You know what makes me mad? Why people even worry over the flag thing. Out here, the same people complaining about people flying the Mexican flag are the ones who have German flags or Italian flags somewhere in their homes (or, occasionally, Confederate flag bumper stickers) and carry them to Oktoberfest and stuff. Apparently you can only have ethnic pride if you're white. Or incredibly drunk on cheap U.S. beer with a faux-German name.

exactly, Vox. thank you. it ain't about a FLAG. it's about being brown and waving a flag.

Amen. I live near the border; if I had a cow every time I saw a Mexican flag waving, I'd be in a permanent freakout. Like the song says, "if not for Santa Ana, just to let you know/where your feet are planted would be Mexico."

People need to quit pissing themselves over expressions of cultural pride. I thought that was supposed to be the great thing about the U.S., all the different cultures contributing all the different flavors.

when i was growing up with my (totally non-political) Mexican mom and American-white dad, we always flew the Mexican flag. We were damn proud. And yeah, wtf with the people with confederate flags (i used to live in Virginia where almost as soon as you got out into the rural countryside the confederate flags popped up like tulips in holland) being all up in arms. I'll show you up in arms, wave one of those things in my face...

I feel ya' Vox. What they really mean is

"How dare you people act as if being brown is something to be proud of?!"

Are people still complaining about flags? I think you're right that those waving the Mexican or Salvadoran or Guatamelan flags are not the recent immigrants, but those who are probably US-born. We've been here long enough to be disillusioned and not want to wave or pledge allegiance to a flag and everything represents (good and bad, though we Chicanas/os focus on the bad).

I have an inherent aversion to flags. Growing up in South Africa took care of that. A hideous orange, blue and white piece of cloth that represented the worst of humanity.

Upon becoming “naturalized” (given how unnatural I must have been, and hopefully remain), I didn’t take to the gaudy red, white and blue that much either, (despite having used it a lot in my art – this deliberately destroyed piece being a favorite).

And I never took to any other flag, not even the new, slightly more representative flag of South Africa.

To me they just seem to inspire nationalism, separateness, xenophobia and a host of other ills. I understand how they can serve as a great unifying tool for those who are oppressed, but in the end, once the oppressed becomes the oppressor, the very thing that once unites tends to do the complete opposite.

At what point does national pride, or any pride for that matter, start to serve as a barrier to entry?

good points raised.

clinton that shit sounds badass. i was looking for a picture! see, i can see that happening with paintings and such. or sculpture. at least something you have to process through someone else that can be taken all in with a look. your Bush/Cross/Missile reminds me of something i had sketched to the side for painting later. not exactly. but in the ballpark.

i agree with your take on flags in an ideal sense. i think they denote property and a body of people that when rallying to that flag can do dangerous and harmful things to others. so i distrust them as a matter of logical thought and general principle.

but then...practically, we use all kinds of "flags," when you think about it. not just formal "flags," but signifiers that serve as "flags." so what's one more? anyway, i don't kill anyone behind mine and i wouldn't. i just hang it in my window, and enjoy the way the light turns it hot colors when the sun comes up.

Actually I like flags and banners aesthetically; I love seeing colorful fabric fluttering in the wind. I just don't like some of the weird stuff that these symbols bring out of people, but I can hardly blame the colorful fabric.

I must admit, personally I can't imagine flying a Chinese flag in America. I guess I feel like my face is already enough of a flag. Plus, on the pragmatic tip, how quickly would it be assumed that I was some sort of communist sympathizer or spy? As absurd as the thought is that a spy would fly a flag, red-blooded Americans would get suspicious or hostile. Imagining this scenario, I sense yet another flip-side to the model minority stereotype of Asians being good at math and science; we're smart and sneaky, you see. As Chris Rock said (paraphrasing), "Asians say that Wen Ho Lee was racially profiled. Black folks don't even get the good racial profiling! Asians get profiled for stealing nuclear secrets; we get profiled for stealing car radios."

yes...i don't know that the symbols bring it out of people. those people want to bring "it" out, and a flag provides a reason. only a symbol of what we want to assign it, as you said...can hardly blame the colorful fabric.

i used to have a korean flag, bumper sticker on my car...that's how much i loved TKD, we bowed to that flag every time we stepped on the mat, off the mat. to me that flag stood for very good things, good values good feelings about myself. and others.

the american flag makes me think of conflict, ....and the rockets red glare...the bombs bursting in air... and watching everyone in school move en masse, like a flock of...something, chanting, learning the pledge words thinking "this is bullshit!", refusing to pledge, trouble with principal, wars and hype, rednecks looking to fight, big pickup trucks and gun racks, Staunch Believers. it reminds me, too, of 9/11, when we all wanted to wear them, manhattan was sold out of any type of american flag fabric, i eventually found a sheer-ish bandanna the likes of which i'd never seen, still have that somewhere. it reminds me of taping up the full page illo that the NYTimes printed of Old Glory that i hung on my window, afraid of anthrax and airplanes, the flag that was hanging from every window that winter, its a symbol fraught with tension for me, still. it means war....

mexican flag feels warm, feels like a pride in my history, in my genes, in my bones. its solid, big stripes, wide, strong, the green is warm, the red is bold, the white is pure, the eagle harkens back, even, to temixtan, to tenochtitlán, to the mixteca, the aztecs, legends of the indigenous. i feel very strong about that flag, even though it has been used to oppress the indigenous, as well, by the Mexican government...so in terms of pure symbolism and philosophy, it ripples in the mestizaje winds itself. but i have great love for it.

they are but symbols and the next person's feelings for each could easily be totally different. we can place no weight on each one, but only ware the potential for weight.

