The Dismantling of Confederate Remnants Continues

[Commodore]

https://www.yahoo.com/news/court-orleans-remove-3-confederate-monuments-234104717.html
https://www.yahoo.com/news/court-orleans-remove-3-confederate-monuments-234104717.html
The above article is about how courts have ruled to uphold a decision to tear down 3 Confederate monuments in the city of New Orleans.

I must say I couldn't be happier with this decision. One thing that always bothered me about Civil War history and southern culture in general, was the honoring of those who fought for the Confederacy. Those traitors don't deserve to be honored. They deserved to be vilified for trying to destroy this nation. So I can't wait until those monuments to the Confederacy are torn down. I hope someone films it and uploads it so I can share it here. I also hope they are replaced with monuments to Union soldiers, maybe a statue of Grant and one of Sherman as well.

It just never made sense to me that this nation honors and reveres soldiers who fought against everything this nation is supposed to stand for. That would be like Sri Lanka building monuments and honoring those who fought with the Tamil Tigers. It makes no damn sense.

Anyway, what do you guys think of this? Is this long overdue? Or should those monuments remain for their historical value?

 

[Thorgalaeg]

In Spain we have the same problem with monuments dedicated to Franco. My take on the issue is they should be kept if have some historical or artistic value. Otherwise they could be removed if there are reasons for removing it, as any other building. Dont like the damnatio memoriae practice nor cultural revolutions.

 

[EgonSpengler]

Anyway, what do you guys think of this? Is this long overdue? Or should those monuments remain for their historical value?

I pretty much agree with you. This country has an enculturated short memory. Insofar as these monuments and flags and university buildings honor the Confederacy and slaveholders, I want them gone or renamed, but we need to do a better job of teaching our history. I have a suspicion that some people already view the Civil War as a disagreement between equally-valid positions, and that the lesson to be drawn from it is that reasonable people ought to be able to disagree and the truth lies somewhere in the middle. If these monuments contribute to that, then they're doing more harm than good and should be torn down. If any monument could be turned to a better purpose, it probably should be, like the Auschwitz-Birkenau Museum.

 

[Kyriakos]

Look away, look away

Imo it is a bit reactionary to tear down confederate monuments. They were a side annexed as a result of a war, and now is (again) part of the US, so why open that nest of hornets, moreso in this period of ludicrous high polarization?..

 

[W|M]

Those traitors don't deserve to be honored. They deserved to be vilified for trying to destroy this nation.

They should be villified for defending slavery, not for committing treason

It just never made sense to me that this nation honors and reveres soldiers who fought against everything this nation is supposed to stand for. That would be like Sri Lanka building monuments and honoring those who fought with the Tamil Tigers. It makes no damn sense.

And building monuments and honouring the war criminals who have committed uncountable atrocities against Tamils in Sri Lanka is fine by you?

In Spain we have the same problem with monuments dedicated to Franco. My take on the issue is they should be kept if have some historical or artistic value. Otherwise they could be removed if there are reasons for removing it, as any other building. Dont like the damnatio memoriae practice nor cultural revolutions.

If it's dedicated to a fascist dictator, that's reason enough to remove it

 

[FriendlyFire]

Anyway, what do you guys think of this? Is this long overdue? Or should those monuments remain for their historical value?

I made the mistake of reading the comments,
The calls to ban the racist democrat party are just insane, but then again the US just elected Trump and handed power over to the Republicans. The anti Feds culture is alive and well ingrainned in the South
Recent attempts to rewrite the civil war history, slavery and racism is still going on, this move is long overdue, replace the monuments with ones of Linlcon, and Grant

 

[CavLancer]

States...they considered the states as we consider the nation now. Problem was the South rebelled over the possibility that Lincoln would free the slaves, and so those who fought were fighting against freedom. this would take the shine off for me, I'd have stayed down on the farm.

 

[EnglishEdward]

I can see no reason why the courts should overide the democratic vote of the City Council.

