From the English point of view in the 1600's, the Powhatans were heathen savages. For centuries, Virginia history books referred to 1622 and 1644 as "massacres" - see
If the tribes had somehow acquired cannon and marched into battle in the European fashion, the warfare and the descriptions of the 1622 and 1644 events might have been different. If you were Powhatan, facing an occupying force that had overwhelming technological superiority, would you consider it a fundamental requirement of your leadership job to find your enemy's weak points and to strike there?
Any adjustment in traditional descriptions of military events in Virginia could be challenged as "political correctness," and that's particularly true about the Anglo-Powhatan wars and the Civil War. Today, the American military faces similar "asymmetric threats1 ," where the weapons and targets of the opposing sides are dramatically different. The emotions associated with such warfare are incorporated into the language used to describe events, and categorizing someone as a "terrorist" is not a neutral statement.
Still, a conversation requires words. We read and talk about people, places, and things in order to understand why things happened, why they happened where they happened, and why they happened when they happened. Such conversations are more-constructive when all parties having a discussion are willing to define and refine their terms so their statements are understood,
The 400th anniversary of the arrival of the English at Jamestown will be in 2007. Initially, various initiatives were planned to celebrate the anniversary. Some Native Americans in Virginia were openly reluctant to join in a "celebration" of the arrival of the English in 1607. After all, the settlement at Jamestown led to a drastic decline in the Native American population and a massive alteration of the traditional cultures in Virginia.
The state government finally decided to "commemorate" the anniversary, in order to minimize the risk of a Native American boycott. Politics is the art of the possible, and the artful choice of words might substantially enhance the economic impact of increased tourism to the Peninsula...
Dealing with the Confederate "heritage" in Virginia is at least as challenging. For almost 20 years, until 2001, the January state holiday for honoring Robert E. Lee and "Stonewall" Jackson, two major Confederate generals, was combined with the Federal holiday honoring Martin Luther King. January 19 was Robert E. Lee's birthday, but that's about as incongruous a grouping as one could imagine... When the governor of Virginia declares April to be Confederate History and Heritage Month, the media recycle the debates over whether it is possible to honor Confederates without insulting those who were enslaved on Virginia.
The last Confederate Veteran Reunion was in 1951, in Norfolk. (Four veterans, each over a century old, composed the last assemblage of Confederate soldiers in Virginia.) The 100th anniversary of the Civil War (1961-65) occurred at the same time as civil rights lawsuits changed behavior at Virginia lunch counters, water fountains, schools, public transportation, restaurants - even municipal swimming pools.
The Ku Klux Klan and other opposed to desegregation adopted the battle flag of the Confederacy as a symbol of "states rights," but others saw that image as a symbol of opposition to cultural change. For over 50 years, the Confederate Navy Jack has been displayed prominently by some residents of Virginia. Often the owner will refer to it as the "Battle Flag of the Confederacy" or the "Stars and Bars" - see Confederate Stars and Bars for the detailed distinctions, however.
More recently, bumper stickers with that flag have begun to include the phrase "Heritage, not Hate." This attempts to separate the racial and historical implications of the flag, though the emotional impact of the symbol still blocks many people from appreciating the distinction. Others note that the key "state's right" underlying the formation of Confederacy was the state's right to preserve slavery, and consider the display of the symbol to be an endorsement of slavery even if the focus is on heritage and not hate.
However you view the issue - you can get a clue to the culture of a neighborhood by observing if there are Confederate flags flying in public. To understand the cultural geography of an entire area, however, you may have to do more than make a snap judgment based on one house flying a flag.
