Richmond is taking down Confederate statues: Is this the end for other Confederate memorials?

#129
#129
Franklin Pierce said:
After the Indians massacred about 500 men, women and children around the present day Mobile, Alabama, the government knew who they wound send to revenge the killings and protect the remaining settlers in the area, and it was Andrew Jackson.

Jackson and his troops hunted down the Indians in the Alabama wilderness and killed more than 800 of the savages. Fewer than 50 of Jackson's men were killed.

After the battle, Jackson's troops made bridle reins from skin taken from Indian corpses, conducted a body count by cutting off the tips of their noses, and sent their clothing as souvenirs to the "ladies of Tennessee."

That was a different time. Different rules applied.

Would you like to know what General Jackson did to the Indians and Spanish in Florida?
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The youngsters don't understand different times because they don't have a time frame going back long enough to have seen different times.
 
#132
#132
1972 Grad said:
Different times, pal. Slavery was legal. Doesn't make it right. It makes it a different era. You can't judge by today's standards. It had been dog eat dog, the strong survive for many, many years before that time. Hell, you guys kill babies by the hundreds of thousands every year, and some day that may be looked upon the same way that you look at Jackson today.
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Enslaved people and Native people were raising concerns, loudly, right in the middle of that "different time." People just heard them screaming and turned their backs, and now we're giving them the "they didn't know any better" excuse? Trash. They chose not to know better
 
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#134
#134
GoBigOrangeUT said:
Nothing changes it, but I’ll never accept forgetting anybody who commits genocide. No matter how far back it goes.
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I didn't say you necessarily need to forget it, but you are pissing in the wind if you think it makes any difference what you think about it.
 
#135
#135
NashVol11 said:
Enslaved people and Native people were raising concerns, loudly, right in the middle of that "different time." People just heard them screaming and turned their backs, and now we're giving them the "they didn't know any better" excuse? Trash. They chose not to know better
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I didn't say they didn't know better. I said times were different.
 
#136
#136
1972 Grad said:
So, you must vote for the losers in the Libertarian Party?
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I voted for Johnson in 2016. That was my first time voting for someone other than a Republican except for local contests without party affiliation. I don't know if I'll vote L this year. I honestly might sit out the Presidential race.
 
#137
#137
bamawriter said:
I voted for Johnson in 2016. That was my first time voting for someone other than a Republican except for local contests without party affiliation. I don't know if I'll vote L this year. I honestly might sit out the Presidential race.
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You probably should.
 
#138
#138
1972 Grad said:
After fighting them tooth and nail for many years and losing many soldiers at their hands, he was probably ready to make them scarce. In those days, we were more like the animal kingdom. The strong survived.
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Similar to the "they shouldn't have been on our land before we got here so they got what they deserved" school of thought.
 
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#140
#140
Ten_Titans said:
I don't care enough about some statues to get into it, but some of y'all just have a really messed up way of viewing history. Viewing history as binary events to be either justified or condemned is just... A silly exercise. A 10 year old can look back on history and tell you what is right and wrong. Is that what you think the purpose of a historical record is? Like a scoreboard?
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I agree to some extent, but is a statue meant to be a "historical record" or an honor?
 
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#142
#142
bamawriter said:
I'd like you to explain how it matters to this conversation.
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You attack President Jackson as an evil man, which he was not. Only people like you, the British and murdering savages consider him to be so.

I forgot to mention that at the Indian battle in Alabama, one of the soldiers under Jackson's command was Sam Houston.

I will say this. Fellow Tennessean Davy Crockett, who fought under Jackson against the Indians, became a little disenchanted with Jackson's total war policy against Indians.

Later, when Crockett ran for reelection to congress, he severely criticized Jackson's Indian removal policy. Crockett lost the election.
 
#143
#143
clarksvol00 said:
Lots of things that aren't novel concepts aren't necessarily right.
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Where have I said it was right or just? I'm just saying it was a different time, and you can't judge historical figures based on today's standards. What possible good comes from tearing stuff down based upon events of 200 years ago?
 
#144
#144
bamawriter said:
Memorials should remain on battlefields and confederate cemeteries. Monuments elsewhere should come down. Paticularly monuments to garbage humans like NB Forrest.

And while not Civil War related, I really wish Tennessee would stop lionizing the genocidal douchebag Andrew Jackson.
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By most accounts, Jackson was a mean bastard. Not really a fan, and I agree the Trail of Tears was a horrible tragedy. At the same time, it's unfair to lay all the blame for how Native Americans were treated on him. That pretty much started with colonization. Native Americans were pushed from their lands and exposed to European diseases well before Jackson came along. That in no way excuses Jackson, but it also was part of the culture. He just did it on a larger scale. But it continued on well after as well, as we violated treaty after treaty and continued to war with them and push them off their lands and round them up onto reservations. We can't erase history, no matter how ugly it is. Even if we take down all the statues, change the names of cities, or whatever else, it's still our history.
 