 

[hobbsyoyo]

I pretty much agree with you. This country has an enculturated short memory. Insofar as these monuments and flags and university buildings honor the Confederacy and slaveholders, I want them gone or renamed, but we need to do a better job of teaching our history. I have a suspicion that some people already view the Civil War as a disagreement between equally-valid positions, and that the lesson to be drawn from it is that reasonable people ought to be able to disagree and the truth lies somewhere in the middle. If these monuments contribute to that, then they're doing more harm than good and should be torn down. If any monument could be turned to a better purpose, it probably should be, like the Auschwitz-Birkenau Museum.

You're exactly right on that. It's a pretty common view that the war was all about 'State's Rights' versus 'Evil Federal Government'.

 

[Lohrenswald]

They should be villified for defending slavery, not for committing treason

An apt comparison to confederate monuments in America would be hypothetical monuments to nazism in germany, I think

 

[warpus]

In Poland, after we kicked out the Russians, we started tearing down all sorts of Soviet statues and monuments. Every single street name that had anything to do with communism or anything Russian was renamed as well. When we returned to our hometown, half the city was named something new, it was hard to find your way around at times. In Warsaw for example you'll find De Gaulle street, John Paul II street, Pilsudski street (the communists hated this guy), Solidarity street, even Winnie the Pooh street, and Washington roundabout. I'm not sure which of these were renamed after the fall of communism, but I'd bet that most of them were.

That's different in my mind, as removing statues from a war long gone by. In Poland we simply removed memories of an invading and occupying force, as soon as we were able to kick them out. In this case it seems that historically interesting monuments were removed, years after the fact. I'm not really sure how I feel about it, to be honest. Maybe move all of the statues and put them in a museum, so that they can't be worshipped by the public, but so that it is not forgotten as a part of American history?

 

[Lohrenswald]

Maybe move all of the statues and put them in a museum, so that they can't be worshipped by the public, but so that it is not forgotten as a part of American history?

The history of slavery and the civil war is another matter

these monuments are dedicating for romanticising the slave holders
and treason, for that matter

They are monuments only to the despicable character of those that raised them
tear them down

 

[warpus]

I think by that reasoning though we should tear down all statues from more than 200 years ago. That would be a shame as that includes stuff that is thousands of years old, a part of human history whether we like it or not.

 

[Thorgalaeg]

I dont see the problem with changing the name of a few streets or removing some statues of not particular interest. But consider this:

This was built by Franco, a fascist dictator and traitor to a democratic government using war prisoners as slave manpower.
However its aesthetic value cant be denied and it is pretty impressive when you see it personally. I think that demolishing it would be barbarous and would impoverish us all in many ways depriving future generations of part of his cultural heritage.

If we are going to demolish any monument built by governments or means we consider odious today, we should destroy anything older than 200 or 300 years, when absolutism, slavery and ignorance of any human right were common in the world.

Lets no turn ourselves in Buddha bombing Talibans, please.

Ops, crosspot with warpus

 

[Manfred Belheim]

I think it's a bit late to suddenly be finding these offensive, and you're trying to erase part of the history of your nation. Call them "traitors" all you like (seems overly emotions to me), but they were a part of the country you hold so dear, not an enemy nation.

 

[metalhead]

They took up arms against this nation. How is that not traitorous? How were they not enemies?

 

[GoodSarmatian]

Call them "traitors" all you like (seems overly emotions to me), but they were a part of the country you hold so dear, not an enemy nation.

Well, at the time they were not. That was their thing.
That and slavery of course.

 

[Perfection]

They took up arms against this nation. How is that not traitorous? How were they not enemies?

The problem isn't that they rebelled, but that they rebelled so they could oppose human freedom rather than promote it.

 

[Lexicus]

The problem isn't that they rebelled, but that they rebelled so they could oppose human freedom rather than promote it.

Yeah, and that was the point WIM was making.

 

[Kyriakos]

The problem isn't that they rebelled, but that they rebelled so they could oppose human freedom rather than promote it.

Then why weren't they allowed to be their own nation, with (forced by the North) banished slave-status? Seems suspect to claim the war wasn't fought primarily to ensure the US would have its manifest destiny stuff. And US kept genociding people long after its civil war