Flying The Flag at Half-Staff: A State of Perpetual Victimhood (VANITY)

9/16/2012 | rlmorel

[rlmorel]

It seems like everywhere I look now, the flag is at half-staff. And it seems like it has been this way for the past year, if not years.

What is going on here?

Please don't misunderstand me. I am fully onboard for the show of mourning and respect the act engenders when done for appropriate circumstances. To pay respect to this man, for example is entirely justified:

And, so is this, in my opinion:

I simply believe it is being over-used, and it is not a positive thing.

Here are the guidelines which codify when the flags are flown at half-staff:

1.) For thirty days after the death of a current or former president or president-elect (as occurred after the death of President Reagan and the death of President Ford.)

2.) For ten days after the death of a current vice president, current or retired chief justice, or current speaker of the House of Representatives.

3.) From the day of death until interment of an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court, a secretary of an executive or military department, a former vice president, or the governor of a state, territory, or possession.

4.) On the day of death and the following day for a Member of Congress.

5.) On Memorial Day until noon.

These seem somewhat appropriate to me, but it is the last one that I have an issue with:
6.) Upon presidential proclamation.

This is problematic for me, because due to Presidential proclamation, we have seen the following: the interment of Frank Buckles, the death of Senator Ted Kennedy; the death of Pope John Paul II, the Space Shuttle Columbia disaster in 2003, the victims of Hurricane Katrina, the Indian Ocean earthquake and tsunami, the deaths of Coretta Scott King and Rosa Parks, Virginia Tech massacre, Fort Hood massacre, the death of Libyan Ambassador Chris Stephens, and the 2012 shooting in Aurora Colorado.

The flag was even flown in one state at half-staff for Whitney Houston! A talented person whose life ended early because of her various drug abuses. A shameful example.

I hope people don't misunderstand my feelings on this. Some of those presidential proclamations listed above are legitimate (in my opinion) and it is true some I disagree with may be legitimate to others. Furthermore, It is not that I think people who die in natural disasters or killed in shootings by deranged people are trivial, they are not; nobody is trivial to themselves and the world that surrounds them.

But is it always a situation for official national mourning?

During WWII, when did we fly the flag at half-staff? After the B-17 raids on Schwienfurt? After the unexpectedly bloody conquest of Tarawa? When we had 6000 Americans killed in 30 days of fighting on Iwo Jima? After the Normandy invasion? When the USS Indianapolis was torpedoed? I don't know, perhaps another Freeper knows where to find that information, but I'll bet not all of those. But lately, I have been unable to view an American flag that has not been flying at half-staff except for perhaps, my own.

This has been nagging at me a long time now, and it came to a head with the lowering of the flag in tribute to the murdered diplomats in Libya.

We did not value those diplomats enough to provide them adequate protection in an environment where the acts of abduction and beheading are well established, but we value them enough to lower the flag for them? I guess this means that if Valerie Jarrett meets an untimely end, she will most definitely have the flag lowered to half-staff in her memory.

That is logical, right?

But my problem with this particular exercise is not the inconsistency, it is the message it sends to us as citizens, and to the world in general: That we are victims.

I personally think this is unhealthy, both from an individual moral and psychological standpoint, but also unhealthy (and dangerously so) from national and international perspectives because it makes us look weak. And if even if the pig-eyed medieval thugs inhabiting many parts of the middle east can't figure out how to use a flush toilet, they readily understand and recognize weakness.

Perhaps most of all, I hate living in an environment where people constantly have their heads bowed in mourning at the behest of the state. I believe that there are appropriate situations to do just that, but to do it constantly is corrosive and dangerous, and renders it meaningless. But a country that constantly has its eyes on the ground CANNOT do great things or be a leader, and that is where I see the current state of affairs leading to.

[Loud Mime]

Since our family has it’s own 30’ flag pole, we use half-staff at our discretion. Tomorrow it will be at half-staff to honor my father’s death two years ago. He was in the Army Air Corps, an original member of the USAF, and a WWII and Korea war Vet.

Tomorrow is also Constitution day.

[upsdriver]

Lowering the flag in any instance is more disrespect for the flag rather than respect for the deceased. It should only be lowered in rare instances. Obama has no respect for the flag so he has no compunction to ordering it lowered often.

[rlmorel]

I don’t think I disagree with you...I think people can fly their flag at half-staff for a variety of reasons, and I think towns and municipalities or even states might as well. If a soldier from a town is KIA, I would have no issue with the town, city or individuals flying the flag at half-staff.

And because the government decrees it, I don’t always follow it. I didn’t when Ted Kennedy finally died. And I sure as Hell won’t when certain others go.

So I agree with you.

[Colonel_Flagg]

Generally speaking the lowering of the national standard is done by decree. To my mind it’s the same issue as flying the flag upside down.

When my father, who was a veteran, passed away, I wanted to lower the flag but didn’t. He’d have been most upset if I had and there was no direction to do so.

[luvie]

Thanks for letting me know. If I had owned my flag then, I would have probably lowered it for your dad and would have upset you. :(

God rest his sweet soul...

[Colonel_Flagg]

Dad taught me respect for the flag. He wouldn’t have wanted it lowered for him. But you’d have been sweet to consider it.

[luvie]

Thank you...I wouldn’t have wanted to do anything against his or your wishes. So, I’m glad I didn’t have the flag pole installed then.

Your Dad was an awesome man.....and one of my heroes.

[ExGeeEye]

I wouldn't fly Old Glory upside down unless I was in need of rescue and had no other means to communicate. Like dialing 911 to report lousy pizza, IMHO. Unfortunately, the message has been so diluted by political use (look at me! i’m in distress because the people in charge won't do it my way!) that it has probably lost its meaning as a genuine distress call.

Also IMHO, different from a display of the flag at half-staff because of personal mourning. Some I know do it on the anniversaries of certain events (space shuttle incidents, the deaths of Mother Teresa or John Paul II, etc.) Added together, people like this could add to the general sense that the flag is half-staff everywhere and all the time, but I will not judge them.