A high school has banned its football team from flying the Thin Blue Line flag in support of a student’s deceased cop father after complaints claiming that the flag is “racist.
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Since the 2019 season, the Fletcher Senators of the Fletcher High School in Neptune Beach, Florida, had been flying the pro-law enforcement flag during their games to show their support for the student whose cop father had passed away last year.
Following the football team’s match last week, however, the school and the Fletcher Senators have been facing backlash whereas critics accused them of racism for flying a Thin Blue Line flag.
“Thin blue flag shown at Fletcher High School game, a lot of students aren’t happy,” one person protested according to News4Jax.
“Fletcher really out here being openly racist,” another one insisted.
As Lorie Lavender, the mother of the junior student whose cop dad passed away in 2019, insisted, the team her son is in didn’t fly the flag for racist or political reasons.
“It is all about my son’s love for his dad and his memory,” Lavender said.
Following the backlash, the school has decided to ban the Thin Blue Line flag in order for personal feelings of the football team’s members not to be confused for a political statement of the school.
“Since last year, a young man on our football team has been allowed to memorialize his father by carrying a flag onto the field with the team during the opening ceremonies of each game,” Fletcher High School Principal Dean Ledford explained.
“The flag, which is known as the Thin Blue Line flag, has different meaning for different people, and rather than representing the young man’s personal feelings, it was being interpreted as a political statement of the team and of the school.
“In consultation with the coaches, I determined that the act of using this flag in this personal way, while in the context of the football game opening ceremony, could easily be construed as representing a political position of our school and not just the personal feelings of the student and his teammates.
“Therefore, I have determined that it is no longer appropriate to continue. I am in conversation with the student and his teammates about ways they can appropriately express their personal views.”
Replaced!