Kentucky city mayor: Confederate statues to come down

[tallguy]

Aug 15, 2017 14:24:00 GMT -5 hurley1980 said:

Aug 15, 2017 11:16:27 GMT -5 OldCoyote said:

So these soldiers ever not fighting for a cause,,  I am pretty sure that those involved in the battle were most certain fighting for a cause, Not because of the beer and partying?

In the interest of political correctness, Let's bulldoze those cemeteries. so we can rewrite history,,

There was no difference between the intent of the leaders and the troop's in the battles!!!!!!!!!!  they were fighting to win their causes.

Take one, take them all.

If you don't agree you are a bunch hypocrites!,,, selective out rage!

Dude, chill out.  They are removing statues from public places. They are not removing the real actual bones of the confederate leaders off the face of the earth, which is what you are suggesting we should do to the soldiers in your comment above.  Apples and Oranges.  And no one is freaking rewriting history....this is the stupidest thing I have ever heard!  No one is going around collecting all the history books and documentaries and burning them in a bonfire, trying to remove the fact that the confederate army ever existed. 

I'm  so hard, I've given myself a migraine!

You really don't read here enough, do you?  We have a few posters who outdo this pretty regularly.  

[steff]

 Baltimore is currently taking down monuments.

Jason Martin‏ @jmart181

Jason Martin Retweeted brandon soderberg

City officials in Baltimore are currently pulling down Confederate statues, 1:44 a.m. Eastern

Jason Martin added,
brandon soderberg @notrivia
Larger crowd gathering as far as I can tell Baltimore police and residents all thrilled
12:45 AM - 16 Aug 2017




brandon soderberg‏ @notrivia

Larger crowd gathering as far as I can tell Baltimore police and residents all thrilled
12:41 AM - 16 Aug 2017

[Deleted]

Aug 13, 2017 23:12:43 GMT -5 Tennesseer said:

Aug 13, 2017 22:04:44 GMT -5 Shooby said:

Trying to erase history doesn't change it.

One does not erase history or change it by taking down a statue as the history of the person memorialized in a statue will always be available in history books, warts and all in this case.

Are you sure about that? It's getting harder and harder to find references to the real reasons for the Civil War... now everything that's taught or EASILY available is "Slavery, slavery, slavery, slavery... and... ummm... ohhh yeah... slavery". None of the rest of the facts exist to the internet generation.

[Deleted]

Aug 15, 2017 11:34:14 GMT -5 thyme4change said:

To the victors go the spoils. The confederates lost. Get over it.

Yes, they did lose... But the Confederates weren't the only ones that lost... all the states of the Union lost too. Because with the loss of the Civil War, the States (not just the former  Confederate states... ALL the states. Yes, even the Union states) lost two things: The right to secede (it was legal up until it was made illegal after the war*) AND the right of self determination via State's Rights.

And yes "to the victors go the spoils", but let's also remember this other poetic gem: "The history of war is written by the victors". It's not written devoid of passion or bias, but enjoying a hearty dose of both. And that passion and bias rarely favors fact over belief. Let's also remember this one: "There's three sides to every story, your side, my side, and the truth." In the case of the Civil War, there's the Union's side of the story, there's the Confederate's side of the story, and there's the Truth. Which one do you thing got more "play" after the Union won the war? I'll give you a hint which two it wasn't: The Confederate side, nor the truth.


*The United States exists in a "It's legal until it's not" situation in most if not all situations. Laws MUST be passed or Rulings must be Supreme Court adopted to make things illegal. Anything with no law one way or the other is considered legal by default (every hear the phrase "there's no law against..."?)

[weltschmerz]

We even removing Confederate symbolism here in Montreal.

The Hudson's Bay Company has removed a plaque from the company's flagship store in downtown Montreal that commemorates Jefferson Davis, who was president of the Confederate States during the American Civil War.

"We are working this evening to have the plaque removed," wrote Tiffany Bourré, a spokesperson for HBC, in an email to CBC News Tuesday afternoon. 

Calls to have the plaque removed emerged after a 32-year-old woman was killed in a deadly car attack on anti-racism protesters who were demonstrating against a white nationalist rally in Charlottesville, Va., on Saturday. The man charged in the attack idolized Nazis, according to a former teacher.

www.cbc.ca/news/canada/montreal/jefferson-davis-confederate-plaque-montreal-1.4248206

[mmhmm]

I see no problem with removing these statues/plaques from public property. They can be preserved in museums, if desired, as I see it. I just can't see making big deal about it. Just move them and be done with it. No need to kick up a storm about it.

