Does our flag actually stand for freedom?

Does our flag stand for freedom?
Throughout all the screaming and rhetoric about patriotism flying about, I have come to wonder if anyone ever actually asks the hard questions about the symbolism of our flag.
For all the talk about how "men and women have died for your rights" or "You are only free because of the blood spilt by those that came before you", there is little discussion of or outright omission of how often our country was all too willing to classify others as inferior or not worthy of citizenship.
The history of our country is not a pretty one when it comes to oppression and the stifling of beliefs. We have never had a time in our entire history where we did not silence opinion and ideology, discriminate and segregate others based on skin color, ethnicity, or social class, or outright engage in extermination.
Couldn't happen in THIS country you say?
Have you read our history?
Even before we were a country and had people fleeing their countries for various forms of basically all of those items I listed above we promptly set out to become the oppressors.
The Puritans were infamous for their treatment of those of other faiths. They would put Quakers out on the street in the stocks for other Puritans to mock, beat, throw rocks and garbage at and even kill. Heaven help you if you were a Pagan or a woman that acted outside the norms of society by maybe practicing some form of early medicine. The flames awaited you to be burned as a witch.
And while we are not TOTALLY responsible for the decimation of the Native Americans, (apparently some sort of plague hit North America before the white man set foot and there were numerous wars between nations) we sure didn't treat them as equals. We hardly regarded them as human.
Fast forward to the days around the revolution and we had basically re-established a quasi feudal society where there were few chances for RECOGNIZED upward mobility. True you could engage in some form of enterprise and attain wealth, but even those were scorned by the "real" upper class.
By this time we were happily utilizing indentured servants and slaves and treating them like cattle. Women could not own land let alone have a say in public affairs.
This continued almost in its entirety through the civil war where we turned a blind eye to northern generals keeping slaves while castigating anyone in the south that did the same.
As that war ended, things did not improve. We moved west and took whatever land we wanted from those we saw as beneath us when it suited us, even reneging on our promise of 40 acres and a mule to blacks of that era.
As the railroads were built, the Irish and Chinese were treated as lepers and lumped in with blacks as undesirable but necessary for labor. Oh and about the only women that were attaining wealth other than by marriage were prostitutes that would parlay their earnings into becoming madames at brothels and bars.
Turn of the 20th century brought on hatred and bigotry for any person that didn't come from basically England, Germany, and France. Blacks and Women were still second class citizens if regarded even that highly. The KKK was in full swing (maybe a bad choice of words) and even our president was praising the EXTREMELY racist film "Birth of a Nation". Hawaii is "annexed" at this time by way of a revolt led by landowners and supported by the United States military.
WW2 came along and you would think we could band together as a country. Segregated units for Black soldiers was the order of the day. We also had internment camps for our own citizens that were of Japanese or German dissent and depending on the stories you read about them, some accounts say conditions were as bad as many NAZI concentration camps. Women were asked to fill the jobs of all the men that were off to war so they gained SOME status but were still not treated as equals. Senator McCarthy was whipping the nation up with hearings on "UnAmerican activities."
Fast forward to the mid 60s. And while blacks and women have had the right to vote for some time, there are active attempts to curtail these rights for blacks through intimidation and legislation. The national guard at this time is being called in to help desegregate schools but state GOVERNORS are organizing crowds to physically block entry. You would also go to PRISON if you wanted to engage in interracial marriage.
In the 70s we had a president that ignored his own advisors about how inane marijuana was so he could declare a war on drugs (yes it was NIXON not Reagan) and imprison blacks and war protesters. Oh and there were raids on groups that played Dungeons & Dragons because apparently you were a worshipper of Satan if you played.
In the 80s and 90s our puritanical side decided to take hold again and there was a battle for our morality. Prayer in schools was continually attempted to be legislated and if you were Asian you were part of some plot to infiltrate and buy our country. The Tailhook scandal showed just how much our women in uniform were valued. The war on drugs intensifies and our prisons fill up with primarily small time users as opposed to actual kingpins.
9/11. The towers fall and I guess we actually did unify,... for about a month, and then anyone in a headcovering was fair game to all regardless of if they were Muslim or not.
Since 9/11 we have watched everyone's rights erode starting with the Patriot act which brought us NSA wiretaps, a further militarization of our police, warrantless searches, the TSA, "Black Sites", and worst of all BLIND PATRIOTISM that turned a blind eye to it all.
And through it all, (with the exception of our pre-revolution days) We have praised those that fought for liberty for ALL while they fought and died under the stars and stripes.
Is it any wonder why SOME while loving what freedoms they still have MIGHT see the flag as a symbol of oppression?