Since the South Carolina shooting of nine, the Confederate flag has found a new wave of heat after photos of shooter Dylan Roof waving it and flying it surfaced. The ongoing debate over its place in history and in modern life have ranged from President Obama’s comments to South Carolina no longer flying it in front of its capitol building.

Apple Inc., too, has erased the Confederate flag from its history- by taking down all iOS games that show the flag in any capacity, following Amazon and Wal-Mart’s decisions to not sell any products depicting it. Developers have received statements explaining Apple’s decision resulted "...because [the games] includes images of the confederate flag used in offensive and mean-spirited ways."

Apps pulled from the store include Ultimate General: Gettysburg and the Civil War games developed by Hunted Cow.

“It seems disappointing that they would remove it as they weren’t being used in an offensive way, being that they were historical war games and hence it was the flag used at the time,” Andrew Mulholland, developer of the Civil War games, said in an e-mail.

Movies and TV shows seem to be untouched, as the 1993 film Gettysburg and the Duke Hazzard series are also still available on iTunes.

The decision may seem odd, considering not only the historical context of the games, but also that games featuring the Nazi flag, such as Wolfenstein 3D, are still up and running in the app store.

Well, I do understand that Apple wants to remove anything that shows the Confederate flag just like they did with the Nazi flag and the Communist/Soviet flag. From a guy living in the Southern United States, I think it was ok for them to remove the flag on any apps, but down here, we still have a lot of Southern pride, and removing the flag from existence can spark outrage from those people, but for me, I think it is a smart move from Apple to do that.

Remember, Germany banned the Nazi flag and Russia / Eastern Europe banned the Communist/Soviet flag, but the United States hasn't banned the Confederate flag yet to this day, even know they have been a lot of controversy in the past mostly involving the KKK (mostly in the South) and they always use that flag, but nothing was done. That is why mostly I don't really like seeing the flag, even being a Southern.

Smart move from Apple.

Before I got to the end of your article, I was already thinking "Well what about the Nazi symbol?" 

It's just a business move, they know the media has a hold of this flag story, and the public may explode about it, meaning it's WAY safer for them to get rid of it now then having a bunch of obsessive complainers give them bad publicity. 

That being said, I think it's stupid. As long as the app isn't glorifying or praising it, then why should we care? The Nazi party did SO much worse, and we have no problem using it's symbol in media, so long as it's used to represent the Nazis or basically anything bad.

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Here's my take on it:
Flying the rebel flag doesn't mean what anyone thinks it means. One doesn't have to be racist to fly it. Most people around here (where I live) take it as a sign that you're proud to be from the south...which is also NOT what it means. What it stands for is anarchy and succession from the United States. It means you disagree with and no longer wish to be associated with the US or it's government. Maybe it isn't such a bad thing after all... xD jk

However, opposed as I am to that flag, people should have the right to fly it if they want. I can think of much more offensive things in games and stores, but hey, they can't be associated with racism which is all people care about anymore (and by the way, the media is slanting these stories to make them sound the way they do. Just pull up legit statistics from the government themselves and you'll see that), so nobody cares. Only racism and homosexuality topics are important in 2015, right? [/rant]

So yeah, this is silly. Especially the removal of games that are depicting the flag in historical settings. Next should we remove it from our text books and just tell children it was an obscene flag with the same colors as the American flag? Can't offend the kiddies parents after all.

While we're at it, should we also remove the Iraqi flag from games and films since they are racist against ALL Americans? Or maybe the Union Jack because they basically had our founding fathers enslaved which is why they formed the US to begin with... Okay...NOW end rant. Sorry about that. The hypocrisy is just so real.


Also, good point about the Dukes of Hazard. A show made back when racism really was a big problem.