2y ago

Minnesota is in the process of proposing a new state flag. Here are some proposals, circulating online. Many feature the North Star, a symbol of the state.

The current flag looks like this, which obviously needs changing:

There is a commission tasked with proposing a new design. A news article about it is available here: https://www.cbsnews.com/minnesota/news/minnesota-house-bill-moves-forward-commission-to-redesign-state-flag-and-seal/

The top proposal, called "The North Star Flag", seems to be a popular favorite.

I gathered these proposals from these two sites: https://newmnflag.org/designs https://vexillology.fandom.com/wiki/Minnesota

49 comments

Is this because they got slagged off by CGP Gray?
- If CGP Gray slagging off shite flags gets places to update them then good, maybe he can do transit infrastructure next
  
  Ha! Sadly CGP grey loves his teslas and cars. His video about how self driving cars are the future shows a dystopian idea where pedestrians or cyclists have no space on the roads at all. (And he doesn’t even consider trains or other public transit)

I vote for #10, the 4yr old's rendition of a Lovecraftian horror.

Minnesotan here. #4 from the top has my vote hands down. Nice clean flag, not too complicated.
- Not a Minnesotan but I agree, #4 is the best.
  
  So just the big fancy star? Or the Nordic Cross?
- Non-minnesotan but I agree on #4 it also allows it to be reproduced on other mediums like buttons and patches easily.
- Minnesota native here - definitely agree, that's a great design. Plenty of potential for it to become an iconic flag.

Those last 5 are absolutely unhinged and I love them. I think that number 4 is really the best choice though
- Seriously what are the stories on those? Surely they were submitted by children or something?

Take it from a Coloradan, get yourself a nice, clean flag design and the merch will sell itself.

Needs a loon with red stars for eyes
- And an optic blast like the Laser Kiwi Flag.
  
  Here you go!

1, 5, 4.
I like Nordic Crosses, and the star’s a good color in a good placement. If you want an snowflake star, 4 is the best version.
But 1 emphasizes the rivers!

Number two or four.
Really disappointed in lack of laser beams coming from the bird eyes.

4 is my choice. Very clean, it's an easily recognizable design, and it seems more creative than just "Nordic cross with star" or whatever the abominations in the later half are.
- The pattern is called Selburose and is a traditional pattern used in knitted mittens and sweaters from the area of Selbu located in Norway at the border to Sweden.
  I thing #4 is by far the nicest flag
- Number five gets my vote. The light blue with a nice star and the swirls , it's the perfect sign for a flag

The fuck are the last two

I like how the farther down you go on the proposals, the more cooked they get
- I actually like the 8th one -- the one with three vertical stripes. The one above that, though, looks like a loon and baby loon are following the Star of Bethlehem, on their way to deliver a nice bowl of cream of wild rice soup to the baby Jesus.

The current flag is ahhh, pretty bad. Like its just awful looking, and the native american racism too.

Number 10 is the clear winner here. Who wouldn't want the pancake loon on their flag?

Personally not a fan of Iceland-with-star, as most Scandihoovians here are of Swedish or Norwegian ancestry (in that order if I remember right, but don't quote me), not Icelandic. I like the dichromatic Nordic cross better, but I prefer #1, with the non-wavy centered stars close behind. If I had to pick, I think I like center-star-with-green more than center-star-with-snowflake even though the former has too many colors---green = forest = Minnesota.
Edit: I apologize for my colorblind ass
- Iceland has a red cross, not a green one, so it isn't Iceland-with-star.
  
  I legitimately thought the cross above was red lol. Looking at it now it's clearly green; my guess is my phone's blue light filter last night and my colorblindness were factors.

Not a Minnesotan, but I like the Nordic crosses. Though I have to wonder why there's no purple in, like, any of the proposals.
- Oh look at the royal snob over here with his "why don't they use purple" nonsense, like it doesn't cost a year worth of grain and my eldest daughter's hand in marriage.

Why does it obviously need changing? The new design will be talked about for like aonth...people will love it and hate it, then no one will care again.
- Every state whose flag is just the state seal over a blue or white background should be forced to change their flag. The concept is offensively boring.
  
  I agree, but the same should be true for yellow and green.
  Really, just don't put your seal on your flag!
  
  And caring about a picture on cloth isn't?
  Especially one that only locals see.
- The whole point of a Minnesota flag is to have an easy way to display you're Minnesotan. Literally half of the state flags look the exact same as ours if there isn't a wind blowing, and genuinely that number doesn't go down much even WITH a breeze.
  If we have something more iconic, noticeable at a glance, it's marketable. Think about Britain's flag on all their tourist merch. Think about the MOA star on everything to do with the mall, think "I lt;3 NYU" mugs, shirts, hats.
  
  As someone who lives in Maryland, the marketability is a big deal. Our flag is on everything ... and it sells.
- Visual aesthetics aside, in the Seal of Minnesota (the busy bit in the center, which has official uses besides the flag), the native on horseback is riding off into the sunset (westward, the 1983 edit notwithstanding) in the most gerenous interpretation or being driven off by the settler in a less charitable one (see rifle in the foreground). Regardless, the message is one of displacement of the native peoples by the mostly European-heritage settlers for the sake of "civilization". It's not something we should display proudly as an embodiment of our state's core values, and for that reason has been contentious for years.
  Some reading if anyone is more interested in the history: #1 and #2
- Because it's ugly
- Beats me, its got five star-cocks surrounding the seal.

Current flag is nice. Maybe take the spear out of the guy's hand, but otherwise why not include images of the native population. Unless those dates have something to do with killing loads of indigenous Americans, in which case...maybe take them off as well.

49 comments