Racial identity and emotional responses to confederate symbols

Objective This research tests whether psychological predispositions influence African Americans’ emotional responses to Confederate battle symbols. The former Mississippi state flag is employed here because it contained the Confederate battle symbol in the left canton. Methods The data were collected using a snowball sample of 68 African Americans from Jackson, the state capital of Mississippi. Emotional responses to the Mississippi state flag were measured using skin conductance levels (SCLs). Using ordinary least squares regression, the SCLs were regressed on variables measuring multiple dimensions of racial identity and ideology: Linked Fate, Private Regard, and Legal Disillusionment. Because of the significant presence of police officers in the sample, a dummy variable was included to account for this group. The study also controlled for the self‐reported Age of the participants. Results The findings of this study reveal that African‐Americans suffer psychological trauma when observing racist symbols. African Americans who shared a common fate with other African Americans and those who possessed a high regard for other African‐American people were more emotionally responsive when they viewed the former Mississippi state flag. Police, however, were less responsive, when compared to civilians. This result may be attributable to officers working near the state capitol building and becoming desensitized to seeing the flag. Conclusion In recent years there has been an increased interest among political scientists in the study of biopolitics. One of the shortcomings, however, is that the research has relied almost exclusively on white subjects. Our research helps to fill this gap by focusing exclusively on African Americans. We interpret the findings to suggest that African Americans do not uniformly respond to the flag but are unique individuals whose personal views and experiences shape how they respond to the world. Even when presented with symbols representing a horrid past of lynchings and terror, African Americans do not constitute a monolithic group. The removal of the Mississippi state flag establishes one of many historical markers in the states efforts to balance the scale of racial justice. Its removal also represents one less source of trauma for African‐Americans and a step toward racial healing for Mississippi and the nation.