[Deleted]

I can't find where we were talking about the statues on the other thread so I'll put this here...

"A timeline of the genesis of the Confederate sites shows two notable spikes. One comes around the turn of the 20th century, just after Plessy v. Ferguson, and just as many Southern states were establishing repressive race laws. The second runs from the mid-1950s to the mid-1960s—the peak of the civil-rights movement. In other words, the erection of Confederate monuments has been a way to perform cultural resistance to black equality."

www.theatlantic.com/amp/article/479751/

You know, just to be historically accurate and not erase and facts...

[swasat]

So its NOT ok to remove confederate statues because history, because values, because remembrance.

But its ok for the neo-nazis protesting the same to completely forget and forego lessons from the worst world war mankind has ever seen and to preach about the man who is responsible for millions of lives lost?

HA HA. The irony of it all 

[steff]

How many statues & monuments to Hitler are there in Germany?   Has everyone forgotten the history of what Hitler did because there are no statues?

What about Stalin & Lenin?   Did the world forget what they did when their statues were torn down?

Saddam?  How many cheered when his statues were pulled down?

History is history.  Doesn't go away & is only forgotten by those who don't pay attention. 

And AGAIN, many statues are simply being moved, not destroyed.   Yes, some cities & states are choosing to destroy them, but for the most part, they are being moved & put into museums.  Ya know, for history & education instead of for honoring them. 

[steff]

I'll also add that trump said it should be left up to the states to decide.   And that is EXACTLY what is happening.   States & cities are making the decisions to remove these statues.  So all he did was fan the flames of the Neo-Nazis & KKK.  

[Deleted]

Another good one savingplaces.org/press-center/media-resources/national-trust-statement-on-confederate-memorials#.WZR7jtEpCf0

[Virgil Showlion]

Aug 16, 2017 13:08:14 GMT -5 deminmaine said:

Aug 16, 2017 11:41:21 GMT -5 steff said:

How many statues & monuments to Hitler are there in Germany?   Has everyone forgotten the history of what Hitler did because there are no statues?

What about Stalin & Lenin?   Did the world forget what they did when their statues were torn down?

Saddam?  How many cheered when his statues were pulled down?

History is history.  Doesn't go away & is only forgotten by those who don't pay attention. 

And AGAIN, many statues are simply being moved, not destroyed.   Yes, some cities & states are choosing to destroy them, but for the most part, they are being moved & put into museums.  Ya know, for history & education instead of for honoring them. 

Thank you.  I was going to get around to making that point, but hadn't yet.

That is so true.  History is not erased one iota by this.  Idolation of slavery is.

This rests on the erroneous presumption that monuments to Confederates constitutes idolization of slavery.

[Value Buy]

Aug 13, 2017 23:06:59 GMT -5 OldCoyote said:

I am going to point it out again, In the interest of rewriting history of oppression & intimidation.

Let's be completely politically correct remove the name statues and everything else of the first thirteen Presidents that owned or used slaves.

What is the problem with that??

That happens in phase two

[Deleted]

Why should that happen? It's not the same ducking thing.

I've been to Gettysburg. I've been to mt Vernon, monticello, etc... they all tell complete, accurate , balanced histories.

Monuments... memorials in public places should be of celebratory interest. People you put on a literal pedestal. Sorry, with all of the potential historical and contemporary figures, these don't cut it.

Put them in s civil war museum of grove if you like. Take them home and make love to them under the moonlight for all I care. But they don't need to keep the places they were stuck in an attempt to try to keep other people in theirs.

[Virgil Showlion]

Aug 17, 2017 10:21:03 GMT -5 oped said:

Why should that happen? It's not the same ducking thing.

I've been to Gettysburg. I've been to mt Vernon, monte Ellis, etc... they all tell complete, accurate , balanced histories.

Monuments... memorials in public places should be of celebratory interest. People you put on a literal pedestal. Sorry, with all of the potential historical and contemporary figures, these don't cut it.

Put them in s civil war museum of grove if you like. Take them home and make love to them under the moonlight for all I care. But they don't need to keep the places they were stuck in an attempt to try to keep other people in theirs.