chinese flag, you are right kai. USers would not like that. we want to use every fucking thing from razor blades to iPods to clothes to games, dont care who makes it, usually China does, but don't let people see a Commie Flag here, everything but their flag is what we want.

on the face thing, i see what you mean. although i'm not sure how good most americans are at telling Asians apart, re Chinese or Korean or even Japanese. perhaps you (your face as you say) are a flag for "Asia" to most, but either way, i agree that what need is there, really, for you to have a flag? (esp if you dont feel the need for one!) and i think there, mexico is in a unique position in terms of this...we are adjoined to them. we pretend to be friends, while we do our best to control them, there is always this tension...we want the workers, dont want it known, just want maids, not live-in maids. we all know this. mexicans know it too. thats why they dont mind traveling to the source of control. it feels like a right, i imagine. after all, if the CIA can have its hands in Mexicos bizness, and we can have our hands in their banks and their cornfields, what does it matter if they are batting at the puppet or the string? mexico, so far from god, so close to the USA, and what way have we Chican@s here in the USA to show our support as we watch our own government squeeze the land of our bones? we have but our words, our hands, sometimes we have these flags we wave in them.

Here's the link to an image of the flag. The piece is called "Like Apple Fucking Pie." It's difficult to see the text, bearing in mind that the piece is actually 78" x 48". (Here's a detail). What was so interesting to me about the destruction of this piece, was that the printer claimed that the stars of the flag "which were repeated images of the iconic Iraqi, (hooded with wire dangling from outstretched arms, and colored white looking more than just a little Ku Klux Klanish) represented "excessive violence" which they felt justified their breach of contract and rationale for destroying it.

It's a pity you can't read all the text though, (but I'll sample some below) because inadvertantly, they ended up reaffirming exactly what the piece was about, namely that the text of the Abu Ghraib report that sat languising on Donaled Rumsfeld's desk gathering dust before the images broke, was so graphic and violent, that you didn't need images to figure out that prisoners were being violently tortured by the United States.

I find that the intentional abuse of detainees by military police personnel included the following acts:

a. (S) Punching, slapping, and kicking detainees; jumping on their naked feet;
b. (S) Videotaping and photographing naked male and female detainees;
c. (S) Forcibly arranging detainees in various sexually explicit positions for photographing;
d. (S) Forcing detainees to remove their clothing and keeping them naked for several days at a time;
e. (S) Forcing naked male detainees to wear women's underwear;
f. (S) Forcing groups of male detainees to masturbate themselves while being photographed and videotaped;
g. (S) Arranging naked male detainees in a pile and then jumping on them;
h. (S) Positioning a naked detainee on a MRE Box, with a sandbag on his head, and attaching wires to his fingers, toes, and penis to simulate electric torture;
i. (S) Writing "I am a Rapest" (sic) on the leg of a detainee alleged to have forcibly raped a 15-year old fellow detainee, and then photographing him naked;
j. (S) Placing a dog chain or strap around a naked detainee's neck and having a female Soldier pose for a picture;
k. (S) A male MP guard having sex with a female detainee;
l. (S) Using military working dogs (without muzzles) to intimidate and frighten detainees, and in at least one case biting and severely injuring a detainee;
m. (S) Taking photographs of dead Iraqi detainees. (ANNEXES 25 and 26)

Maj. Gen. Antonio M. Taguba, Article 15-6 Investigaton of 800th Military Police Brigade, US Army Report on Abuse of Iraqi Prisoners, February 2004

Finally, flags for the sake of aesthetics alone I can understand. Despite what it represents, the Swastika flag of the Third Reich is one of the best looking designs I've seen for a flag. But I don't think I'll hang it out my window anytimes soon, regardless of what the sun might do to it (delivered light-heartedly, not snidely).

yes.... they took three of the most striking colors and an old symbol often invested with much energy and meaning by different peoples at different times. not surprised it's striking. and i agree with your point! although i dont think i like my flags only for aesthetic, as i went on to explain above. i'm just not either-or on it...i feel good about a couple, bad about a couple, and even the ones i feel good about i'm not taking into any battle with me.

thanks for filling in the info and links. i'll check it out.

STOP THE GRUMPINESS, SAVE IT FOR WHEN YOU JOIN THE MARINE CORPS AND FIGHT FOR THIS COUNTRY NEXT TO ME AND OTHER MANY OTHER MEXICAN-AMERICANS THAT DO NOT BULLSHIT, WE JUST ACT BY WEARING OUR DRESS BLUES VERY PROUD!!

whoa. i'd ease back on the crazy pills a little, sarge.

Who cares, bucko. I have better things to worry about. I am a cavacha who married, then divorced a Mexican American guy. We have one child together. My son speaks spanish and is fully involved in BOTH his cultures....the only thing one can see in this young man that is a part of me is his smile. His father's family hails from Mexico as well, but he's an American first and foremost and will tell you that in 2 seconds....usually in Spanish. You, my good man, are a bigot...not a racist....because you ARE caucasion....whether you like it or not. Blah, blah, blah....get a job.

Blah, blah, blah....

Too many words to get to your real point!

Marcy, my job (aside from working with MTV and AP/Knight, and designing books in Mexico, and quiza ahorita escribando a column in El Centro, Mexican newspaper, and selling my art and designing blogs) is speaking my mind and heart here. And dealing with puddles of ugly like you. You can call me "caucasian" all you like. It's not really important. I'm still an anti-racist and made of mexican and jew and russian and none of your business and i only have to wonder why you feel so hostile to me, but in the end who really cares! You're a small mind and heart. A lot of those around. Not so remarkable. M was right. "Blah blah blah" would have saved you a lot of time and communicated your essence much better.

adios!