"On the evening of July 13, 1968, red and black flags appeared in the Place de la Bastille. On July 15, the black flag was here in Douarnenez and Annemasse. On the morning of July 16, the black flag was flying again in Douarnenez. During the May events, the black flag traveled through Paris, side by side with its brother, the red flag. It flew during the strikes at some factories, in the Paris region and in the provinces. ---- A representative of the reactionary Gaullist majority declared during the election campaign that all French people, without exception, could claim the national tricolor flag, 'except those who wave the black flag.' With this story about the flag, to which some would have a right, and on the other hand, this parliamentarian has, I hope, made a fool of himself in the eyes of the voters." The social and economic problems that motivate the current protest movement cannot be reduced to a question of flags.
But since we're on the subject, let's talk about them. In 1789, the tricolor flag flew through Paris and was substituted for the emblems of the absolute monarchy by a rebellious class, just as black and red flags sometimes flew in Paris in May 1968 instead of the tricolor. Like the tricolor flag today, the fleur-de-lis flag of the monarchy was, in 1789, the national emblem. Yet, it was not retained, precisely because a flag is a symbol, and when you want to change the existing order, it is also necessary, for the sake of clarity, to change the symbols. That is why we have a flag, although it is not the flag itself that is important, but the ideas it symbolizes.
We don't have the right to the tricolor flag, to the national emblem? We can do just fine without it. Because the national flag always represents "the general interest." But it's clear that in a class society, what is called "the general interest" is the interest of the ruling class, the exploiters. That's why the national emblem becomes the reactionary bourgeois emblem that symbolically represents the privileges of the leaders. Moreover, the black flag and the red flag are in the streets and accompany workers' demonstrations, while a profusion of tricolor flags fly over banks, insurance companies, the headquarters of large corporations, and over ministries, prefectures, etc. In short, over the buildings that are the instruments of economic oppression on the one hand, and political oppression on the other.
In a class society founded on the exploitation of man by man, the national flag is also the flag of nationalism in all its forms (war, colonialism, etc.). Capitalists, to escape economic deadlocks, need armed conflict, and the national flag then becomes the emblem of an exacerbated patriotism in whose name people are pitted against one another while arms dealers and other speculators amass profits.
As for the black flag, it represents no one's interests. It flies in every country whenever the oppressed rise up against any form of oppression. It is a symbol of struggle and hope that dates back to the first workers' revolts. It is the emblem of anarchists because anarchists were the catalyst for the first workers' struggles. It was born in and from misery. Its origins are of little importance now that it has become the symbol of revolutionary struggle, the complete challenge to bourgeois society in the face of the reformists and opportunists of every stripe who hide behind the folds of the tricolor flag.
"The black flag is the flag of the Revolution."
Le Combat Syndicaliste CNT-AIT, July 25, 1968, issue 515
SOURCE: Actualité de l'Anarchosyndicalisme
https://www.socialisme-libertaire.fr/2025/12/le-drapeau-noir-contre-le-drapeau-tricolore.html
_________________________________________
Source - A-infos-en@ainfos.ca
Geen opmerkingen:
Een reactie posten