If the only reason is because of the slavery association

Posted on: August 18, 2017 at 12:27:52 CT

then I think you should just stop having statues from the entire slavery period in American history. Jefferson did own slaves. So did Ulysses Grant etc. Most of the impoverished rural schmoes on either side of the Civil War didn't own slaves - but most of them, including the ones who fought for the North, were racist in terms of thinking that even if freed, blacks should not be treated as equals.

In other words, the "confederate = slavery = bad" reason to get rid of all traces of confederate history is way too simplistic. Our country was founded by slave owners who wanted to be free. Some of them were from South Carolina. Some of them were from Massachusetts. But they all were part of a slave owning culture at the start.

If we want to stop celebrating that aspect of our history by getting rid of statues, targeting just the confederate ones won't cut it. You would indeed need to get rid of statues of Thomas Jefferson and the like as well. And if that's the direction we want to go, so be it, I'm neutral on that. But I think projecting everything onto the confederate statues alone is too skewed a view of what our history really is.

Edited by McMuffin at 12:32:58 on 08/18/17