The Confederate flag

[MaceB]

Isn't the best time always, now? When people say, "well why now," it always feels more like a deflection to avoid doing something they don't want to do. "Well why is now the time to end the drug war? It's been going on for years." And the answer is now's the time because now is the only time we have control of, and if not now, then when?

 

[Kahran Ramsus]

I have no problem with taking down the Confederate Battle Flag from government buildings. But I really dislike this idea of tearing down historic monuments and the like, most of which are well over a century old. It is our history, for good or evil, and trying to pretend it never happened helps nobody. We need education, not destruction. There are countless historic sites and monuments around the world that are dedicated to horrible people. Preserving history is not the same as endorsing their policies.

 

[Thundercrack85]

I don't think it's about pretending it didn't happen. But why should many of these people be honored today?

How insane is it that the bridge in Selma is still named after not just a Confederate general, but a Grand Dragon of the Ku Klux Klan?

Or places named after Bedford Forrest, a man accused of war crimes against black federal soldiers.

Why is Robert E. Lee's birthday officially celebrated in several Southern states? I think we can all agree he was an excellent general. But why is his birthday being celebrated?

 

[Kahran Ramsus]

Changing place names isn't an issue. It is the desecration of historic sites and artwork and digging up corpses that I find appalling.

 

[MessiahDecoy123]

I have no problem with taking down the Confederate Battle Flag from government buildings. But I really dislike this idea of tearing down historic monuments and the like, most of which are well over a century old. It is our history, for good or evil, and trying to pretend it never happened helps nobody. We need education, not destruction. There are countless historic sites and monuments around the world that are dedicated to horrible people. Preserving history is not the same as endorsing their policies.

So an old monument of Nazi soldiers should be preserved for historical purposes?

At the end of the day it's a monument that glorifies, not a museum exhibit that educates.

 

[Kahran Ramsus]

So an old monument of Nazi soldiers should be preserved for historical purposes?

Yes. Absolutely.

At the end of the day it's a monument that glorifies, not a museum exhibit that educates.

These are effectively outdoor museum pieces.

 

[MessiahDecoy123]

You know, I get it, but I kinda roll my eyes at how now was the right time to take all this stuff down.

Now is a good time because people have the political capital to make progress. Without that no flag or monuments gets removed.

 

[Blitzkrieg Bop]

Isn't the best time always, now? When people say, "well why now," it always feels more like a deflection to avoid doing something they don't want to do. "Well why is now the time to end the drug war? It's been going on for years." And the answer is now's the time because now is the only time we have control of, and if not now, then when?

The flag and these monuments would still be standing had something terrible not happened. It took a tragedy for any of these removals to go down and I just find that stupid. Like before it was okay to wave the flag, but now it's just heinous. I drove by the statehouse last week and saw the flag and I've seen a lot of Confederate flags and t-shirts in the community lately and I just kinda laugh at it. Both sides to the argument are stating their cases in one way or another and it almost seems like it's only because of a widely talked about event. It feels like a little too late to me and spured from the wrong origin.

 

[MessiahDecoy123]

Yes. Absolutely.

A monument celebrates and glorifies historial figures.

They are erected to heroes.

Take the nazi and confederate monuments and put them in a museum where they belong.

You can preserve history without heroic monuments.

You think a statue to King George is going to stay in Boston Square 250 years after the Revolutionary War?

Why should American kids look up at a statue of King George for hundreds of years in the center of a major city?

Take it to a museum.

 

[MessiahDecoy123]

The flag and these monuments would still be standing had something terrible not happened. It took a tragedy for any of these removals to go down and I just find that stupid. Like before it was okay to wave the flag, but now it's just heinous. I drove by the statehouse last week and saw the flag and I've seen a lot of Confederate flags and t-shirts in the community lately and I just kinda laugh at it. Both sides to the argument are stating their cases in one way or another and it almost seems like it's only because of a widely talked about event. It feels like a little too late to me and spured from the wrong origin.

What should be the catalyst to force the removal of confederate symbols from government property?

 

[Kahran Ramsus]

A monument celebrates and glorifies historial figures.

They are erected to heroes.

Take the nazi and confederate monuments and put them in a museum where they belong.

You can preserve history without heroic monuments.

You think a statue to King George is going to stay in Boston Square 250 years after the Revolutionary War?

Why should American kids look up at a statue of King George for hundreds of years in the center of a major city?

Take it to a museum.

These aren't new monuments. They are in many cases well over a century old. They are historical pieces at that point. No, I wouldn't expect a King George statue to survive the Revolution. But if somehow it did and was still standing 250 years later, it should stay standing.

Should we destroy the Great Pyramid because Khufu was a power mad dictator too? How about the Arc de Triomphe because it was meant to honor Napoleon?

 

[MessiahDecoy123]

These aren't new monuments. They are in many cases well over a century old. They are historical pieces at that point. No, I wouldn't expect a King George statue to survive the Revolution. But if somehow it did and was still standing 250 years later, it should stay standing.

Should we destroy the Great Pyramid because Khufu was a power mad dictator too?

