The left is doing the best they can to promote it, but there was zero interest in it even here in far left Silicon Valley. Most people were inconvenienced with no mail delivery and the stock market closed.
After the BLM riots, Democrats were looking for a way to cement the minority vote in their favor while also continuously pressing racial division.
The Biden Admin decided to federally recognize “Juneteenth”, a “celebration” of the emancipation of slaves that no one had ever heard of until the Democrats made it official.
Rather than acting as a tool for racial healing, Juneteenth has become yet another attempt to incessantly inject racial conflict as its proponents assert that white Americans today need to pay for the slavery of centuries ago. Never mind that white Americans fought a bloody civil war in part to end the practice. Never mind that it’s an institution that existed for thousands of years before the US was founded, yet progressives seem to think slavery is exclusively American.
No one in the west needs a reminder that slavery is bad.
The artificial popularity of these DEI events has been made evident this June with the erasure of bureaucratic handouts and a sharp pullback in corporate participation. Juneteenth has been a dud in 2025 and the political left is not happy about it.
Confederate flags and military leaders are still popular and celebrated in the southern states that lost the Civil War. They desperately need that reminder. And don’t tell me the war was about anything other than slavery, cause that’s baloney.
Actually, they’re popular in all the states. I have seen many here in California. They have nothing to do with slavery. They are probably about being a rebel, which is quite popular with many young men.
The problem is they had a lot to do with slavery – they tried to keep it past its time. Anyone who wants to worship rebels could worship our founding fathers. At least they won their rebellion.
But you dont get to dictate what something symbolizes to someone else. You decide what you display means to you, I decide what I display means to me. If you are interested in the meaning of what I display, you should ask me what it means to me, not tell me what it means to me.
Whether you get to or don’t get to dictate is a choice. For example, Nazi symbols are banned in many European countries. You don’t need to ask anyone with a swastika tattoo what it means to them – we all know what it means.
Except you dont. You know what it means to you, you dont know what it means to me unless you ask me.
A child may draw swastikas all over their notebook because, frankly, it’s a rather fun shape to draw. Are you really going to exile and shun that child based on what it means to you, when that child is clearly just doodling and thinks it’s a cool looking design?
No, I would teach that child what it means. Children’s brains aren’t fully developed yet. Also drawing one for fun on paper isn’t the same as getting a tattoo. I was talking about adults. And I do know what it means, because, let’s be frank, it doesn’t have many meanings.
You’d teach what it means to you. There is no inherent meaning to teach.
What it means to me is that some a-hole is probably going to start bitching about it so I should probably hide it to prevent them from causing a disruptive scene we’ll all end up regretting. That’s it. To me, the only thing to teach a child is that they shouldnt draw one because some people will get really mad and call them terrible names and declare them guilty of horrible things. I dont like teaching kids to be submissive and afraid, but I dont want them to be subjected to the abuse either.
Not everyone buys into subjective symbolism. I can understand meaning without requiring an illustration to express it, and I can see illustrations without assuming any meaning to them. A drawing is a drawing, and feelings are feelings. They do not need to be mutually exclusive, but one does not beget the other, either.
I would not teach kids to be submissive or afraid. I would teach them to be considerate and compassionate. You shouldn’t hide it because you might get hurt, you should hide it because it might hurt someone else.
I wasn’t talking about kids drawings, I was talking about adult tattoos and celebrated Confederate symbols. These are specific examples that most people learn about in school, not some random symbol nobody knows about. These specific symbols have specific meanings. If you have empathy towards people who suffered from whatever these symbols symbolize, then these symbols beget feelings.
And you are assigning reasons why they’re being celebrated, instead of asking the celebrant what it represents to them.
Symbols do not cause suffering. Rather than reinforcing and validating it, perhaps the most empathetic thing to do is removing the power such symbols hold over people?
I’d rather not remove the power of some symbols since they provide reminders for everyone of what terrible events happened and how people let them happen.
Not a holocaust survivor but to this day, seeing the USSR flag (or just the crossed hammer and sickle) still reminds me of what living under Russian control was like and how being defenseless or relying on fickle allies allowed that to happen.
Except they dont. They provide reminders of terrible events to the people who suffered those terrible events. They only remind those people of those terrible events.
I respect your take on the USSR flag. But that reaction is personal. To me that flag is just one of the many that I’ve happened to see over the years. It’s only meaning to me is that there’s a chance I may be able to identify which country it belonged to. And there really isnt anything anyone could tell me that’s going to change that meaning or give it any sort of power. So it is only a reminder of your recurring nightmares.
The symbol’s power is in how it forces YOU to relive your nightmare. So as I said, perhaps the most empathetic thing to do is relieve you of that burden.
History can help explain why a symbol might be of significance to certain people. As I said, I respect Shandril’s feelings about the USSR flag. But those are personal feelings based on personal experience; when I study the history of the USSR, a picture of some old flag has zero influence on what I take from that history lesson.
How? There’s no making amends for it. And it’s not so much a burden than a source of determination to undermine Russian interests any way I can (starting with my votes).
I dont know what to say - I see a swastika and it mights as well be a circle or a square, it’s just another shape. I dont let some random organization, movement, or person co-opt a random symbol or artwork and claim it as their own (rather, they certainly can, but it doesnt change my perception of the symbol). I equate it to people who claim that if you buy lunch at a certain chicken restaurant you are supporting gay oppression and bigotry, I think it means I was hungry and their sandwiches taste good.
If you cant understand this, then I’m sorry for the burden you must carry from such attachments.
