"What's a wife beater?" my German friend asked.

"Uh, it's basically an undershirt," I said.

"In your country there's a special shirt for men who beat their wives?!"

Uh-oh.

A number of summers ago, I decided to take my 18-pound rabbit, Pig, for walks around the neighborhood. I bought him a mesh body harness with a leash and let him hop in the backyard to get used to the new wardrobe. Pig was not a fan; however, he accrued many from the numerous pictures I took. In one particular photo, Pig stood up tall on his enormous back feet, his long ears slicked down against his neck, his back to the sun. My Flemish giant looked adorable, like a man about to start grilling on a warm summer evening.

In the comments below the photo, one of my friends stated, "Pig looks like he's wearing a wife beater." She was referring to Pig's mesh harness. Once brought to my attention, the harness's resemblance to the sleeveless undershirt was undeniable. I laughed and vehemently agreed — that is, until another one of my good friends chimed in to our silly banter with her astonished and accusatory question, "In your country there's a special shirt for men who beat their wives?!"

She was appalled, and I stopped laughing. I'd always thought the name was funny — something simple and silly that didn't merit definition or deep consideration. But in that moment, I realized that my friend's adverse reaction to the slang went far beyond a language barrier. I started to look at it differently, realizing that if I were to address my true understanding of the shirt's name origin honestly, it would lead down a rabbit hole of domestic violence, sexism and cultural humor that I felt ill-equipped to explain. So I didn't.

In the wake of the Charleston, South Carolina, church massacre, there has been a tidal wave of pleas to remove the Confederate flag from government buildings. I grew up near a Civil War battlefield, spending my childhood summers in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. There I believed the Confederate flag represented our history, a lost culture and a racist ideology. The flag hung from every ice cream parlor and was sold in every gift store. Yet I firmly believed that the stars belong to the dreamers, the bars belong to the drinkers and the flag belongs to the past. It had its time in the sun, but we've long since had a new and brighter dawn.

Sometimes we are called upon to assess the way things always have been and call into question whether it's the way things always should be. These images, these words, carry weight. We can't ignore that waving the flag makes light of slavery, just as the term "wife beater" makes light of domestic violence.

Now, as far as I know, Pig is not a wife beater, despite the name attributed to his attire. Looking at him in his mesh harness, you wouldn't know he doesn't have a violent bone in his body. Actually, that's not true. Pig did bite my ankle last week. And there was that time he threw a pillow at my son. Seriously. He picked up a pillow with his big rabbit teeth and chucked it across the room, knocking my barely walking baby to the ground. He also ate our family portrait. OK, come to think of it, Pig may be evil, but his personal actions don't speak for the masses. Not the undershirt-wearing or the flag-waving.

I was unprepared to answer my German friend when she asked whether we have shirts for men who beat their wives, so I just sent her a picture of Kenny Chesney performing in his white undershirt and said, "It's what Kenny is wearing."

My friend said, "Ooh, I love Kenny Chesney." The conversation ended.

I stopped using the term "wife beater" for shirts after that day. And that's the point.

Perhaps explanations and justifications aren't always needed. Perhaps in this nationwide time of re-evaluation, we can just move forward with being what we should be rather than what we've always been. And we'll see a future without racist iconography, without violence and, with any luck, with plenty of Kenny Chesney.

Like Katiedid Langrock on Facebook, at http://www.facebook.com/katiedidhumor. Check out her column at http://didionsbible.com. To find out more about Katiedid Langrock and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate Web page at www.creators.com.