The U.S. state of Mississippi has a choice to make: are they going to change their state
flag? Why are people suddenly talking about this? Well, because of this. This part of
the flag, in the corner, is known as the Confederate battle flag. This was the military flag used
by the Confederate States of America in the American Civil War. This war happened in the
1860s when a bunch of southern states split from the United States of America after the
anti-slavery Abraham Lincoln was elected president. Eventually, the Confederate States of America
lost the war, and slavery was banned across the entire United States. Now, you can pass
a law and get rid of slavery, but you can't just pass a law to get rid of racism. And
there was plenty of racism left. Shortly after the war ended, Southern state governments
started passing a ton of laws that were basically designed to keep "white people" at the top
of society, and keep "black people" down at the bottom of society. These laws are known
as Jim Crow laws, and they were awful. So this brings us to Mississippi in 1894, during
the Jim Crow period. That year, Mississippi's state government passed a state law that made
this the official state flag. Since the Confederate battle flag is on prominent display here,
and taking into account what the Confederate battle flag has been used to represent...
not just the pro-slavery Confederate States of America, but the Confederate battle flag
has also been used by many racists to try to intimidate black people. So it's pretty
likely that the flag law that made this the official Mississippi flag probably counts
as a Jim Crow law. Ehh. Now thankfully, in our country, there has been a lot of healing
since then. But with that healing has come a lot of controversy about various symbols
of that time, including the Confederate battle flag. For example, this came up again in 2001,
when Mississippi had just discovered that due to some weird legal technicality in the
1900s they were without an official state flag. So Mississippi was like, "Hey, let's
make this official," but because of the controversy about the battle flag, they put two options
to a vote. The first option was, of course, the 1894 flag that people were already using.
The second option was an alternate version of it that replaced the battle flag in the
corner with, like, this thing of a blue square and 20 stars, because Mississippi was the
20th state. So they had the referendum, and 65% of the vote went to the 1894 flag. So
that was made official, and it's still being used today. But the discomfort around the
battle flag has not really gone away, of course. It entered the national discussion again last
year in 2015, when there was a terrible attack on a black church in Charleston, South Carolina,
where nine people were killed. In the investigation that followed, images were found of the suspected
culprit posing with the Confederate battle flag. Now, at the time this was happening,
the South Carolina state capitol grounds featured a Confederate battle flag flying high. And
since this was considered wildly inappropriate for what had just happened, the South Carolina
government decided to take down the Confederate battle flag from capitol grounds for good.
Georgia's official state flag used to have the Confederate battle flag on it, but after
two flag changes in 2001 and 2003, it does not appear there anymore. Now, Georgia and
some other southern states do have some more subtle references to the Confederacy on their
state flag designs. It's just that Mississippi is the only state flag with the most controversial
one still there. So in the midst of all this talk, Mississippians now have a choice to
make: are they gonna change the flag, or are they gonna keep it? There have been a bunch
of proposed bills that would change the flag, there have been a bunch of bills proposed
that would keep the flag, and this has been getting interesting. The state's top university
has taken down their own state flag from their campus, as well as the University of Southern
Mississippi. At least two county governments have taken down the state flag from their
county buildings. And there's a whole list of city governments in Mississippi that have
taken down the state flag from their city buildings. And there has even been talk of
this issue going to court. It is getting interesting. So, as we keep an eye on what Mississippi
does next, I wanna know what you guys think. Is this a flag that can represent all Mississippians
or is it not? So please, leave a comment. I'd love to hear what you think, especially
if you're from Mississippi. And thanks for watching, y'all. Bye.