I don't think monuments should be destroyed. They belong in a museum.

You can't move the pyramids into a museum or any historical site so of course you have no other option but to leave them be.

But a monument to a historical despot in a park or public square? That's the wrong context for people to view it. Thst's glorification.

 

[Blitzkrieg Bop]

What should be the catalyst to force the removal of confederate symbols from government property?

I don't believe it should be mass murder. Personally, I don't care if the flag is up there or not. I don't like that it took death for the ball to get rolling.

 

[MessiahDecoy123]

I don't believe it should be mass murder. Personally, I don't care if the flag is up there or not. I don't like that it took death for the ball to get rolling.

But that's the only way the confederate flag is coming down.

Unfortunately, the idea of taking it down will never be more popular than when there's this kind of tragedy.

 

[Marvolo]

Ugh, just got in a huge fight with my dad about this. He thinks this whole thing is a ploy by the democrats and liberals to suppress southern heritage. When he said the flag wasnt racist and that Obama and black people today have no right to demand that flag be taken down I lost it. His argument was that mo one alive today was ever enslaved so no one alive today has a right to hate that flag or have a problem with it. Mostly he is just pissed because he thinks Obama is trying to tell us what to do.

Im actuallIy not even sure how we got on the subject. It started out about Trump. My dad thinks Trump is a genuis who could help our economy just because he has a big fat bank account. He then said Trump was right about everything and when i tried to tell him no he wasnt right about much of anything and direct him to factchecker.org he refused to go to that website because he thinks its "liberal BS". Then it just spiraled and somehow went to liberals and then to the flag and then to him denying that the flag was a symbol of racism and hatred.

I love my dad, but my god, his politics and unflinching distrust and hatred for anything or anyone that isnt the GOP infuriates me. His blindspot when it comes to the GOP is massive. He doesnt trust the latest unemployement statistics, health insurance statistics or any bit of data that disproves whatever the GOP is saying. I wish he wasnt so damn stubborn and hard headed.

 

[chaseter]

Should we destroy the Great Pyramid because Khufu was a power mad dictator too? How about the Arc de Triomphe because it was meant to honor Napoleon?

Or the Roman Colosseum where countless died for spectacle or for political and/or religious persecution?

Very good points.

Human history as a whole is dark. These are reminders of our past. A statue of Robert E Lee only means he's a hero if you personally believe that he's a hero. Tearing it down doesn't change history and we certainly don't need to forget our history.

A lot of the founding fathers owned slaves but we aren't tearing down their statues in DC.

 

[The Overlord]

Or the Roman Colosseum where countless died for spectacle or for political and/or religious persecution?

Very good points.

Human history as a whole is dark. These are reminders of our past. A statue of Robert E Lee only means he's a hero if you personally believe that he's a hero. Tearing it down doesn't change history and we certainly don't need to forget our history.

A lot of the founding fathers owned slaves but we aren't tearing down their statues in DC.

Except perhaps not all parts of history deserve to be honored that way though, should all parts of history be equaled honored?

Is everyone here okay with the various Stalin statues still around in Russia?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_statues_of_Stalin

What about the Japanese war memorial that contains the bodies of various criminals?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yasukuni_Shrine

The rest of Asia flips out when every time a Japanese PM visits that site.

Clearly some parts of history are more sensitive today then other parts, no one is going to care about something that happened a 1000 years ago, because it is unlikely to affect their lives the way something more recent has and while the Civil War is old, its not from ancient times, it has lingering effects today, like Stalin or the Japanese war effort did.

Where do we draw the line in terms of honoring the past, clearly Germany doesn't honor its Nazi past, would anyone here be okay with Bavaria making the Nazi flag its state flag? I doubt it. So clearly there are lines we have drawn.

 

[MessiahDecoy123]

Or the Roman Colosseum where countless died for spectacle or for political and/or religious persecution?

Very good points.

Human history as a whole is dark. These are reminders of our past. A statue of Robert E Lee only means he's a hero if you personally believe that he's a hero. Tearing it down doesn't change history and we certainly don't need to forget our history.

A lot of the founding fathers owned slaves but we aren't tearing down their statues in DC.

The founding fathers biggest accomplishment wasn't defending slavery and attempting to dissolve the United States.

 

[Kahran Ramsus]

Except perhaps not all parts of history deserve to be honored that way though, should all parts of history be equaled honored?

Except we aren't talking about honor. We are talking about education and remembrance. Sure the people that erected these monuments were doing it to honor these men, but they are long dead. Our history is our history, even the bad parts, and we shouldn't forget any of it. I would be perfectly fine with putting a plaque up explaining all the bad things these people did. After all, like I said, it is about education.

Is everyone here okay with the various Stalin statues still around in Russia?

Yes

What about the Japanese war memorial that contains the bodies of various criminals?

Yes.

The rest of Asia flips out when every time a Japanese PM visits that site.

That's different. An official visit like that is making a political statement. If President Obama visited Stone Mountain on Memorial Day, yeah, there would be reason to be upset about that.

