By far, my biggest issue with flags in r/place and Canvas does not apply to a (like you said) 20x30. It’s stuff like this:
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People covering and fiercely defending huge chunks of the canvas, for something that is completely unoriginal, repetitive, and boring. And yet it still gets a pass - unlike, say, The Void; everyone fights The Void.
Another additional issue that I have has to do with identity: the reason why we [people in general] “default” to a national flag, for identity, is because our media and governments bomb us with a nationalistic discourse, seeking to forge an identity that “happens” to coincide with that they want.
But, once we go past that, there are far more meaningful things out there to identify ourselves with - such as our cultures and communities, and most of the time they don’t coincide with the countries and their flags.
As such I don’t think that this is a discourse that we should promote, through the usage of the symbols associated with that discourse.
Maybe where you’re from it’s easy to separate your government flag as its own symbol that doesn’t represent real people
I think that this is more of a matter of worldview than where we’re from, given that some people in Brazil spam flags in a way that strongly resembles how they do it in USA.
I agree with your basic point that just claiming the space with a flag and not using it is no fun but if you look at the final state of the section you posted the flags are very nicely decorated with artwork
By far, my biggest issue with flags in r/place and Canvas does not apply to a (like you said) 20x30. It’s stuff like this:
People covering and fiercely defending huge chunks of the canvas, for something that is completely unoriginal, repetitive, and boring. And yet it still gets a pass - unlike, say, The Void; everyone fights The Void.
Another additional issue that I have has to do with identity: the reason why we [people in general] “default” to a national flag, for identity, is because our media and governments bomb us with a nationalistic discourse, seeking to forge an identity that “happens” to coincide with that they want.
But, once we go past that, there are far more meaningful things out there to identify ourselves with - such as our cultures and communities, and most of the time they don’t coincide with the countries and their flags.
As such I don’t think that this is a discourse that we should promote, through the usage of the symbols associated with that discourse.
I think that this is more of a matter of worldview than where we’re from, given that some people in Brazil spam flags in a way that strongly resembles how they do it in USA.
I agree with your basic point that just claiming the space with a flag and not using it is no fun but if you look at the final state of the section you posted the flags are very nicely decorated with artwork