If they were black and saw statues every day in prominent place celebrating the Civil War, how can it be helpful.
It can't.
And it isn't.
Because it wasn't/isn't meant to be "helpful."
Anyone who's interested should
read about the peak times that these statues were erected. Sword-wielding confederate generals on rearing steeds were planted in town squares to send a clear message to a very specific segment of America's population.
Virginia has BLACK citizens and they shouldn't have to see those statues very day for next thousand years.
See my statement above. Follow the link. These dots aren't hard to connect.
Don't destroy them, but move them to less conspicuous places.
As I said in a post when these stories were still current news,
these statues are artifacts of an earlier time. We already have public places that are dedicated to preserving and displaying artifacts from times gone-by. They are called:
museums. Places that people
voluntarily attend. A place set aside for those who wish to examine artifacts of the past. At present, these monuments have been removed, and have been placed in storage. I think some rich racist land owner would be well-served to construct a garden park on his own private land as a place to display these monuments. (S)he could even charge admission. If I saw a story like that pop up at some point in this forum, I'd say: "Go on, with your bad self." I would not be offended or put-out in any way. 1A, free enterprise, private land... ticks off all the boxes. No problem for me at all. I can choose someplace else as my vacation destination. But if I have a concert to play in a town that forces me to drive past one of those-
things in its town square, then yeah- that's a personal problem for me,
Clemdawg: American Citizen.
Wonder if Stone Mountain in Georgia will ever be resurfaced- JMHO, it should be.
Ask the Lakota Sioux what they think of the defacing of
The Six Grandfathers. The US government green-lighted the desecration these peoples' equivalent of Jerusalem.
Jerusalem, my fellow Christians.
On land they stole,
as defined by their own laws that they got to write.
______________
I'm writing my response to you not only because your thoughts added to the conversation, but also because it gives me a chance to add my thoughts about a broader issue: how we teach American History to our youngest citizens. Thousands of people visit Mt. Rushlimbaugh each year, without knowing how it came to be, or why it was placed where it was. It's not like the West is bereft of mountains to carve up, you know?
Millions drove past those monuments in town squares every day without understanding the significance of their prominent placements, or the message they were meant to send. These are just two examples of America's History that weren't taught to me when I was in public school. I suspect that they weren't taught to most US kids by the time they graduated high school, because mine was the stereotypical public education. History class: as good as our teachers could give us, but woefully incomplete and inadequate (one exception: Wayne Brown/Grade 10 History teacher/swim team coach/-ex hippie, who prompted us to 'go to the dusty stacks of the library to learn who America really is').
My family reunions were a yearly history lesson when I was growing up. I heard some of the same stories every year... but sometimes, I'd hear also hear stories that weren't told quite so often. Not all my forebears were the upright citizens that my Momz & Pops were. And those stories were as important as the oft-told ones, because they were true, real... and a part of the fam history we need to own. Case in point: My Dad became the kind of man he was because as a young kid, he realized that his best role models came
from his mothers' side of the union that produced him. My gramps was a worthless, shallow, self-centered p.o.s. Old Roy wasn't the only Lousy Clem, but I digress from my message. The message: In order to be a true Clem, I must take on and carry ALL of what being a Clem means... and that means taking the awful along with the awesome.
Which brings me to the point I've not been talking about, up 'til now:
If America is to grow from a fledgling, adolescent society into the adult phase of our evolution, She must fully acknowledge
the entirety of who She's been. If My Family can acknowledge its total oral history on a yearly basis- the good
AND the bad- I expect/demand My Country to do the same. It's what adults do. And it's how adults continue to grow. America's Fam should do the same, for Her own damned good.
There is a current movement in many states to continue the tradition of suppressing the teaching of America's total historical truths in an effort to further a particular societal end. Books are being burned/banned. Selective segments of Our Collective American History are being actively suppressed. This movement seeks to continue the teaching of a whitewashed American History that mimics the history books of 1940-1965... the last years that Confederate monument construction flourished, one half-century ago.
This is not coincidental. It is synonymous with the last death-throes of a bygone American time that refuses to die with dignity.
If I must bear the burden of carrying my grandfather's weight as part of my personal family name, America should be required to carry the same weight of the things that She f#d up.
Standards are standards.
Or they are not.
