On banning the Confederate Flag and Renaming Military Bases

Mott the Hoople said:
OK, I’m the descendant if a GAR veteran. I’m justly proud that he served in an Indiana Regiment and did his part to end both rebellion and slavery. I’m equally embarrassed that his Grandson, my Great Grandfather was a member of the Indiana KKK during its second iteration during the 1920’s. I am no apologist for the Stars and Bars. It certainly has no place in my State if not our nation. I loath the historical revisionism of the lost cause mythogies as they, to this day, have a pervasive and evil influence in our Nation.

Most statues built to honor Confederate Historical figures were not built after the Civil War but at the turn of the 20th Century and in the 1950’s and 60’s as a means to intimidate blacks and to reinforce beliefs in Jim Crow Segregation and opposition to civil rights. If a community decides that these symbols no longer represent their values then down they should and will come.

The naming of US Military Forts after Officers that we’re not only enemies of the United States but many, like Braxton Bragg were also Jackasses and military incompetents is both absurd and ironic. Equally insulting is that not a single Military instillation is named after U. S. Grant who was by far the greatest General of the Civil war and a savior of our nation but was also the first truly modern military General. I would like nothing better than to see Fort Bragg’s name changed to Fort Grant.

Having said all this I’m critical of much that is being written at this time by polemicist who want to eliminate these historically absurd iconography (not that I don’t support that). They tend to be guilty of two historical crimes. The first is “The victor gets to write the history” and the second is viewing history anachronistically. For example this dismissive attitude of Southerners and how the could have went to war over a cause as terrible as slavery.

The Civil War was in fact, as many Southerners claim, the second American Revolution or more correctly counter revolution. The aristocratic agrarian South with it’s feudal social system was far more like the rest of the world at that time where slave/serf caste systems predominated and the small geographic regions of Northern Europe and the Northern US with their industrial revolution dependent on highly skilled free labor were in fact revolutionary. In that respect the Confederates weren’t exactly wrong in considering themselves the true inheritors of the American Revolution by fighting a counter revolution against the United States Industrial Revolution and to protect slavery and a white supremacist aristocracy. This is important history for us all to understand as it gives us an understanding of why so many good people could support such a vile and evil system as chattel slavery as that is how most of the worlds societies were at that time.

So even though we have grown as a nation and found a far superior and egalitarian way to structure our society that is infinitely superior these facts of history should not be forgotten or dismissed as old and obsolete history but should be remembered and used to reconcile this nation from its divided past.
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I think historical education is a priority, and every American should receive an education on the civil war and the Confereracy. None of my history teachers ever needed a statue to teach history.

Local citizens should have a say on what statues are displayed in their parks. I suspect Richmond and Atlanta are majority black, and we can all understand how offensive public memorials to Robert E Lee and Nathan Bedford Forrest would be to them.

The United States prides itself on being a prodigy of western civilization, and that is who we are going to compare our conduct to. In the 19th century, chattel slavery was practiced nowhere in the western world outside of the American South. 19th century Brazil and the Caribbean are not the western models we aspire to.

Even the ancient Greeks did not practice chattel slavery. They had slavery, but not chattel slavery which is the cruelest and harshest form of slave labor.

I do not think we should get in the habit of comparing ourselves to the backwards and autocratic tsarist Russian agrarian economy. But even a feudal serf labor system never reached the level of cruelty and inhumanity of a chattel slavery system. Given a choice, almost all 19th century black residents of the south would rather be a serf than a chattel slave, as would any of us given the correct information.

At any rate, the Russian serfs were emancipated in 1861, while at the same time Confederates were waging war to defend chattel slavery.
 
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Eagle_Eye said:
Ok let's assume we remove every statue and monument to the south, just what will that accomplish? Will it wipe out the memory of slavery and Jim Crow laws? Is the next step to remove all traces of the civil war from our history books? By removing and destroying these so called monuments and basically denying the war ever happened you are doing a disservice to the thousands who fought and died to defeat the evils of slavery. My town was founded as a place for northern civil war vets could retire to. We have a statue of a union solider looking north. Do you know what I think about when I see that statue? Absolutely the exact same thing when I see a confederate statue. Not one damn thing and I am willing to bet 99% of blacks and whites do the same thing. It's only the activist that stir up the shit that brings these inanimate objects to the forefront. Like it or not but people take pride in their ancestry.
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How is trying to teach the true history of the Civil War, instead of neoconfederate revisionist mythology, removing Civil War history from our books and schools? For generations students were taught lies and fiction about the Civil War by Confederate apologist. What is wrong with fixing that with fact based history?
 
Jarod said:
I don’t want them erased from history, I want them removed from positions of honor.
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That’s not my point. I stated in my OP that I support removing these iconographies. Let’s not create a false dichotomy here. I’m emphasizing that truly understanding these historical events is important to effecting change now and that those proposing changes I agree with are wrong by being dismissive towards understanding that history or not even trying to understand it.
 
archives said:
After WW II the first thing Germans did was remove any trace of Hitler and Nazism from the culture, they saw no redeeming purpose, the same should apply to public Confederate memorabilia in this country, it also has zero redeeming purposes, when you see the dimwits in Michigan protesting shutting down the State packing with Confederate flags on their jackets it says it all
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you ignore the historical differences of the time period and the reconcilliation of the 2 parties and the men who made peace with each other - muchless comparing Confederates to Nazis -
 
Mott the Hoople said:
That’s not my point. I stated in my OP that I support removing these iconographies. Let’s not create a false dichotomy here. I’m emphasizing that truly understanding these historical events is important to effecting change now and that those proposing changes I agree with are wrong by being dismissive towards understanding that history or not even trying to understand it.
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the men in battle were honorable, even if the cause unjust
 
anatta said:
the men in battle were honorable, even if the cause unjust
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"Calling it your job sure don't make it right," as they say.

