Minnesota’s new state flag should feature an eight-pointed North Star against a dark blue background shaped like the state, with a solid light blue field at the right, a special commission decided Tuesday as it picked a replacement for an older design that many Native Americans considered offensive.

The State Emblems Redesign Commission chose the final version on an 11-1 vote after finalizing a new state seal that depicts a loon, the state bird. Unless the Legislature rejects them, the new flag and seal will automatically become official April 1, 2024, when Minnesota observes Statehood Day.

The star echoes Minnesota’s state motto of “Star of the North.” The commission’s chairman, Luis Fitch, said that to him, the light blue represents the Mississippi River, “the most important river in the United States,” pointing to the North Star. But he acknowledged it could mean other things to other people. Symmetry and simplicity won out over other versions, including ones that included a green stripe for the state’s agricultural heritage.

    • Ranvier@sopuli.xyz
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      50
      arrow-down
      1
      ·
      edit-2
      1 year ago

      Don’t worry, Republican legislators are already in frothing rage about the change. I’m sure it has nothing to do with them wanting to keep the problematic imagery in the current one of native Americans being driven off their land. /s

      Also they’re spreading some conspiracy theory the new flag is supposed to look like the flag of Somalia or something and that this is a prelude to Sharia law being imposed. I wish I was joking. Yeah, because it has blue colors and a star in it, it must be an homage to Somalia, couldn’t have anything to do with being the “land of 10,000 lakes” and “the north star state.” Or even the old flag, which get this, is blue with a big star in it.

      I also liked the version with the stripes better, but this is very nice too, and anything is better than the atrocious current one. The new seal with the loon is very nice too.

      Other states that just lazily slapped their seals on to a blue background take note and get to fixing them up please.

      New seal:

      • IvanOverdrive@lemm.ee
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        19
        arrow-down
        2
        ·
        1 year ago

        Libtard snowflakes don’t even know what a seal looks like. It sure ain’t looks like a bird, I tell ya

      • postmateDumbass@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        5
        arrow-down
        1
        ·
        1 year ago

        Loonie flag?

        Why are the using the same bird as the Canadian money?

        Is Minnesota signaling they intend to join Canada?

        • Ranvier@sopuli.xyz
          link
          fedilink
          arrow-up
          3
          ·
          1 year ago

          I wish! It’s the state bird though. It’s been the unofficial seal and symbol for some time already. And with all the lakes there are tons of loons.

      • Kerensky1101@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        4
        arrow-down
        1
        ·
        edit-2
        1 year ago

        Other states that just lazily slapped their seals on to a blue background take note and get to fixing them up please.

        As a Virginian, I take slight offfense at this! ^but ^yeah ^our ^flag ^is ^just ^the ^state ^seal ^^on ^^a ^^blue ^^background

      • Occamsrazer@lemdro.id
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        1
        ·
        1 year ago

        No that was the tricolor variation that preceded this final design, and it actually did look like a Somalia flag. I think this one will be pretty well liked by pretty much everyone. The only people who won’t like it will instinctively not like it because of the taint of wokeness as a motive to change it. Whatever. But at the end of the day, it was a trash flag and everyone will ultimately agree that it’s better now.

    • Sorgan71@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      27
      ·
      1 year ago

      I cant make out the racism. Is that supposed to be a slave? It looks like a taco bell employee the way hes dressed

          • wieson@lemmy.world
            link
            fedilink
            arrow-up
            29
            arrow-down
            4
            ·
            1 year ago

            It’s a depiction (celebratory?) of them being purposely driven away from the land. The Native American is fleeing.

            • aulin@lemmy.world
              link
              fedilink
              arrow-up
              20
              ·
              1 year ago

              Wow. I saw it as the two people sharing the land. I did not see it as fleeing. Still a terrible flag, and even more so if it can be interpreted so differently.

              • Alien Nathan Edward@lemm.ee
                link
                fedilink
                English
                arrow-up
                9
                arrow-down
                4
                ·
                1 year ago

                I saw it as the two people sharing the land.

                Honestly? Even if it was unequivocally that it would still be a problem. The whitewashing of using violence to drive people from their homes and then pretending that they came to an agreement to share the land is just gross.

                  • S_204@lemm.ee
                    link
                    fedilink
                    arrow-up
                    2
                    arrow-down
                    7
                    ·
                    1 year ago

                    Are we still using that word or did we figure that part out already?

                  • Alien Nathan Edward@lemm.ee
                    link
                    fedilink
                    English
                    arrow-up
                    2
                    arrow-down
                    1
                    ·
                    1 year ago

                    There really isn’t any “before all that” though. Especially that far west. Along the east coast there might have been a generation of “we just want to escape weligious pewsecution and gwow cown uwu 👉👈🥺” but the first permanent settlement in Minnesota was in 1852, 7 years after the phrase “manifest destiny” was coined. Minnesota was established during the era where the prevailing belief of white Americans was that God commanded them to take all of America for themselves and anyone who tried to stop them was to be destroyed.

              • wieson@lemmy.world
                link
                fedilink
                arrow-up
                17
                arrow-down
                1
                ·
                1 year ago

                Yes, but a flag is not the place to tell history. It usually depicts your ideals.

                If Germany had f.ex. a shattered David’s Star on their flag, that would accurately depict history. But it would read as antagonism and a current stance on things. As if it was their goal to destroy Jewish people.

          • hactar42@lemmy.ml
            link
            fedilink
            arrow-up
            13
            arrow-down
            4
            ·
            1 year ago

            It has to do with the setting. It’s not just a Native American riding away on horse back, but the fact that the settler is watching him with his rifle near by. It is like he is driving him away and claiming the land for his own.

            • viking@infosec.pub
              link
              fedilink
              arrow-up
              4
              arrow-down
              21
              ·
              1 year ago

              You’re overinterpreting things. And despite that, it’s exactly what happened. Historical accuracy is not racism.

              • KoboldOfArtifice@ttrpg.network
                link
                fedilink
                English
                arrow-up
                8
                ·
                1 year ago

                Historical accuracy is not racism. Choosing to identify yourself based on the racist actions in your history is.

                To drive it to the extreme, it would be like saying that Germany depicting Jews being gassed on their new flag isn’t racist, just historically accurate.

    • Fisk400@feddit.nu
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      26
      arrow-down
      3
      ·
      1 year ago

      That is a terrible flag even without the racism. A good flag should be clearly identifiable as an emoji or at least a stamp.