Removing and Renaming Confederate Statues, Schools, Streets, etc: Why?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:It is shameful we ever had statues to those treasonous traitors. The reckoning is long overdue.

They weren't treasonous traitors. Stick to facts.

I don't mind taking down the statues but there's a lot of recent revisionist history from both sides.

Np How do you figure they weren't traitors? They wanted to secede from the US. That is the very definition. They took an oath to support the US and the constitution, not the southern states

That would be the case for Confederates who resigned from the US military to fight on behalf of their states.

For most Confederates, allegiance to their local towns and their states was much stronger than their allegiance to the United States, and they'd taken no oath to defend the US or the Constitution. The problem was that the states' rights they undertook to defend had as one of their principal tenets the right to own other human beings.

Simply by being born in America do you owe allegiance to this country. No special oath required before treason kicks in. So every last Southern rebel who took up arms against their own government was a traitor.

But here you go again, splicing and dicing around some fake technicality to justify racial hate and oppression.

More like responding to a prior post, which you now appear to admit was nothing but fiction and hyperbole.

Since you seem to have comprehension issues, so I'll say it again: Every last Southern rebel was a traitor to his country. No honor in that. And after these racist traitors lost their bloody illegal war, there was a massive PR campaign by the KKK and other racist organizations to distort and reimagine that racial terror as "heritage" and "honor." And that's why we have all those stupid racist statues and street names now.

And they weren't fighting for states' rights. They were fighting for slavery (and were pretty open about it. Read the declarations of secession, or the Cornerstone Speech). The Confederate Constitution prevented any state from banning slavery, after all.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Because they lost and we won. America has learned a lesson in the last few years about letting racist, fascist losers regroup and we're done doing it.

And to remind them and everyone else of that fact, we’re going to do the same thing, and rename stuff after not like the neighborhood or landmark, but some hyper liberal poster child with no relationship to the street or community.

Do you want examples? John Lewis (Georgia) and Ruth Bader Ginsberg (did she ever step foot in Virginia)?

Naming something in Chevy Chase after Kavanaugh would be more appropriate.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:For the same reason Germany and Italy don’t have Hitler Boulevard or Mussolini Drive.

+1000
This is everything. End of thread right there.

I want to push back a bit and say there's actually more. The premise of the OP is that these names were once OK but no longer are. These names were never OK. This is not like the town of East Hamburg, NY, deciding to rename itself "Orchard Park" during WWI. Or french fries becoming "Freedom Fries" during the first Gulf War. There was never a time when Robert E. Lee was not a polarizing figure and a symbol of hate and racism.

[phone]

Ah, but there is the fact that Germany had the Nurenberg trials. What does U.S. do but welcome the traitors back into Congress.

There is a difference between wanting to exterminate people and treating them as property. Both dehumanizing and neither worthy of commemoration, but also not the same.

I’m not sure what you see as being a crucial difference — but you might pause and ask yourself why forced labor on the way to exterminating people and exterminating people in the process of using them as forced labor feels like an important distinction for you to make.

Because slavery, while inhumane and despicable, was not the same as murder.

Murder, rape and mutilation are all part and parcel of slavery. 2 million people are estimated to have died on the middle passage alone. Just forcing people to America slaughtered millions.

Many, many, many slaves were murdered, and with legal impunity. Slaves were beaten, tortured, raped, branded. They were worked to death. They had their children taken away and were sold away from their families. Slavery wasn't even just "forced labor." It was far, far, far, far more horrific. Read "The Half Has Never Been Told." It doesn't have to be the literal Holocaust to be fairly categorized with Nazism.

[Anonymous]

Youngkin has just appointed a monument defender to the historic resource board! What a great win for this great state, god bless Governor Youngkin. Please run for senate or President, you will have Virginia’s vote!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Virginia has a long history of being a southern state and has a deep history with southern culture and ties to the confederacy. Northern Virginia in particular, with the Arlington Cemetery’s connection with Robert E Lee, whom led the Army of Northern Virginia, and the wide spread usage of confederates like Stonewall Jackson High School in PWCS and Robert E Lee High School in FCPS seems to have continually played a part in modern Virginia history throughout the state. Not to mention highways and streets dedicated to Confederates and segregationists like Robert E Lee and Harry Byrd still remain.

