I'm going to just throw away a confederate flag that has been in my family since just after the civil war
Why would you throw something that is a precious treasure of your family?
I can't stand to look at it anymore. I finally realized the history of the flag after doing research
Your family kept that flag because it is important to them. If you do not want to support them keeping, just keeping it is better than throwing away.
But isn't it offensive to keep it? I hate seeing how much it hurts the black people.
While it is good that you are learning about history and about racial issues, throwing things away won't fix the problem. It will just make your family upset to know that you threw a precious heirloom away.