Displaying Confederate Flag Was Insensitive

Re “Confederate Flag on Gridiron Sparks Painful Civics Lesson,” Nov. 16:

What were Newport Harbor High School officials thinking when they exhibited the Confederate flag during their football game halftime shows? It was especially asinine displaying it in front of a predominantly African American student body. Are they blind to the well-publicized efforts previously executed by Southern legislative governments that all but eliminated such a racist symbol from public view? Perhaps their insensitivity and ignorance are due to being locked away for too long in their safe Newport Beach enclave.

Cesar Madrid

Orange

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Re “Football Half-Time Show Leaves a Sorry Bunch on the Sidelines,” Nov. 18: In writing his column about the Confederate flag being unfurled at Newport Harbor High School during a football game against a predominantly African American student body, Dana Parsons has me confused. First he gives us the snide remarks about the Confederate sympathizer cells in Newport Beach, even though we are really discussing racism, not the Confederacy. Then he finally seems to get the point about that flag offending most black people, with its connotations of slavery and racism in the Old South.

There were and still are serious arguments in some Southern states over it being flown over state capitols. The flag is also still used by some as a subtle way of revealing bigotry to other like-minded people.

Parsons then proceeds to trivialize the whole situation, going so far as to blame the very people who were offended and to declare that no apology was needed at all.

Writing a column from Orange County shouldn’t have to make one totally clueless about racism. Anyone over 50 from the South can still recall separate bathrooms and drinking fountains. Maybe Par-sons should read some recent history books about these United States.

Eric Parish

Vista