Monuments of the Confederates are being dispatched ostensibly because of a morals clause: Indeed these men accomplished great works, won great victories, founded great cities, etc., but they fought for the Confederacy, which was anti-abolitionist, therefore disqualifying them from being honoured. They've been 'tainted'. Honouring their works is what Demin calls "idolization of slavery".

The same morals clause can (and certainly has, in literature put out by BLM mouthpieces like M4BL) be equally applied to US presidents who owned and used slaves.

Why should Americans honour their accomplishments when they held the wrong moral views on slavery? Why is this not also "idolization of slavery"?

You can wave your arms and argue that not all of the presidents actively fought to preserve slavery, but the 21st Century zeitgeist of the political left is that honouring men who so much as tolerate "hateful" behaviour is a form of violence that must be expunged. This admittedly isn't a reasonable argument, but "reasonable" and "BLM" don't go into the same sentence.

America's early presidents are going to be in the crosshairs soon enough and you're going to behold the culture war at a whole new level of intensity. Viva cultural suicide.

[Gardening Grandma]

Aug 17, 2017 10:50:08 GMT -5 deminmaine said:

Aug 17, 2017 9:44:30 GMT -5 Virgil Showlion said:

This rests on the erroneous presumption that monuments to Confederates constitutes idolization of slavery.

Many of these monuments were actually erected long after the war, and the reason was glorification of the old and defeated Confederation cause.  So yes, idolation of slavery, the engine of the Confederate economy. 

Another reasons for the statues erected long after the Civil War were to keep certain "uppity" people in their place.  It's not a coincidence that many of them went up in e early 1900's when the Jim Crow laws were passed.

They should have been removed years ago. This is not who we are.

[thyme4change]

The one in AZ was put up in 1961.

Someone placed a 'participant" trophy on it.

[Deleted]

Did you read the black pastor talking about how she had never been to Emancipation park ? When she was little she wasn't allowed due yo the color of her skin.

[Virgil Showlion]

Aug 17, 2017 10:50:08 GMT -5 deminmaine said:

Aug 17, 2017 9:44:30 GMT -5 Virgil Showlion said:

This rests on the erroneous presumption that monuments to Confederates constitutes idolization of slavery.

Many of these monuments were actually erected long after the war, and the reason was glorification of the old and defeated Confederation cause.  So yes, idolation of slavery, the engine of the Confederate economy. 

If you consider this a valid argument, watch in amazement as it's used to tear down the majority of American colonial history. America was built on slavery. It touched every aspect of American life for hundreds of years.

You've tolerated it being retroactively turned it into a morals clause, hoping the purge will stop at major figures in the Confederacy. What ignorance. What naivety.

The worst part is that the further the purge progresses, the more reasonable the reactionaries will seem, the more people will rally to their cause, and the more profound America's culture war will become.

[thyme4change]

I just spent a week in DC. I question the value of all the monuments. I viewed them as art. But standing at the base of a 500 foot obelisk didn't teach me much about, nor endear me to George Washington. Even the Lincoln memorial and Thomas Jefferson memorial was more of an appreciation for some amazing sculpture work and beautiful materials.

[Value Buy]

Aug 17, 2017 10:50:08 GMT -5 deminmaine said:

Aug 17, 2017 9:44:30 GMT -5 Virgil Showlion said:

This rests on the erroneous presumption that monuments to Confederates constitutes idolization of slavery.

Many of these monuments were actually erected long after the war, and the reason was glorification of the old and defeated Confederation cause.  So yes, idolation of slavery, the engine of the Confederate economy. 

look how long it took to build the Vietnam Memorial to be built after the war, and this was for honoring our troops who were accused of being baby killers when they returned home.
The liberal left does change their thought process very fast at times.

[midjd]

Aug 17, 2017 12:43:00 GMT -5 Value Buy said:

Aug 17, 2017 10:50:08 GMT -5 deminmaine said:

Many of these monuments were actually erected long after the war, and the reason was glorification of the old and defeated Confederation cause.  So yes, idolation of slavery, the engine of the Confederate economy. 

look how long it took to build the Vietnam Memorial to be built after the war, and this was for honoring our troops who were accused of being baby killers when they returned home.
The liberal left does change their thought process very fast at times.

