May 24, 2013

The Washington Post endeavors to explain the flag-displaying behavior of tornado-stricken Oklahomans.

"The flag-raising seemed to hearten the neighbors, as if to assure them they would emerge triumphant from this disaster...."
They are hung from skeletal trees denuded of leaves and bark, stuck in the doors of cars turned upside down and draped over pieces of twisted metal embedded in the ground.

The shot of red, white and blue flying in a landscape of ashen brown is startling and powerfully defiant, seeming to embody the mettle of the national anthem.
 ADDED: That prose is a far cry from "A View From Mrs. Thompson's."

60 comments:

Scott said...

Oh great. The media seems to be back to the point before 9/11/2001, where they acted like any displays of patriotism were foreign to the American character, or indicative of right wing fascism.

TerriW said...

If the reporter stays very still and very quiet long enough, he might be able to catch them grooming one another.

Lem the artificially intelligent said...

I cant open pdf urls but this is doing the job.

Scott said...

TerriW, that was subtle. Bravo.

mesquito said...

Flags. How so very gauche.

Bender said...

Fools. When you put your hope in a piece of cloth, especially today's American flag, you are putting your hope in the system of Barack Obama, you are putting your hope in the Congress, you are putting your hope in the Supreme Court (HA).

Greg Hlatky said...

Flags. How so very gauche.

You'd never catch the Europeans doing that.

Anonymous said...

Not nearly as disapproving as these pith-helmet pieces usually are. The apolitical nature of the disaster probably helps.

hombre said...

Just like New Jersey after Sandy. Oh, wait ....

mccullough said...

Denuded sticks out like spats.

gadfly said...

Oh the Code of the West
When you’re drinkin’ tequilla
The Code of the West
Toast the Red White and Blue
The Code of the West
Be kind to your neighbors
Your new northern neighbors
Remember they’ve been awfully good to you!!

~Roger Miller, "The Ballad of Waterhole #3"

Lem the artificially intelligent said...

I remember my father put out an American flag. The next day. He hung it down from the second floor's front porch, like they did in Wall Street, just not as big.

Anonymous said...

Screw all of them and perhaps you also.

I love our flag, I've folded it after it has been draped over coffins of better men than I...

Amartel said...

Gorillas in the mist.

Amartel said...

Amurikkans in our midst.

Bleach Drinkers Curing Coronavirus Together said...

America will save us from the Great Tornado!

Bleach Drinkers Curing Coronavirus Together said...

If the reporter stays very still and very quiet long enough, he might be able to catch them grooming one another.

But reptiles don't groom each other...

David said...

The comments at WAPO on this article are instructive. There is genuine contempt for the rubes of Oklahoma.

David said...

I did not catch the whiff of contempt from the reporter. Maybe he was surprised by this. Apparently he and his editors felt it was worth an article. But he was respectful.

The commenters are another matter.

edutcher said...

If they need to explain it, they're too stupid to get it.

Ritmo emphasizes the point.

Methadras said...

Leftists are some of the dumbest human beings to grace the face of this earth. Do they not realize that a banner is used to strengthen and embolden those that follow it? For all of the majesty that leftists can muster for the yearning of symbolism from their Marxist leadership, they can't for the life of them understand that others use these standards for their purposes as well. Standards for me, but not for thee. Fucking idiots.

kcom said...

The self-deception is strong in the comments. And let's hope there are no open flames about because the strawmen will go up like a torch.

In the meantime, look at the implied world view:

We don't exist without the Federal government. It provides for all our needs. It shows up to help us like it's our kind Aunt Edna. Therefore there's no limit on the power and authority to run our lives that we should give it. Carte blanche is the only option. You know, because it helped us out (with our own money, mind you) during that little tornado incident that one time.

Hammond X. Gritzkofe said...

Washington Post?

We no longer expect folks in our nation's capital to understand the patriotic feelings of those in flyover country.

kcom said...

But I agree the Federal government is very generous. You know, it must have worked awful hard at that after-school job to save up enough money to just give it to other people. What a nice thing to do.

