Corey Meyer at the Kindred Blood blog has decided to hang it up after a Confederate flag and a bag of coal with a note are said to have been tied to a flag pole near the school he teaches at. He says the flag and coal were then left in his school mailbox and as such he has decided to stop blogging due to the intimidation. Was this flag flown (not at his school if I understood his now deleted post) in reaction to him? At this point we only have his word to go on since we do not know the details in the note.
Mr. Meyer was never one to let potential controversy go by without comment so I find this reaction a bit puzzling. If you are going to continually to point out and laugh at almost every action or word of a fringe group there is always the potential for some type of comeback. Again, not knowing the details of the note I can't say what might have prompted him to shutter his blog. Of course trying to get in the last word by saying you will be allowing students to wipe their feet on the flag and then burn it will not endear you to a portion of the population. That tends to have been his way on the blog however.
So far, overall sympathies don't seem to be running in Mr. Meyer's favor. I think he tended to come off as abrasive at times on his blog and while there were times he may have had valid points they were not presented as well as could be. If I remember correctly he had stopped blogging before but had not taken his blog down. It has even been suggested in the comments section on another blog that he will be back blogging soon enough and even suggested he may have staged the stunt himself (again please remember this was somebody making a comment and not the blog writer himself). Maybe, but that seems quite a stretch that he would risk his reputation and potentially his job over such.
I would question however whether those he is against, such as Connie Chastain, will really care. They will comment on it, probably laugh about it, but in the grand scheme neither really did any harm to the others cause. They just bickered back and forth. For those truly interested in preserving the heritage of their ancestors any use of the Confederate flag for intimidating another person should be wrong. Unfortunately the flag has been hijacked by many on the fringes, those who just think it is cool to wear on a shirt or use as a bumper sticker and by those who want to still continue fighting the war. Of course the same might be said about the use of the United States flag in some instances; flag waving politicians come to mind immediately.
As I have said above my blog name is mostly due to living in a Confederate state. I have ancestors who fought in both the Union and Confederate armies. I don't however get wrapped up in the controversy around the Confederate flag. For those who want to fly it go right ahead. It is not however the flag of the United States. As such there are limits to where it should be flown and over governmental buildings is not the place. Why we have to continue fighting that battle in courts is beyond my comprehension.
Well, all that being said I do hope that whatever was in the note Corey received was just a bag of wind. Differences aside, a good solid respectful debate is healthy. Name calling, threats, taunting, bullying and intimidation have no place in a civilized discussion. It is too bad that it appears the actions of a reckless person or persons have shut down an avenue of discussion as unlikely as it was to change any minds.
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