July 02--It's beyond appalling that the school board in downstate Martinsville -- a city of fewer than 1,200 residents roughly midway between Indianapolis and St. Louis -- has fired a high school teacher for illustrating the breadth of our First Amendment rights of freedom of expression by stepping on a small U.S. flag during a lecture to a classroom of juniors.
"What I did was never intended as a show of disrespect to our country, to our veterans or to anyone, nor would I ever do or say anything with that intention," teacher Jordan Parmenter told the Mattoon Journal Gazette Times Courier. "I love my country and have nothing but the utmost respect for those who serve it."
He apologized and described stepping on the flag as "a terrible error in judgment."
I don't see why. If the U.S. flag stands for anything, it stands for the right to disrespect it.
Parmenter's reportedly spontaneous stomp wasn't a political protest, which would be inappropriate if performed by a teacher in a public school setting, but a vivid and obviously memorable pedagogical act, a demonstration that freedom of speech applies to more than just politely offered sentiments and mildly confrontational displays.
Firing him undoes that lesson.
The terrible error in judgment was shown by the school board.
'Stars and bars'
Speaking of flags, recent voluminous reporting and commentary about racially loaded symbolism has only fueled the misapprehension that "the stars and bars" is a clever, slangy way to refer to the iconic Confederate battle flag.
It's not. "The stars and bars" is the first Confederate national flag, a banner with three large red and white bars in the field where the United States flag has 13 red and white stripes, and a circle of white stars against a blue background in the upper left where the United States flag has rows of stars.
The flag that now commonly is associated with the Confederacy, the one that still flies at the South Carolina Capitol and is embedded in the Mississippi state flag, was the battle flag of Gen. Robert E. Lee's Army of Northern Virginia. The "stars and bars," with the addition of a state seal in the middle of the circle of stars, is the flag of Georgia.
They're both emblems of treason, racism and defeat. Stomping on them should not just be tolerated but encouraged.
