When does a flag go to half-staff?

Serious discussion is over.

 

I think it ended right there, actually.

 

Our governor lowers the flags whenever a native dies in Iraq. And when VaTech is shot up. And for whatever else. Seems like it's lowered for damn near half the year when it shouldn't be.

 

On a serious note, I'd just like to point out that one should raise the flag to the top of the staff before lowering it to half staff. It's not called lowering the flag to half staff for nothing. I had a fight with the woman who puts the flag up at one paper I worked with over this after Reagan died. [/former flag girl in high school]

 

Actually, I made a few points. I threw in one (admittedly unncessary) shot at the president, but I did contribute to the discussion.

 

Fair enough.

 

I can think of other things to lower more appropriate to Madonna.

 

Come on, F_B, you're thrilled any time you can get your flag to half staff!

 

If the flags should be at half-staff for the Virginia Tech massacre, does that mean they also go to half-staff the next time, when someone kills 35 or more people? I understand the thought that those killed came from all over the nation, but does that automatically make it rise to the level of a national tragedy? In my mind, no. In many ways, the Columbine killings were more shocking, more chilling than the ones at Virginia Tech.
I think the flag should fly at half-staff across the nation for only truly national moments in history, such as Oklahoma City, 9/11, when a president dies, a Katrina-type event.
I have a problem with the instant memorialization of tragic events because it seems to trivialize, on a grand scale, the true emotion of what happened. It's one of the more damnable parts of our instant-gratification culture.

 

I'm not sure how we should define the threshold for a national lowering, though it should not be taken lightly. I'd say the VT situation qualifies. Seems like it's a common practice at a local level. Any by local, I mean really local, like building by building. IE, local firefighter dies, and the firehouses around town lower their flags. Or, an individual who is vital to a particular organization dies, and that organization lowers its flag. Perhaps no one else cares, but I see nothing wrong with that kind of show of respect. In my town, a lot of the flags were lowered following VT, but I noticed a couple of businesses that did not do it and wondered why.

 

Nationally? Only the president can make that call, IMO.

Locally, it would fall on the governor or mayor.

 

There was a Taco Bell near my office that had its flag fly at half-staff for more than a year.

I chose not to eat there.