The Vietnam War ended in 1975. The Memorial was constructed in 1982. I'd call that pretty close to contemporaneous.

Most of the Civil War memorials were erected in the early 1900s--40+ years after the war ended and right around the time we started re-segregating under Jim Crow. Coincidence, I'm sure, and definitely not a way of hearkening back to the good ol' days when people knew their place. 

It's also significant that these monuments tended to be placed in city parks (many white-only at the time), courthouses ("see, white people are still in charge here!") and other public areas. 

[Deleted]

Aug 13, 2017 22:00:40 GMT -5 steff said:

www.cnn.com/2017/08/13/us/kentucky-confederate-monuments/index.html


The mayor of Lexington, Kentucky, is taking action to remove two Confederate-era monuments from his city's former courthouse after the deadly clashes in Virginia.


Mayor Jim Gray revealed his intention Saturday after the attack in Charlottesville. He said he planned to announce it this week, but the incident prompted him to declare his intentions earlier.
Violent clashes between white nationalists and counter-protesters left three people dead in Charlottesville, including a woman killed when a driver plowed into a group of counterprotesters. Dozens more were injured.

The statues of John Hunt Morgan and John C. Breckinridge are on the grounds of Lexington's former courthouse, which is set to become a visitor's center.

John Hunt Morgan served in the Mexican-American war, and fought for the Confederacy until his death in 1864. John C Breckinridge, who was the 14th Vice President of the US, owned slaves.


I bet the Nazi's & KKK members couldn't even tell you who these 2 people were. 

The first African slaves arrived in the American colonies in 1619.  Therefore, in 246 years of slavery in America, that was ended by the Republican party, the Confederate flag flew for 4 of those years.  The rest were under the British and US flags...  Think about that when you want to start banning flags or Confederate monuments.  In 1776 there were twice as many slaves in New York than in Georgia.  I don't believe in removing monuments  of our history and heritage because of some political correctness du jour.    

[Virgil Showlion]

Aug 17, 2017 11:57:31 GMT -5 deminmaine said:

Aug 17, 2017 11:21:45 GMT -5 Virgil Showlion said:

If you consider this a valid argument, watch in amazement as it's used to tear down the majority of American colonial history. America was built on slavery. It touched every aspect of American life for hundreds of years.

You've tolerated it being retroactively turned it into a morals clause, hoping the purge will stop at major figures in the Confederacy. What ignorance. What naivety.

The worst part is that the further the purge progresses, the more reasonable the reactionaries will seem, the more people will rally to their cause, and the more profound America's culture war will become.

Calm down Virgil.  I live in the bedrock of colonial America.  It is quite safe, I assure you.  And we New Englanders built huge fortunes transporting those chattel from Africa to the Colonies.  I don't need a statue to tell me that.

Hey, I wish a patented Demin "What, Me Worry?" could reassure me too.

Of course, as the monuments do eventually come tumbling down in colonial America, you'll undoubtedly consider it progress and a wonderful thing. Life is peachy when every milestone resets the odometer.

[steff]

How in the hell is a statue of Stone Wall Jackson honoring the young men that died?    How is the man who created the KKK a person to be honored? 

And can people seriously not grasp the difference between a President & a General who fought to destroy the country thru division?   

[Virgil Showlion]

Aug 17, 2017 13:39:10 GMT -5 steff said:

How in the hell is a statue of Stone Wall Jackson honoring the young men that died?    How is the man who created the KKK a person to be honored? 

And can people seriously not grasp the difference between a President & a General who fought to destroy the country thru division?   

Saith Wiki:

Military historians consider Jackson to be one of the most gifted tactical commanders in U.S. history.[4] His Valley Campaign and his envelopment of the Union Army's right wing at Chancellorsville are studied worldwide, even today, as examples of innovative and bold leadership.

...

Little as he was known to the white inhabitants of Lexington, Jackson was revered by many of the African Americans in town, both slaves and free blacks. In 1855, he was instrumental in the organization of Sunday School classes for blacks at the Presbyterian Church. His second wife, Mary Anna Jackson, taught with Jackson, as "he preferred that my labors should be given to the colored children, believing that it was more important and useful to put the strong hand of the Gospel under the ignorant African race, to lift them up." [26] The pastor, Dr. William Spottswood White, described the relationship between Jackson and his Sunday afternoon students: "In their religious instruction he succeeded wonderfully. His discipline was systematic and firm, but very kind. ... His servants reverenced and loved him, as they would have done a brother or father. ... He was emphatically the black man's friend." He addressed his students by name and they, in turn, referred to him affectionately as "Marse Major".

