This flag is displayed everywhere both as a flag and as an adornment. I mean, it's a nice place with a rich BBQ history and all, but car decals bearing license plates from other states? Why when you live in, say, Alabama do you fly your South Carolina flag outside your house? What do these SC-o-philes want to convey? Do they wish they were back there? Is it a harkening to something? A secret fraternity?
I went so far as to research the flag hoping to gain insight. Found out the crescent moon isn't a moon after all; it's a symbol taken from the Revolutionary War uniform signifying military prowess. And people accuse Southerners about still fighting the Civil War - you folks got it all over the rest of us! The Palmetto Tree is the state tree and it got that designation from Revolutionary War times due to its strength (a fort wall made of this tree's trunks withstood bombardment from a naval attack). So, now that I'm informed about the history of all this, WHY do people put this flag all over the place? Enlighten me, PLEASE!!!! I want to get in on the fun. It's a great place with totally fun people. When it's humid (read: 99% of the time), you can smell the sweet tinge of bourbon in the air. It's my kind of atmosphere, you know!
Obviously, I don't get it, so if someone out there would please explain this phenomenon to me, I'd feel so, so much better.
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Being married to a South Carolinian for the past ten years I think I can shed some light there. It's just an enormous amount of state pride (and powerful marketing/branding). Remember, as the first state to secede, South Carolina has always thought they were better than the rest of us and this is one way they show it. Not only do former residents fly their flags outside of their homes in their new states, but every college and university in the state has shirts, bumper stickers, hats, etc with the state flag represented in the school colors. I teach at Louisiana Tech and one of my colleagues has a Clemson-orange state flag sticker on his car. In addition to the universities, every tourist destination (all of the low country islands) will have t-shirts and hats that have the crescent and palmetto along with the location name. state jingoism or marketing genius...you be the judge.
Oh, Pumpkin, thank you!!! The first state to seceed being lorded over the rest of us. Makes all the sense in the world, especially when you add in they throw back to the Revolutionary "Wa-wa" to get the crescent and the flag background color. Ah! Enlightenment! Off to fetch a celebratory toddy.
PS I haven't seen the word "jingoism" flapped about since Mr. Nau's Government Class. Off for another toddy.
Ahhhhhh...if one can't bandy about bon mots like "jingoism" then what good is one?
Speaking of South Carolina, especially with one of your Current Interests being a certain beauty queen, I thought you'd appreciate these collected bad similes:
Her vocabulary was as bad as, like, whatever.
Her face was a perfect oval, like a circle that had its two other sides gently compressed by a Thigh Master.
His thoughts tumbled in his head, making and breaking alliances like underpants in a dryer without Cling Free.
She grew on him like she was a colony of E. coli and he was room-temperature Canadian beef.
She had a deep, throaty, genuine laugh, like that sound a dog makes just before it throws up.
He was as tall as a six-foot-three-inch tree.
Wow, Allen. Thank you for applying your Diva Post Knowledge. Very, very impressive such as. I hate it that Lauren Caitlin's notariety ship has sailed (to The South Africa, perhaps? If a map can be found and The Africa correctly identified). Apparently, she has nothing else to say - which is not that far fetched. Thank you for all you add to the blog.
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