The key from the OP:
"Most statues built to honor Confederate Historical figures were not built after the Civil War but at the turn of the 20th Century and in the 1950’s and 60’s as a means to intimidate blacks and to reinforce beliefs in Jim Crow Segregation and opposition to civil rights. If a community decides that these symbols no longer represent their values then down they should and will come. "

I always say that racism is about intent. I get upset about some of the PC overreactions to gaffes people have, or clumsy words that they speak - when there is no hate behind those words.

There is hate behind why some of these statues went up.

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Micawber said:
Assuming the south had some ancillary consideration that explains how "good people" could support that insurrection to maintain slavery,
there is no rationale for people of our day supporting those who did. Hillbilly folk want that flag to say fuck you to liberals at the expense of black people, not to turn back industrial might to save agrarian economy.
The explanation of good people doing bad things is as simple as the Milgram experiment demonstrated.

Take those statues down and place them in a museum of tolerance or civil rights museum. Anyone who opposes doing that is basically a traitor.
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What about Yankee tariffs on products from south, though?
 
Grajonca said:
It was primarily an agrarian economy, slavery would have died out anyway. The British were dead against it and would have insisted it was phased out as a condition to buying US cotton.
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Bullshit!The South loved slavery,and the power over blacks.
The USA would never let the British dictate to us how we ran our country.
They would have shut the fuck up,and bought the cotton
 
archives said:
After WW II the first thing Germans did was remove any trace of Hitler and Nazism from the culture, they saw no redeeming purpose, the same should apply to public Confederate memorabilia in this country, it also has zero redeeming purposes, when you see the dimwits in Michigan protesting shutting down the State packing with Confederate flags on their jackets it says it all
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This demonstrates why I wouldn’t dare to post this on social media. I knew my point would go over to many heads. That my comments that I concur with their removal would be missed.

My point is that being dismissive or anachronistic about our past history does not either help us understand how we got into this current situation nor does it help solving the problem. Eliminating these iconographies is an important step but it’s also Important that we not only remove these symbols of historical revisionism but understand how they came to be in the first place and this understanding can help guide us to more effective solutions to the problems of race in America.
 
anatta said:
you ignore the historical differences of the time period and the reconcilliation of the 2 parties and the men who made peace with each other - muchless comparing Confederates to Nazis -
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No I didn’t, as someone up above noted, this southern attachment to Confederate symbols didn’t really arise till the 20th Century, long after the end of the Civil War, and during the height of the Jim Crow era. It has little to do with the actual fighting or events of the war

And I also didn’t compare Confederates to Nazis, rather I pointed out that after a tragic event most societies abandon the cultural ties that led to that conflict
 
Mott the Hoople said:
This demonstrates why I wouldn’t dare to post this on social media. I knew my point would go over to many heads. That my comments that I concur with their removal would be missed.

My point is that being dismissive or anachronistic about our past history does not either help us understand how we got into this current situation nor does it help solving the problem. Eliminating these iconographies is an important step but it’s also Important that we not only remove these symbols of historical revisionism but understand how they came to be in the first place and this understanding can help guide us to more effective solutions to the problems of race in America.
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So you are saying maintain these relics and symbols so we can understand the reason why many want to see them abandoned now?
 
archives said:
No I didn’t, as someone up above noted, this southern attachment to Confederate symbols didn’t really arise till the 20th Century, long after the end of the Civil War, and during the height of the Jim Crow era. It has little to do with the actual fighting or events of the war

And I also didn’t compare Confederates to Nazis, rather I pointed out that after a tragic event most societies abandon the cultural ties that led to that conflict
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most of the statues wee erected in the 25th anniversary periods, which obviously included Jim Crow.
There are a few odious ones -like the one in Nashville I think outside a former slave market.

But Robert E Lee for ex. in Richmond is about as historical value as it can get. Natch it's coming down.

The way to do it is to appoint a national commission to evaluate each one -but the mob isn't interested in perspectives
 
Mott the Hoople said:
This demonstrates why I wouldn’t dare to post this on social media. I knew my point would go over to many heads. That my comments that I concur with their removal would be missed.

My point is that being dismissive or anachronistic about our past history does not either help us understand how we got into this current situation nor does it help solving the problem. Eliminating these iconographies is an important step but it’s also Important that we not only remove these symbols of historical revisionism but understand how they came to be in the first place and this understanding can help guide us to more effective solutions to the problems of race in America.
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Thomas Sowell begs to differ.

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anatta said:
most of the statues wee erected in the 25th anniversary periods, which obviously included Jim Crow.
There are a few odious ones -like the one in Nashville I think outside a former slave market.

But Robert E Lee for ex. in Richmond is about as historical value as it can get. Natch it's coming down.

The way to do it is to appoint a national commission to evaluate each one -but the mob isn't interested in perspectives
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Why? Why is it important to remember who Lee was or what his role was in the time period? What is the significance of his statue in Richmond, or anywhere for that matter?

I mean the guy was a brilliant general, but there has been a lot of brilliant generals in American History, and the vast majority never had statues erected for them nor did they fight on the other side.
 
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