Darleen said...

yikes, what a moral cesspool in the WaPo comments. The sneering condescension directed at the tornado survivors is at 11.

cassandra lite said...

Ah, the enlightened NYT reader.

This oped doesn't show up in the paper's most-viewed articles: http://www.nytimes.com/most-popular-viewed?period=1

Doesn't show up in the most e-mailed articles: http://www.nytimes.com/most-popular-emailed

Doesn't show up in the most-blogged articles: http://www.nytimes.com/most-popular-blogged

Brian Brown said...

David said...
The comments at WAPO on this article are instructive. There is genuine contempt for the rubes of Oklahoma.


When the civil war starts, I'm putting my $ on Oklahoma to defeat DC or any other liberal metropolis.

Amartel said...

Dumbass @ 6:09
The American flag represents a great deal more than the federal government.
So sorry this comes as news to you.

Tim said...

Hmmm.

Maybe someday America can have an American journalist class again?

Amartel said...

Yeah, I just checked the comments section for the WaPo article and it's full of stupid. Some of which seems to have overflowed its banks and landed here. IblameBush.

edutcher said...

Methadras said...

Leftists are some of the dumbest human beings to grace the face of this earth. Do they not realize that a banner is used to strengthen and embolden those that follow it? For all of the majesty that leftists can muster for the yearning of symbolism from their Marxist leadership, they can't for the life of them understand that others use these standards for their purposes as well. Standards for me, but not for thee. Fucking idiots.

Back in the 60s, Lefties the world over, used Mao's Little Red Book for the same purpose.

They're not in any way superior, just hypocrites and, therefore, inferior.

mariner said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
KCFleming said...

I see a flag with fewer stars in our near future.

Unknown said...

Sad and a little repulsive.
One thing you can always count on when flyover people are discussed by the coastal libs is a kind of baffled contempt overlaid with a wistful longing for enough power to suppress it entirely.

rhhardin said...

It means that if you have a million victims, you have a million helpers.

Anonymous said...

It would be interesting if the comments at WAPO could be tracked to the users address. How many would be government agencies?

Chip Ahoy said...

A far cry is the distance separating a sheepdog from its handler when the dog's responses take one second or more after ... Oh dear, apologies, did it again. Wrong thread.

I Have Misplaced My Pants said...

I've asked myself recently whether I feel more fealty to the flag with 50 stars or the one with a lone star.

kcom said...

I assume you're talking to me, Amartel, since I have the only comment at 6:09. And all I can say is read it again, Dumbass. Of course, I say that lovingly since it's obvious the meaning sailed right over your head. Try it again with that in mind.

Known Unknown said...

Ritmo calls suburban/rural Oklahomans reptiles. He doesn't even know any of them.

Teri said...

And while we have Christie and Obama parading around in New Jersey, the folks in Oklahoma will start to put their lives together again. The state will use its "rainy day" fund to start the process. Any bets on whether or not New Jersey has a rainy day fund? Folks in Oklahoma don't sit around waiting for someone to help them out. They have no pretensions that OKC will be the next New York City. It's a pretty straight forward, self reliant place. It would be a wonderful thing if this attitude was contagious.

Bleach Drinkers Curing Coronavirus Together said...

How many of your flyover-based commenters know any of these supposedly elitist coastal people, EMD?

I know a few Kansans. Nearby Oklahoma is a bit smaller. Some fit the stereotype and some don't. But to have allowed such an intellectual monstrosity as Sam Brownback to represent them both as governor and as senator is both concerning and informative. As is, apparently, this popular book.

Sam L. said...

It's the WaPo. Clues, they have none. Understanding, even less. Empathy, waaaaaaaay negative.

traditionalguy said...

The Stars and Stripes waiving over the wreckage has always been a rallying cry of encouragement for survivors of a storm. That began with the storm of the invading British Monarchy's rockets aimed at Ft McHenry and was enshrined after the storm of Japanese steel and artillery fire aimed down at the Marines ashore on Iwo Jima's beach until Mt.Suribachi's peak was taken on day 5 of that 40 day slaughter that had American 30,000 casualties.

cubanbob said...