#145
#145
Weezer said:
By most accounts, Jackson was a mean bastard. Not really a fan, and I agree the Trail of Tears was a horrible tragedy. At the same time, it's unfair to lay all the blame for how Native Americans were treated on him. That pretty much started with colonization. Native Americans were pushed from their lands and exposed to European diseases well before Jackson came along. That in no way excuses Jackson, but it also was part of the culture. He just did it on a larger scale. But it continued on well after as well, as we violated treaty after treaty and continued to war with them and push them off their lands and round them up onto reservations. We can't erase history, no matter how ugly it is. Even if we take down all the statues, change the names of cities, or whatever else, it's still our history.
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I am in no way suggesting that we erase the history books. Just the opposite in fact.

I simply wish we'd stop honoring those who don't deserve to be honored.
 
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#146
#146
NashVol11 said:
Enslaved people and Native people were raising concerns, loudly, right in the middle of that "different time." People just heard them screaming and turned their backs, and now we're giving them the "they didn't know any better" excuse? Trash. They chose not to know better
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I don't necessarily disagree with the moral argument, but nations were built by conquerors. That is history.
 
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#147
#147
MontyPython said:
The statue of Robert E. Lee has towered over Richmond for more than 100 years. In recent days, though, it's been conveying a different message - words like "Black lives matter" are covering its stone pedestal.

At least a hundred people gathered on a muggy Thursday afternoon near the monument to the Confederate commander after Gov. Ralph Northam announced it was to come down "as soon as possible."

Richmond isn't alone. Around the U.S, demonstrations over the death of Floyd and racial inequality have sparked both protesters and city officials to remove, deface or announce plans to take down many Confederate memorials.

While the decision in Richmond signals a positive step for those who want to see the monuments removed, experts warn that the push to take them down and address what sparked them to be erected still has a long way to go.

Among the locations where mayors, protesters and even groups dedicated to Confederate history have taken down statues or announced plans:

  • In Montgomery, Alabama, on Monday, another statue of Lee was toppled in front of its namesake high school. Cheers went up among a small crowd gathered to watch the fallen general as cars circled the area and honked.
  • In Birmingham, Alabama, Mayor Randall Woodfin ordered workers to take down a 50-foot-tall Confederate obelisk on Monday night after a group of protesters failed to knock it down. The night before, the group dismantled the brass cast of Charles Linn, a captain in the Confederate Navy, from its base.
  • The city of Mobile, Alabama, removed a bronze figure of Admiral Raphael Semmes early Friday, without making any public announcement. Semmes was a Confederate commerce raider, sinking Union-allied ships during the Civil War, and the statue had become a flashpoint in the city.
  • Indianapolis Mayor Joe Hogsett announced Thursday that a monument dedicated to Confederate soldiers who died at a Union prison camp in the city will be removed from a park.
  • A statue outside the Tennessee State Capitol of Edward Carmack, a controversial former lawmaker and newspaper publisher who espoused racist views, was torn down Saturday.
  • The United Daughters of the Confederacy removed a statue of a soldier gazing south in Alexandria, Virginia, on Tuesday.
  • The Arkansas division of the United Daughters of the Confederacy also announced that a Confederate soldier monument in Bentonville will be removed from the downtown square and relocated to a private park.
Richmond is taking down Confederate statues: Is this the end for other Confederate memorials?

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Good
 
#149
#149
NashVol11 said:
Enslaved people and Native people were raising concerns, loudly, right in the middle of that "different time." People just heard them screaming and turned their backs, and now we're giving them the "they didn't know any better" excuse? Trash. They chose not to know better
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Let me ask you a question man. It really changed my perspective on history when I was asked this question.

If you were a German teenager when Hitler took power, you would have been a Nazi, statistically speaking. And not like a going through a motions Nazi... Like a true believer Nazi.

Have you ever tried reading history from the perspective of the perpetrators? It's a good exercise in humility and the dark places your mind can go. Not about "people" because of course they can be evil, but yourself.

Just a thought. I bring it up because I think there is a disconnect between reading history as an observer and a judge. I don't think it is a useful intellectual exercise to read history as a judge. I think any middle schooler can sit atop the moral framework our culture stumbled blindly into for thousands of brutal, malevolent years and say what is right and what is wrong.
 
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#150
#150
1972 Grad said:
Where have I said it was right or just? I'm just saying it was a different time, and you can't judge historical figures based on today's standards. What possible good comes from tearing stuff down based upon events of 200 years ago?
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I think there were heroic things about Jackson's life, his policies regarding Native Americans were not heroic. I don't want to see anyone tear down the Hermitage. It seemed like you were defending his policies regarding Native Americans based on your response to the question about the Indian Removal Act.
 
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