This unique attatchment to our history seems to be most or entirely prevalent in Virginia as opposed to DC or Maryland, and has never been a problem for the past century to half a century, through progressive movements and such. However, ever since the slain of George Floyd and the riots in 2020, there seems to have been a new attempt to pit the blame on the “monuments” that apparently glorize these views, and to radically erase them from history and forget about them once and for all. I seem to check google maps and am seemingly forced to learn new road names Like Langston Blvd in Arlington on a weekly basis. From my perspective, being a native of Fauquier county in southern country Virginia and spending lots of time in rural Loudoun and Prince William county, it’s a great change to what I’m used to.

Why the call for action now? Are we really suppose the blame people whom lived in an era where slavery and segregation was an unarguable stance that was unanimous among all politicians? What good does it really do, as it seemingly hasn’t seen a decrease in any sort of statistic that they intended to target. Do you support such action against these historical landmarks? Would love to know what the general consensus is, especially from other Virginians.

Would you want to be an 8 year old black child going to a school that was named for someone who fought to keep slavery?
Why until now? Because it took until the death of George Floyd and many other people recently for US TO REALIZE that because we haven't addressed the systemic racism in our country it will lead to continual and seriously horrible consequences, here in the 21st century. That is why.
We do not honor racism. We learn about racists, but we don't honor them.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Youngkin has just appointed a monument defender to the historic resource board! What a great win for this great state, god bless Governor Youngkin. Please run for senate or President, you will have Virginia’s vote!

He does not have Va's vote. He does, however, have some wealthy racist donors.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Youngkin has just appointed a monument defender to the historic resource board! What a great win for this great state, god bless Governor Youngkin. Please run for senate or President, you will have Virginia’s vote!

He does not have Va's vote. He does, however, have some wealthy racist donors.

No no, he does. Regardless of the debate about these statues it’s not of much importance to voters. Realistically, if he ran for senate he would have a VERY good chance of winning, especially as he won as a no name republican against a former governor and won and now would have the incumbency factor. He would be the favorite, no matter the nominee (idk which democratic nominee would be strongest, maybe Northam? but he had his own scandals). If he ran for president, now he may not win that, but he would sure put lots of effort to do so. I would expect it to be within 3 points for either party.

[Anonymous]

This entire thread is an example of why these monuments need to be removed, schools need names changed, and a lot of history needs to be taught.

Can you imagine that here we are, in 2022, explaining why slavery was bad? This entire thread is frightening.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Youngkin has just appointed a monument defender to the historic resource board! What a great win for this great state, god bless Governor Youngkin. Please run for senate or President, you will have Virginia’s vote!

He does not have Va's vote. He does, however, have some wealthy racist donors.

No no, he does. Regardless of the debate about these statues it’s not of much importance to voters. Realistically, if he ran for senate he would have a VERY good chance of winning, especially as he won as a no name republican against a former governor and won and now would have the incumbency factor. He would be the favorite, no matter the nominee (idk which democratic nominee would be strongest, maybe Northam? but he had his own scandals). If he ran for president, now he may not win that, but he would sure put lots of effort to do so. I would expect it to be within 3 points for either party.

Because of people who are putting him there. A lot of racist people.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:This entire thread is an example of why these monuments need to be removed, schools need names changed, and a lot of history needs to be taught.

Can you imagine that here we are, in 2022, explaining why slavery was bad? This entire thread is frightening.

Well this thread is also very biased. What percent of these posters you think are from VA as opposed to Dc or Md? Probably only half. Also take into account the political biases, it’s not representative of the state at all.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Youngkin has just appointed a monument defender to the historic resource board! What a great win for this great state, god bless Governor Youngkin. Please run for senate or President, you will have Virginia’s vote!

He does not have Va's vote. He does, however, have some wealthy racist donors.

