CSotD: Half-Mast Reponses
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Chris Britt makes a simple point that I've been mulling over.
The idea that mass shootings occur so often that we seem to always be mourning one or the other is nothing he came up with alone.
Rob Rogers, for instance, offers this commentary on the futility, though using Obama's repeated calls for action leaves open the question of whether he is simply commenting on the futility of it all, or specifically lumping those speeches in with the "thoughts and prayers" comments.
That is, it's easy to condemn "thoughts and prayers" that come from legislators who have either actively opposed steps to stem the flow of killings, or are in such lockstep that they refuse to stand up against a party that opposes (A) any such measures and (B) anything that might give Obama an apparent victory.
Both cartoons, however, suggest that, however you direct and apportion blame, gestures of mourning don't do much to change things.
Britt, however, touches on a long-standing sore point for me that recurs in particular every June 14, which is the change in the flag over the years, and how it serves as a metaphor for the change in us.
We lower the damn flag too often, but, each time we do, it seems boorish to say so, because it comes across as suggesting that this particular lowering is unworthy. Which means the only way you can say it and spark an actual conversation about the topic is to say it during a period when we haven't lowered it.
Good luck finding that moment.
I don't know why they even bother stringing the halyards to the top of the pole anymore, though I suppose that, if anybody actually knew the proper way to display a flag at half-staff, they'd point out that you have to raise it to the top and then lower it.
You could also argue that, if we'd quit lowering it to half-staff every time somebody runs over a squirrel, you could simply skip the halyards and just nail it up there, because nobody bothers taking it down at night or in the rain anymore anyway.
Yes, I'm an old man grousing.
I remember that, when we were in school, we knew it was starting to rain if we were on the right side of the building because you'd catch motion out the window and you'd look to see the head janitor walk out and take down the flag.
And getting a small flag to wave at a parade involved something of a responsibility, because it was like being handed palms on Palm Sunday: You were now obligated to take special care of it. Don't let it touch the ground, for a starter, and, for a finish, you had to dispose of it properly.
I also remember taking my drivers' test, which meant going 40 miles to the county seat, a town I wasn't all that familiar with. The guy told me to turn left at the post office and I said, "Where's the post office?" to which he impatiently replied, "By the flag."
This was back when it was a violation of flag etiquette to display the flag as an advertising gimmick, so that the only flag on main street was at the post office. Hard to imagine these days, isn't it?
What makes this more, I hope, than an old man grousing is the bizarre way in which the people who most worship the flag now least care about all those old rules of respect for it.
The shift began in the waning days of the Vietnam war, when the flag became a symbol for going along with government policy.
"Patriotic" people supported the war and flew the flag.
On everything.
There was a bit of a controversy when fire departments and local police forces began adding it to their uniforms, from people who pointed out that they were not federal services, and it seems bizarre today that people who are most distrustful of and disloyal to the federal government, who crow the loudest over states' rights and local control, stick the national flag all over everything.
And then leave it there in the dark, in the rain, no matter how tattered and filthy it becomes.
So that's Part One of the rant.
But here's Part Two:
When we saw the flag at half-mast, there would be a moment of "Why is that?" and then you'd remember that a former President or a Supreme Court Justice or someone similar had died.
As much as I grouse over the misuse of this gesture, however, I might have expected it to follow an event like the shootings in Orlando, but we didn't have events like the shootings in Orlando.
So while I still think we lower it too often for the wrong reasons, I also think we lower it too often for the right reasons.
And that we ought to accompany the empty gesture with some meaningful action.
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