...

After a series of maneuvers, Jackson defeated Frémont's command at Cross Keys and Brig. Gen. James Shields at Port Republic on June 8–9. Union forces were withdrawn from the Valley.

It was a classic military campaign of surprise and maneuver. Jackson pressed his army to travel 646 miles (1,040 km) in 48 days of marching and won five significant victories with a force of about 17,000 against a combined force of 60,000. Stonewall Jackson's reputation for moving his troops so rapidly earned them the oxymoronic nickname "foot cavalry". He became the most celebrated soldier in the Confederacy (until he was eventually eclipsed by Lee) and lifted the morale of the Southern public.[27]

Besides this, he won key victories in the Mexican-American war, authored books, founded a college, was a deacon in the Presbyterian Church, and is near-universally regarded as a man with deep moral convictions.

He was not Nazi scum. Nor were the thousands of soldiers that died under him.

On Gen. Forrest:

Ulysses S. Grant called him "that devil Forrest." Another Union general, William Tecumseh Sherman, considered him "the most remarkable man our civil war produced on either side." He was one of the Civil War's most brilliant tacticians. Without military education or training, he became the scourge of Grant, Sherman, and almost every other Union general who fought in Tennessee, Alabama, or Kentucky. Forrest fought by simple rules: he maintained that "war means fighting and fighting means killing" and that the way to win was "to get there first with the most men." His cavalry, which Sherman reported in disgust "could travel one hundred miles in less time it takes ours to travel ten," secured more Union guns, horses, and supplies than any other single Confederate unit. He played pivotal roles at Fort Donelson, Shiloh, the capture of Murfreesboro, the Franklin-Nashville campaign, Brice's Cross Roads, and in pursuit and capture of Streight's Raiders. [5]

...

In an 1868 interview by a Cincinnati newspaper, Forrest claimed that the Klan had 40,000 members in Tennessee and 550,000 total members throughout the Southern states. He said he sympathized with them, but denied any formal connection. He claimed he could muster thousands of men himself. He described the Klan as "a protective political military organization... The members are sworn to recognize the government of the United States... Its objects originally were protection against Loyal Leagues and the Grand Army of the Republic..." After only a year as Grand Wizard, in January 1869, faced with an ungovernable membership employing methods that seemed increasingly counterproductive, Forrest issued KKK General Order Number One: “It is therefore ordered and decreed, that the masks and costumes of this Order be entirely abolished and destroyed.” [64]

In August 1874, Forrest “volunteered to help ‘exterminate’ those men responsible for the continued violence against the blacks.” After the murder of four blacks by a lynch mob after they were arrested for defending themselves at a BBQ, Forrest wrote to Tennessee Governor Brown, offering “to exterminate the white marauders who disgrace their race by this cowardly murder of Negroes.” [65]

By the end of his life, Forrest’s racial attitudes would evolve — in 1875, he advocated for the admission of blacks into law school — and he lived to fully renounce his involvement with the Klan that he headed and abolished.

Again, a man of tremendous accomplishments and, by the end of his life, bearing no resemblance whatsoever to an unrepentant coward like Adolf Hitler.

Certainly monuments exist in the US capitol, Baltimore, and beyond honouring more deeply flawed men.

[thyme4change]

www.mcsweeneys.net/articles/as-your-doctor-i-am-protesting-the-removal-of-your-tumor-because-i-dont-want-to-erase-your-medical-history

As your doctor I am protesting the removal of your tumor because I don't want to erase your medical history.

[Tennesseer]

[Virgil Showlion]

Aug 17, 2017 19:38:53 GMT -5 thyme4change said:

www.mcsweeneys.net/articles/as-your-doctor-i-am-protesting-the-removal-of-your-tumor-because-i-dont-want-to-erase-your-medical-history

As your doctor I am protesting the removal of your tumor because I don't want to erase your medical history.

Was your tumour a war hero, a master tactician, and a central figure in a war that claimed nearly a third of the lives on the continent?

This one is even worse than the "poisoned bowl of Skittles" from a year ago.

[Tennesseer]