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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Also, I'm not a native Virginian, but I live here now and likely will for the remainder of my life, and my children were born and will be raised here. I don't like all this revisionist history, where Confederates get to be presented as men worthy of honor. They were not and are not. They were traitors to our nation, and they LOST. The winners get to write history, not the losers. That's how it goes. Maybe we should sue the daughters and sons of the confederacy to remove these names and statues that they forced upon us. [/quote]

They were not "forced" when they were built.  They were "forced" by their children and descendants who were honoring their fathers and grandfathers.  Please remember that. Most of these monuments were built as the soldiers were dying off.  It's too bad you cannot understand that.  They did see them as men of honor because they wished to do so and they loved them.  Lee was looked up to because he fought for them and promoted peace after the Civil War.  He could have acted differently.  And, please remember, that they were pardoned.  This was done in the name of unity for our country.  And, their sons and grandsons fought proudly for the US in WWI, WWII, and following wars.  I am sorry you cannot see that.  You should teach your children to learn from their mistakes and tell them what a great country we live in that we could come together after such a bloody, bloody war.
And, there were battles fought all over Virginia and in this area.  You want your children to be ignorant of that?

Other countries have not unified after civil wars or other conflicts.  Look what happened in Ireland.  Centuries of conflict.  Iraq.  There are plenty of examples.  And, FWIW, the Irish still honor those who fought.[/quote]

While it sounds like your heart is in the right place, your history isn't really accurate.

Although many people subscribe to the belief that states’ rights was the reason for the war, quotes from Confederate leaders at the time make their intentions clear. This is just a sample:

[i]"We hold as undeniable truths that the governments of the various States, and of the confederacy itself, were established exclusively by the white race, for themselves and their posterity; that the African race had no agency in their establishment; that they were rightfully held and regarded as an inferior and dependent race, and in that condition only could their existence in this country be rendered beneficial or tolerable.”[/i] Texas Declaration of causes for secession, February 2, 1861

[i]“Our position is thoroughly identified with the institution of slavery — the greatest material interest of the world.” [/i] Mississippi Declaration of causes for secession

[i]“They assume that the negro is equal, and hence conclude that he is entitled to equal privileges and rights with the white man. If their premises were correct, their conclusions would be logical and just but their premise being wrong, their whole argument fails.”[/i] Alexander H. Stephens, Vice President of the Confederacy, Cornerstone Speech, March 21, 1861

[i]“Our new government is founded upon … the great truth that the negro is not equal to the white man; that slavery subordination to the superior race is his natural and normal condition.” [/i]Alexander H. Stephens, Vice President of the Confederacy, Cornerstone Speech, March 21, 1861

[i]“A geographical line has been drawn across the Union, and all the States north of that line have united in the election of a man to the high office of President of the United States, whose opinions and purposes are hostile to slavery.” [/i] South Carolina Declaration of causes for secession, December 24, 1860

So, the war wasn't about "states rights" (except for the right have slaves). The war was about slavery because the entire economy and the "southern way of life" was based on slavery.

While some of the statues were put up for the reasons you cite, even those were honoring a rebellion that was based on maintaining slavery. However, a study of Confederate statues and monuments across the country published by the Southern Poverty Law Center last year (https://www.splcenter.org/20160421/whose-heritage-public-symbols-confederacy#findings)notes that the placement of statues and naming of schools in honor of Confederates tended to peak during times of racial tension:

[quote]There are at least 109 public schools named after prominent Confederates, many with large African-American student populations.

Schools named for Robert E. Lee are the most numerous (52), followed by Stonewall Jackson (15), Jefferson Davis (13), P.G.T. Beauregard (7), Nathan Bedford Forrest (7), and J.E.B. Stuart (5).*

...

Of these 109 schools, 27 have student populations that are majority African-American, and 10 have African-American populations of over 90 percent.

[b]At least 39 of these schools were built or dedicated from 1950 to 1970, broadly encompassing the era of the modern civil rights movement.[/b][/quote]

and

[quote]There were two major periods in which the dedication of Confederate monuments and other symbols spiked — the first two decades of the 20th century and during the civil rights movement.

Southerners began honoring the Confederacy with statues and other symbols almost immediately after the Civil War. ... But two distinct periods saw a significant rise in the dedication of monuments and other symbols.

The first began around 1900, amid the period in which states were enacting Jim Crow laws to disenfranchise the newly freed African Americans and re-segregate society. This spike lasted well into the 1920s, a period that saw a dramatic resurgence of the Ku Klux Klan, which had been born in the immediate aftermath of the Civil War.

The second spike began in the early 1950s and lasted through the 1960s, as the civil rights movement led to a backlash among segregationists. These two periods also coincided with the 50th and 100th anniversaries of the Civil War.[/quote]

Those spikes are easily visible in the following chart:

[img]https://www.splcenter.org/sites/default/files/timeline-whoseheritage.png[/img]

We shouldn't be destroying statues. We should be putting them in places where it is appropriate to remember, in context, who these men were and what they were fighting for. A statue at a battlefield or in a museum or a cemetery is appropriate, because then they are in context and can include more educational information.

Random statues of Confederate generals in town squares, not appropriate, but still art that shouldn't be destroyed.

Alternatively, if individuals or businesses want to make their own preferences known and have statues moved to their property, that's fine, too. If it's a business, people can vote with their wallets. If it's a person, people can decide whether they want to associate with someone who venerates those who led a war to retain slavery.

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