Setting debates about names aside, I think there are some important issues coming up here. I tend to be of the feeling that the meaning of a symbol, like a flag, is in the eye of the beholder-- we all have the scope to interpret it according to our own experience and understanding of the world, and that's what makes it potent. That said, however, there are some symbols that have become such powerful markers of particular events-- like the swastika-- that it's almost impossible not to equate them. The Southern Cross isn't quite in that league, but for many people I know, it's not far behind. They are not wrong to understand it as a symbol of white supremacy and racism. And neither are the people who display it as a marker of a sense of Southern identity that is NOT connected with slavery or racism. But symbols that are used thoughtlessly-- and people who are not prepared to have a dialogue about them-- are asking for trouble. Try walking through the east end of Glasgow wrapped in a Union Jack on the day of an Old Firm game, and you'll see what I mean.

As an American bluegrass player living in Britain, I am very aware of this. I've lost count of the number of times people have asked me how I can reconcile playing bluegrass with my left-wing political views and ex-pat status. Because for a lot of people, bluegrass is the 'ultimate' American music, and America itself has aquired some fairly dubious symbolic meanings in recent years. But MY America represents possibility and diversity-- which is exactly, I suppose, what appeals to me about bluegrass. After all, it was Black music that made bluegrass blue, and I'm fairly sure that Big Mon himself would have agreed with that.