Jackson Free Press

"What you are seeing now is a cultural genocide that's being carried out by small revolutionary cliques of cultural Marxists that have seized power in our media institutions, in our governments, in our educational system, and this does not reflect the will of the people. It does not reflect the will of southerners."

— William Flowers, a member of self-described southern nationalist group League of the South, on calls to remove Confederate symbols from government buildings and the Mississippi flag.

Why it stinks: There was an actual genocide, you know: the enslavement of black people in this country. The institution of slavery was so integral to southern culture that half the nation, including Mississippi, revolted in secession (which Flowers' group wants to do again, by the way) and, some argue, an act of treason. Although Flowers' view might be considered extreme even within the pro-Confederate heritage crowd, consider that joining Flowers on the Capitol steps in Jackson was Jeppie Barbour, the brother of former Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour, who also said flying the flag means "that my two great-grandfathers are being saluted and recognized for the effort they made way back then."

As Haley is wont to do, he's walked a fine line on the issue, saying the Mississippi state flag shouldn't be cast in the same lot as the Rebel flag because Mississippi adopted its flag in 1894 (four years after it adopted a state Constitution that legally disenfranchised black voters) but adding that he'd be OK with the Legislature remaking the flag. This is the same man who once said he didn't remember blacks having it so bad under Jim Crow in his boyhood home of Yazoo City.

There are plenty of folks who would dismiss the comments of Flowers or the Barbour brothers as the rantings of a few tone-deaf individuals. But when an advocate of southern secession doesn't sound that much different than a twice-elected governor, it's easy to see how much work there is left to do for reconciliation in Mississippi.