WOODSTOCK, Va. (WHSV) -- Jeremiah Lanham is just one of the many who came out Sunday, July 5, in Woodstock to fly their confederate flag.
"People want to judge me for flying my flag, telling me I've got to take it down is wrong, especially in the land of the free," said Jeremiah Lanham, an attendee.
The flag has been accused of representing racism following the shooting death of nine people in a South Carolina African American Church.
"It's not racist, it's not. I'd take my shirt off my own back just to give somebody else. I don't care what color skin you are. I'll help anybody I can," continued Lanham.
The flag has now been removed from many store shelves, including Walmart. Sunday's rally actually took place in the Walmart parking lot. Organizers say businesses removing the flag is an issue for them.
"If somebody wants to buy something to support their confederate ancestors [because] they didn't have union ancestors, they should be able to have confederate merchandise, flags, all that type of stuff to support what they believe," said Dustin Fadeley, who organized the event.
It's not just the flag that they're standing up for.
"The monuments getting messed with, now that's different, that's something in our history," Lanham said. "That's our heritage."
Yet price says it is all just a misunderstanding.
"Don't judge a book by it's cover," said Austin Price, another organizer of the event. "There have been people who have used it for the wrong meaning, it just shows that there are good people out there and there are bad people. We're the good people."
Although the people we spoke with said the flag should be on monuments, there were mixed opinions on whether it should be on federal and state property.
The flag still flies high over South Carolina's state house grounds in the state's capital city. Saturday, crowds turned out to call for its removal.
The division comes from a difference of opinion. Hundreds of critics, including members of the NAACP made their case on what the flags represent to them.
"It was put up to represent segregation, and so it represents segregation to me," explained Dr. Rose Fichett in Columbia, South Carolina.
After the racially motivated massacre at Charleston's Emanuel AME Church, South Carolina's governor called for the confederate flag's removal from the state house grounds.
State lawmakers will begin debating the issue Monday..
