HUNTSVILLE, AL -
Healthcare Reform is an issue that's dividing a nation, and now it is dividing a neighborhood.
When the House approved the healthcare reform bill by a thin margin on Saturday, many cheered while others did not. Huntsville's Debbie Orr's stomach turned.
"I do not think that it's right for people to go to prison if they cannot afford to pay their fine and pay for healthcare," says Orr.
So she decided to take daring measures to get her point across, by hanging an upside-down American flag from the balcony of her home.
Orr's display poses a breach to flag respect protocol. An upside-down flag is supposed to signal dire distress. Orr says that's exactly her point.
"This is my way of using my voice in protest," says Orr.
But it is Orr's outspoken statement of protest that's raising a red flag with the community Homeowner's Association and several neighbors.
"My husband and I were walking and we thought she'd hung it upside down by accident, drove by and asked her if she did it on purpose and she said yes," said Patricia Breland.
Breland continues saying Orr " ...Went off on a tangent about freedom of speech or something and I said well, it's against restriction, you're offending some people in the neighborhood, please turn it back."
Breland says this is a legal issue for the Homeowner's Association, not something based on politics or opinions.
But in Orr's opinion, it is going to take a whole lot more than restrictions and upturned noses to make her flip the flag back right-side up.
"The stripes on this flag represent the blood that many many people have shed for this country to have freedom," says Orr.
When the House approved the healthcare reform bill by a thin margin on Saturday, many cheered while others did not. Huntsville's Debbie Orr's stomach turned.
"I do not think that it's right for people to go to prison if they cannot afford to pay their fine and pay for healthcare," says Orr.
So she decided to take daring measures to get her point across, by hanging an upside-down American flag from the balcony of her home.
Orr's display poses a breach to flag respect protocol. An upside-down flag is supposed to signal dire distress. Orr says that's exactly her point.
"This is my way of using my voice in protest," says Orr.
But it is Orr's outspoken statement of protest that's raising a red flag with the community Homeowner's Association and several neighbors.
"My husband and I were walking and we thought she'd hung it upside down by accident, drove by and asked her if she did it on purpose and she said yes," said Patricia Breland.
Breland continues saying Orr " ...Went off on a tangent about freedom of speech or something and I said well, it's against restriction, you're offending some people in the neighborhood, please turn it back."
Breland says this is a legal issue for the Homeowner's Association, not something based on politics or opinions.
But in Orr's opinion, it is going to take a whole lot more than restrictions and upturned noses to make her flip the flag back right-side up.
"The stripes on this flag represent the blood that many many people have shed for this country to have freedom," says Orr.
