Some hate comes with the territory. This was personal.
Someone used my Syracuse City Flag Survey to tell me they hate me. This is what public work looks like behind the scenes, and why they won't stop me.
Last week I started a survey about the Syracuse city flag. I'm trying t understand what people know about it, how they show their civic pride, and what they'd like to see. It's also how I find out what I'm missing.
Most responses are thoughtful. This one wasn't.
What they wrote
One question asks how you'd feel spotting a stranger wearing or flying the flag. This person picked "Something else" and wrote:
Asked what makes them proud of Syracuse, they answered:
I'm not sharing this for sympathy. I'm sharing it because this is part of public work that almost nobody sees, and I'd rather you saw it.
What I can tell you about who wrote this
Not much. There's no name and no contact info, which is how this usually goes. The response came in through the survey link on a Facebook ad, so it reached a wider audience than people who already follow me. That's the point of running ads. It also means you sometimes hear from someone like this.
I don't know what's going on in this person's life, and I'm not going to guess. I'll just say that a stranger who fills out a civic survey to tell me they hate me "so much" is carrying something that has very little to do with a flag.
This isn't Strathmore
The response lists Strathmore as their neighborhood. I can't verify that, and anyone could have chosen that from the dropdown list. But if it's true, it surprised me.
Strathmore is one of the kindest, most inclusive neighborhoods in the city. It's where I get a lot of the love and support for the flag. Nothing in this response sounds like the Strathmore I know, and I'm not going to let one anonymous comment redefine a neighborhood. If you're from Strathmore, thank you. You're not what this looks like.
Public work has a cost people don't frequently post about
Design a flag for a city and you get a lot of feedback. I expect that. Plenty of people don't like the flag, and I'm fine with that. Disagreement about design is part of the deal.
This is a different thing. Criticism should be aimed at the work. This was aimed at me, and it was built to hurt. Public work means your name is attached, and your name makes you easy to find, and a stranger can say all of this to you without ever saying who they are.
I rarely see this exact flavor of hate. When it shows up, it lands harder because it's so personal.
A few things worth correcting
I don't owe a debate to someone who won't sign their name, but a few claims are easy to answer.
- "Ripped off Minnesota's flag." Minnesota adopted its state flag in May 2024. The Syracuse flag was adopted in June 2023. The timeline runs the other way.
- "Conned the city." I entered a city flag competition and my design was voted as the winner by residents of the city of Syracuse. There was no con.
- "Selling it for personal profit." I do sell flags. First Light Syracuse Goods is a small business, it's just me, and I've never hidden that. I'd rather the flag be something people can buy and fly than die out, relagated to a file in a city gov drawer. Selling it is how it gets seen, shared and embraced.
What this person is after
My read on this is that this person's goal is to demoralize me, wear me down, and make me quit. That would mean quitting the work of sharing the flag, what it stands for, and the time I spend with the diverse communities here who've made it their own. The flag was made to bring people together. A message like this one is an attempt to pull that apart.
I've thought about it, and I'm sure I'm not the only person in this person's orbit who's gotten this hateful treatment. I feel for anyone who has to live in that world.
But they won't pull me into it. They won't pull the Syracuse flag into it either.
Being the steward of this flag means more than designing it and selling it. It also means protecting it from things like this.
The survey is still open
If you've got real thoughts on the flag, good or bad, I want them. The survey is open through October 18, and there's a chance to win a city flag prize via raffle.
Take the City Flag Survey