No no, he does. Regardless of the debate about these statues it’s not of much importance to voters. Realistically, if he ran for senate he would have a VERY good chance of winning, especially as he won as a no name republican against a former governor and won and now would have the incumbency factor. He would be the favorite, no matter the nominee (idk which democratic nominee would be strongest, maybe Northam? but he had his own scandals). If he ran for president, now he may not win that, but he would sure put lots of effort to do so. I would expect it to be within 3 points for either party.

Because of people who are putting him there. A lot of racist people.

Moderate, so called “RINOS” are the silent majority within the republican party and certainly in northern virginia. Youngkin has to be the smartest man, appeasing both the far right and anything in between. He will be a great virginian politician.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It is shameful we ever had statues to those treasonous traitors. The reckoning is long overdue.

They weren't treasonous traitors. Stick to facts.

I don't mind taking down the statues but there's a lot of recent revisionist history from both sides.

Np How do you figure they weren't traitors? They wanted to secede from the US. That is the very definition. They took an oath to support the US and the constitution, not the southern states

That would be the case for Confederates who resigned from the US military to fight on behalf of their states.

For most Confederates, allegiance to their local towns and their states was much stronger than their allegiance to the United States, and they'd taken no oath to defend the US or the Constitution. The problem was that the states' rights they undertook to defend had as one of their principal tenets the right to own other human beings.

Nobody names streets or has statues of the confererates you are talking about. We are talking about removing the honorific signs of the trators who did take the oath.

Btw, just because the confederates thought they were supporting their state does not mean they were also not being traitors tp the US. Same reason those storming the capital can't argue that they didn't know either.

What on earth is this ahistorical word salad?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Because they lost and we won. America has learned a lesson in the last few years about letting racist, fascist losers regroup and we're done doing it.

And to remind them and everyone else of that fact, we’re going to do the same thing, and rename stuff after not like the neighborhood or landmark, but some hyper liberal poster child with no relationship to the street or community.

Do you want examples? John Lewis (Georgia) and Ruth Bader Ginsberg (did she ever step foot in Virginia)?

Naming something in Chevy Chase after Kavanaugh would be more appropriate.

John Lewis and RBG are ational heroes -- they don't have to be local.

Kavanaugh is a douche bag who lied under oath to get onto the Supreme Court. This has nothing to do with his political leanings. Why would we honor a liar, someone who sullied the supreme court like that? America can do better. Pick someone who's actually worthy of the honor, PP.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Because they lost and we won. America has learned a lesson in the last few years about letting racist, fascist losers regroup and we're done doing it.

And to remind them and everyone else of that fact, we’re going to do the same thing, and rename stuff after not like the neighborhood or landmark, but some hyper liberal poster child with no relationship to the street or community.

Do you want examples? John Lewis (Georgia) and Ruth Bader Ginsberg (did she ever step foot in Virginia)?

Naming something in Chevy Chase after Kavanaugh would be more appropriate.

John Lewis and RBG are ational heroes -- they don't have to be local.

Kavanaugh is a douche bag who lied under oath to get onto the Supreme Court. This has nothing to do with his political leanings. Why would we honor a liar, someone who sullied the supreme court like that? America can do better. Pick someone who's actually worthy of the honor, PP.

*national* heroes.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My confederate ancestors were slave owners and, judging by my family members, no one was really sorry about it until the 1970s, a few of us who are in our 50s now.

I think all the statues and names should come down. They glorify a not glorious past, and help to recruit new generations into at least whitewashing,if not hate.

That is also what Robert E. Lee V and Robert W. Lee IV believe. Take them down.

It’s what Robert E. Lee OG believed!

“But Lee himself never wanted such monuments built.

"I think it wiser," the retired military leader wrote about a proposed Gettysburg memorial in 1869, "…not to keep open the sores of war but to follow the examples of those nations who endeavored to obliterate the marks of civil strife, to commit to oblivion the feelings engendered."
https://www.pbs.org/newshour/amp/nation/robert-e-lee-opposed-confederate-monuments