• mydoomlessaccount@infosec.pub
    0·
    9 months ago

    Don’t forget the rather unfortunate usage of a bunch of people cruising around in the Confederate car all being named “Duke.”

    See, there was once a man named David, who was the leader of a wacky little group of goofballs back in the '70s. That li’l jokester even went so far as to get everyone to call him a grand wizard, which is such a zany thing to ask people to do, but people totally did it with a straight face

    Anyway, I wonder if it’s a coincidence. Who knows?

  • xantoxis@lemmy.world
    0·
    9 months ago

    Apart from the confederate flag itself, this show was pretty much anarchist. They spent every episode humiliating the cops and breaking any unrighteous law they could. The show treated the flag as set dressing.

    They also came from a family that canonically resisted the Union during the civil war. And there’s very few black people in the show whatsoever. So.

    I know the hate symbol has always been a hate symbol, but if there’s any show where you could say “it was a product of its time” (the 70’s, btw) I think it’s this one.

    • aeronmelon@lemmy.world
      1·
      9 months ago

      There’s a whole episode of The Cleveland Show (as in Cleveland Brown, the black character from Family Guy) where Cleveland gets upset at his neighbor friend for flying a Confederate flag on his house and finally tries to get rid of it. When he fails, he confronts the hick neighbor and calls him a racist. The neighbor doesn’t understand why Cleveland is upset and when Cleveland points to the flag the neighbor says, “What, my Dukes of Hazard flag?”

      Cleveland immediately realizes he approached the problem from the completely wrong angle and drops the matter indefinitely. They continue to be friends.

    • don@lemm.ee
      0·
      9 months ago

      I was never into it or pretty much anything country-related, being an Airwolf, Mission Impossible (the reboot), and MacGuyver kinda kid, but Dad liked it, and explained it to me pretty much the way you did.

  • BarbecueCowboy@lemmy.worldEnglish
    0·
    9 months ago

    I definitely support that we’ve pushed this show out of the forefront, but this is where a lot of the arguments for the flag as a ‘symbol of southern pride’ come from. It’s a weird argument, and it is definitely not a fair one, but there’s very fond associations in the south with that car even from people who had no clue where the flag came from. Super successful attempt to help the confederate flag be seen as acceptable, whether on purpose or not.

    It’s a weird show too for someone who isn’t from the south… Racial diversity is non-existent in the show, but that’s also pretty accurate for its location… It had some awesome car scenes, but no depth. The only hot take in the show beyond the flag painted on top (which wasn’t even a hot take then) was that the government was widely seen as corrupt and it was more than a bit sexist.

    • Kaboom@reddthat.com
      01·
      9 months ago

      Yeah, hell, Sheriff Little, the black sheriff from the neighboring county was actually pretty competent. Yeah, it was mostly white, but the black people were always smarter than Roscoe or Boss Hogg.

      I dont think op ever watched the show.

  • VubDapple@lemmy.world
    0·
    9 months ago

    The Friday night lineup in those days was Dukes, followed by The Love Boat, followed by Fantasy Island. I didn’t know it was racist. I thought it was a sort of Robbin Hood story with cool car jumps and a corrupt Sheriff of Nottinghazzard.