Where do we draw the line in terms of honoring the past, clearly Germany doesn't honor its Nazi past, would anyone here be okay with Bavaria making the Nazi flag its state flag? I doubt it. So clearly there are lines we have drawn.

It is a similar situation. Yeah, they outlaw the Nazi flag and we haven't gone that far because it violates our First Amendment. But there are still World War II sites around Europe. Even Auschwitz-Birkenau, maybe the most horrific site in all of human history, has been turned into a historic site by Poland. Tearing it down would be an atrocity. As a species we should always remember what happened there, and keeping it as a memorial helps a ton with that. It is the same here with the Civil War.

 

[regwec]

I agree with Kahran entirely. Suppressing the past is, to me, just as bad as suppressing factual reporting of the present. It condemns us to relive past mistakes, and condemns us to cultural chauvinism by shielding our eyes from our ancestors' wickedness and folly.

I find the notion that historical monuments should be transferred to "museums" (presumably galleried buildings) to be particularly worrying. Why should this be done? It would remove the past from the view of everyone who was not determined to actively seek it out. The public are uneducated and complacent enough without the presence of history being removed from their daily lives. Who would determine when something had become "history", or when it was "offensive", thus condemning it to concealment from the public gaze? That seems analogous to book burning, and certainly no better than the role of the state as arbiter of public taste in countries like Iran. Another consideration is that many historical monuments have a position in the landscape which is essential to a proper understanding and appreciation of them. Experiencing the past in its proper context can be a transformative experience for those who have only a casual interest in history.

 

[DaddlerTheDalek]

This whole conversation is proof that the USA still isn't sure about how to deal with the legacy and the burden of the Civil War and the CSA. But I have to agree woth Kahren and regwec. I think a country has to deal with it's past in a honest way. That plague idea of Kahran is good. And maybe they should built new memorials and statues that honor and remember the victims of the war.

 

[Dangerman]

I agree with Kahran as well. As a black man I do not think the flag should be flying over a government building but in the same I don't think we should be going around and trying to remove it from everything as well. That flag stands for much more than slavery but the meaning behind it has been forgotten over time. What really should be done is that people should really read more and educate themselves over the causes for the Civil War which wasn't just about slavery. Because like it has already been pointed out where does it end should everything about Russia be taken down because of what happened to the Czars, should we make an out cry and destroy everything in Rome because of how they ruled, should we erase Columbus Day, should we not honor president's who owned slaves. It's a part of our history I think it shouldn't be flying over a government building but in the same I don't think that we should remove it all together.

 

[MessiahDecoy123]

I agree with Kahran as well. As a black man I do not think the flag should be flying over a government building but in the same I don't think we should be going around and trying to remove it from everything as well. That flag stands for much more than slavery but the meaning behind it has been forgotten over time. What really should be done is that people should really read more and educate themselves over the causes for the Civil War which wasn't just about slavery. Because like it has already been pointed out where does it end should everything about Russia be taken down because of what happened to the Czars, should we make an out cry and destroy everything in Rome because of how they ruled, should we erase Columbus Day, should we not honor president's who owned slaves. It's a part of our history I think it shouldn't be flying over a government building but in the same I don't think that we should remove it all together.

Slavery is one of the major causes of the Civil War.

People need to pick a side. Either you believe the South deserved to win the Civil War or you don't.

If you don't there's no reason to glorify their "heroes" in the United States.

Many people in the South and elsewhere wish the South had won the Civil War and don't give a damn if blacks suffered as a result. That's the ugly truth about people who want promote the confederate flag.

Look at WW2 history. People can visit historical sites and preserve history without huge monuments that celebrate and glorify the Nazis.

But like the Japanese, there are too many Southerners who deny the South was wrong duting the war.

The glorification of Confederate "heroes" doesn't help matters.

 

[MessiahDecoy123]

I agree with Kahran entirely. Suppressing the past is, to me, just as bad as suppressing factual reporting of the present. It condemns us to relive past mistakes, and condemns us to cultural chauvinism by shielding our eyes from our ancestors' wickedness and folly.

I find the notion that historical monuments should be transferred to "museums" (presumably galleried buildings) to be particularly worrying. Why should this be done? It would remove the past from the view of everyone who was not determined to actively seek it out. The public are uneducated and complacent enough without the presence of history being removed from their daily lives. Who would determine when something had become "history", or when it was "offensive", thus condemning it to concealment from the public gaze? That seems analogous to book burning, and certainly no better than the role of the state as arbiter of public taste in countries like Iran. Another consideration is that many historical monuments have a position in the landscape which is essential to a proper understanding and appreciation of them. Experiencing the past in its proper context can be a transformative experience for those who have only a casual interest in history.

I can understand the history of the Revolutionary War without statues celebrating red coats and King George scattered throughout New England.

Those statues were never erected because Americans agreed the British were on the wrong side of history. But many Southerners don't believe they lost. In fact these monuments and flags show they feel they actually won.

 

[regwec]

So you are saying that something which doesn't exist has no historical significance, ergo something with historical significance shouldn't exist.

I'm sorry, but I think you're completely wrong on this point.