-meanings-of-the-flag bunk, but has been present and taking notes during the oppression-and-sufferings-of-minorities bunk.Let's just point out that for the conservatives protesting it, flag burning and gun pointing are also the same thing. Exactly so, and exactly as much as cross burning is, for Wes and the liberal crowd. So, having read this far, you've learned two things. One of them is that if you want to get at some flag burner, cross burning is probably a good avenue.
The second is that if you want to talk to people, you are well advised to talk to
them rather than to yourself.
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