By Kermit Hobbs

As the current controversy over the Confederate flag progresses, I, as a history buff, have concerns about where it is taking us.

The Confederate flag means different things to different people, and the issue in question is how to properly acknowledge and address the feelings of everyone involved.

Most obvious is the fact that the Confederate flag symbol is offensive to people of the African-American community, and with good reason.

The flag, actually the battle flag of the Confederate Army of Northern Virginia, is the one many brave Southerners (including my own ancestors) followed a century and half ago in their fight for independence. Nearly half of the white males in the South were casualties of that war. To many people today, the Confederate flag holds special meaning as it honors their sacrifices.

I have read countless letters and firsthand accounts written by Confederate soldiers, and I cannot remember ever reading that any of them were fighting to preserve slavery. Rather, the ones that mentioned any motivation were those seeking to protect their homeland from Yankee invaders or those who fought to preserve their way of life.

There is the catch, though. That way of life, “The Cause” as it was sometimes phrased, depended upon the abominable practice of slavery. This fact is appalling, especially to the people whose ancestors were subjects of that practice.

Soon after the war, the Ku Klux Klan used the Confederate flag as its symbol of hatred of all black people, and this continued through the years, even up to Dylann Roof and the present time. By their actions, those people desecrated the symbol, venerated by those who had given their lives for it. They clearly turned it into a mark of evil.

We often see the Confederate flag used as a statement of defiance, in essence saying, “We were defeated on the battlefield, but our spirit is unbroken.” I think this was the case of the flag being flown on the capitol grounds in Columbia, S.C.

A symbol this divisive should never be used by a government entity that supposedly represents all the people under its jurisdiction.

Finally, we see Confederate flags everywhere from baseball caps to beach blankets, used with no intention of malice to anyone. Some people, though, see these as unpleasant reminders of past events.

What concerns me is the way this issue affects the way we see history. In our haste to erase everything related to the Confederate flag, we are in danger of distorting our history, trying to pretend it didn’t happen.

The story of our past is not always neat and clean. Unpleasant things happened, not just here, but throughout human history. Still, the truth is what it is, warts and all. Arbitrarily erasing it does not change it.

There ought to be a way we can recognize the Confederate flag as an important component of our history. Many of our ancestors, however misguided they may have been, selflessly offered up their lives for it. The monuments their loved ones erected in their memory likewise deserve our respect, even if they display the symbol of the Confederacy.

At the same time, in deference to people who have suffered from anyone and anything relating to the Confederate flag, I don’t think it is too great a sacrifice to put away those reminders of a tormented past. Putting away the flags is not a matter of shame. It is a matter of respect.

As Americans, we should recognize our history, understand it, and learn from it. Acknowledging and respecting the feelings of others, black and white, is one of the many lessons we can learn.

Kermit Hobbs Jr. is an accomplished Suffolk historian and Virginia Certified Mediator. Email him at khobbs5@aol.com.