Leftists are some of the dumbest human beings to grace the face of this earth. Do they not realize that a banner is used to strengthen and embolden those that follow it? For all of the majesty that leftists can muster for the yearning of symbolism from their Marxist leadership, they can't for the life of them understand that others use these standards for their purposes as well. Standards for me, but not for thee. Fucking idiots."

Methadras they get it completely. It's what the flag symbolizes that they don't like. Now if the Oklahoma rubes were to display the hammer and sickle the progs would be down with that.

Bleach Drinkers Curing Coronavirus Together said...

Methadras they get it completely. It's what the flag symbolizes that they don't like. Now if the Oklahoma rubes were to display the hammer and sickle the progs would be down with that.

Please explain this mystical power of a flag to ward off evil tornadoes, and the damage they cause. I was not aware of it. And does a hammer and sickle flag really work better?

Bleach Drinkers Curing Coronavirus Together said...

Does the power of the American flag to cure and heal work in operating rooms too, or just when it comes to weather calamities?

Birches said...

For a people that loves the government so much, they sure disdain any symbol representing said government . . .

Birches said...

I just can't help myself. This is one of the comments:

"There are many things to do when a tornado hits, perhaps least of all, look for survivors. Yet this tornado has seen, apparently, more flag waving than any other such disaster. And, if respect for a fluttering flag will cause individuals not to look underneath it to see if someone is perishing, that seems to be considered a small price to pay for what seems a burgeoning totemism. Not so very strange in the New World Order controlled age of impotent diversions in place of real, substantive action. Instead of responding to anger against the U.S. with calls to investigate wholesale violation of human rights by America, instead, a plurality if not the majority have been brainwashed into simply raising the flag, screaming “America can do no wrong!' and calling for more Muslims to be killed."

IF this is what passes for educated these days. . .

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Rusty said...

Rhythm and Balls said...
If the reporter stays very still and very quiet long enough, he might be able to catch them grooming one another.

But reptiles don't groom each other...

You would know.

Darleen said...

Rhythm and Balls

What a sad, sick life you must lead. Please do engage in some self-post-birth-abortion.

Rusty said...

You put the flag out to show your neighbors that your alive.
If you need help or not.
etc.
Every scout knows this.

Rusty said...

I guess in Balls case he/she displays a urine soaked bed sheet.

Anonymous said...

"For a people that loves the government so much, they sure disdain any symbol representing said government . . ."

This sort or categorical error says more about the author's worldview than it does about anyone else.

Known Unknown said...

How many of your flyover-based commenters know any of these supposedly elitist coastal people, EMD?

MY flyover-based commenters?

I don't have any. If you'll notice, I rarely cast aspersions on a group of people because of where they live. There are smart and stupid people everywhere. There are nice and mean people everywhere. There are considerate and ill-tempered people everwhere. We have become so encased in our own provincialism that we fail to see that human beings, by and large are the same the world over.

Known Unknown said...

Please explain this mystical power of a flag to ward off evil tornadoes, and the damage they cause. I was not aware of it. And does a hammer and sickle flag really work better?

That's not the point of raising the flags AFTER the disaster and you know it.

Don't be so coy.

ken in tx said...

I read somewhere that the flag in American culture is what the royal family is in other cultures. There are portraits of the king in most Thai homes, and of the queen in many British homes. It's something we all have in common, regardless of our differences. It's important that it has a star for each state and a stripe for each original state. It's like a history lesson on cloth.

Anonymous said...

How many of your flyover-based commenters know any of these supposedly elitist coastal people, EMD?

I cannot speak for anyone else.

But, having lived all over this country, I can say that elitist coastal types, though more commonly found in their native habitat, also display an annoying ability to appear within flyover country and simultaneously heap scorn and contempt on the local yokels while bidding the locals to change their ways, such that their dismal locale might one day be 'improved' to the point where those same coastal elites feel the need to flee to points elsewhere.

The Californication of Arizona and Idaho being but two examples I've witnessed.

kentuckyliz said...

Merica. Fuck Yeah.