[6] [7] [8] [9] [10] [11] [12] [13] [54], According to the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC), 59 Confederate statues and nine markers or plaques were removed from public land in 19 US states between June 17, 2015 and July 6, 2020. The Onion looks at the pros and cons of removing historical statues. Confederate monuments, in our society, are an artifact from an era gone wrong. GAZETTE: In recent years, many have called for the removal of monuments honoring Confederate officials and other controversial figures, such as Christopher Columbus, with mixed results. As a result, when you reach the tierra, you will reach the arena. The campaigns demise was both sad and pathetic. Many of the men with whom George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, and Ulysses S. Grant were associated at the time were slaves. Mississippis secession declaration states, Our position is thoroughly identified with the institution of slavery the greatest material interest of the world. Between June 17, 2015 and July 6, 2020, 59 Confederate statues, nine interpretive markers, and plaques were removed from public land in 19 states across the country. It has also been suggested that statues shouldn't be removed but new plaques could be added which explain why the person is controversial, for example reflecting both the good and bad things. As a result, the monumentos, as well as the ellos located in the various areas of the city, are erigen within the context of the community. Some jurisdictions have placed explanatory plaques beside Confederate monuments to teach a more complete history of the Confederacy. Some people argue that these statues are a reminder of the countrys history and should be left in place, while others believe that they are a symbol of oppression and should be removed. He was also an abolitionist, though a hypocritical and pragmatic one who understood the country would not give up slavery so easily. Tension over statues has arisen within the recent Black Lives Matter protests. Ive been studying the impact of Black Lives Matter on statues and memorials around the world for the past few months. They are a part of our cultural heritage. There are at least two reasons for not permitting contemporaneous vices to disqualify historical figures from favorable commemoration. Removing statues is a slippery slope that could lead to the brash removal of monuments to any slightly problematic person. A: Theres certainly a school of thought that says so, that maybe they could be taken out of civic spaces and put into a museum where they can be recontextualized. And I also grew up hearing stories from my family or reading in archives the terrible things those men did to my people.. Basically any time a new government or regime or religion comes in, stuff gets torn down, temples get sacked. They are also a reminder of the sacrifices made by those who fought for the Confederacy and a symbol of Southern heritage. The intention was to intimidate Black while reinforcing white power structures in America. So now we've moved into a different phase. Since Black Lives Matter protests began in response to Columbuss legacy, a number of statues of him have been removed. Explain your answer with examples and reasoning. It would be odd for me to condone other people doing something I would not do. This is why they put them up in the first place; to affirm the centrality of white supremacy to Southern culture. [1], Because the statues were intended to promote white supremacy, Richard Rose, President of Atlantas NAACP, argues, You cant contextualize racism or compromise on racism. He states that the contextualization plaques added to Atlantas Confederate statues establish that racism is valid. [24], The statues still appeal to white supremacists, as demonstrated by the 2017 rally to defend the Lee and Jackson statues in Virginia and in Dylan Roofs 2015 pre-massacre tour of plantations and a Confederate museum. Sophia A. Nelson claims in her book that Washingtons Lee University didnt hate black students because it had statues of Robert E. Lee and George Washington. Petition Pushes for Parton Statues, arkansasonline.com, June 23, 2020, 30. Memorials serve as a permanent reminder of our values, as well as a place to honor and display them in public. There are statues being targeted of people like Ulysses S. Grant, of people like President George Washington, who were not involved in the Confederacy. Lawrence A. Kuznar, PhD, Professor of Anthropology at Indiana UniversityPurdue University Fort Wayne, stated that removing Confederate statues is a whitewashing of our history that destroys our ability to remember inconvenient truths from our past. Robert E. Lee has become a target among those seeking to obviate history allegedly because he held slaves and fought for his home state rather than the nation. Amanda Holpuch, Ed Pilkington, and Oliver Laughland, Charleston Shooting: Confederate Flag at Heart of Growing Political Storm, theguardian.com, June 20, 2015, 4. Slavery is represented in statues by people who distort history and commemorate individuals who perpetuated it. Are you. Activism forces a reckoning with what our values are. Q: What can you tell us about Americas history with monuments and memorials? Dreamers and DACA supporters rally outside of the U.S. Supreme Court. Dessi Gomez, Hello, Dolly? These loans are designed to help low and moderate-income borrowers obtain affordable financing. To access extended pro and con arguments, sources, discussion questions, and ways to take action on the issue of whether historic statues should be taken down in the United States, go to ProCon.org. If we disqualified all figures because we now reject their societys practices, we would commemorate few people indeed, and we would deprive ourselves of many sources of inspiration. The removal in recent years of several monuments depicting Confederate leaders and other controversial historical figures by both politicians and unsanctioned activists have generated debate over whether their removal is justified. Its saying, We still have the upper hand. [23], Finley hit not only on the current psychological impact of the statues, but also on the intended historical impact. In recent years, there has been a growing debate over whether or not political statues should be in public spaces. The Mdia Exterior de Chvez highlights how the country responds to its problems: through its actions, the country seeks to advance human rights, including the rights of foreigners, as a result of the decreto de 1817. Does removing statues of Columbus or Confederate officials pave the way for action against monuments honoring those who helped create the United States? Citizens have the right to express themselves in ways that respect their personal beliefs by creating statues and holding controversial opinions. Since antiquity, statues in public places have been primarily used to represent power and authority. Latisha Jensen, Portland Man Describes Tearing Down Thomas Jefferson Statue: Its Not Vandalism, wweek.com, June 20, 2020, 12. [23] For example, the Confederate statues in the Capitol building should embody our highest ideals as Americans, expressing who we are and who we aspire to be as a nation. Annie Grayer and Clare Foran, "Statue Honoring Mary McLeod Bethune Unveiled in Statuary Hall in US Capitol,". Following the white nationalist rally in Virginia on August 12, 2017, it was back in the news. In Valencia, a retirar a la Rplica del Imperio has been arranged. The campaign to remove controversial monuments and memorials has attracted a lot of criticism - charges that we are "erasing" history or imposing our own values and perspectives on people . We see this in the National Statuary Hall Collection in the U.S. Capitol. The SPLC reported at least 160 monuments were removed in 2020 after George Floyds death, more than the prior four years combined At last count, about 704 Confederate monuments remained on public land. Where do we draw a line? Da de la Raza was founded in 1578 to end the Spanish race and promote the civilizing movement that followed it. BBC, Confederate and Columbus Statues Toppled by US Protesters, bbc.com, June 11, 2020, 21. Neil Vigdor and Daniel Victor, "Over 160 Confederate Symbols Were Removed in 2020, Group Says," nytimes.com, Feb. 23, 2021, 56. In several cities, these tributes have been vandalized or torn down by protestors or removed by public officials. There is no path to a peaceful and prosperous country without challenging and rejecting that as a basis for our society. Preserving historic statues and place-names can serve a number of positive aims. Despite being recognized around the world as a hero, Columbus statues have long been criticized as a result of his colonization and genocide of Indigenous cultures. [39] [40] [41], However, Washington led the Continental Army to victory over the British, held together the country as the first President over two terms, resisted calls to become King of the country, and, in his will, freed his slaves upon his wifes death. When the statues are publicly owned, removing them by wanton destruction still usurps decision-making authority from the public. [47] Do we exclude the achievements of these figures from public display because they displayed controversial behavior? As for museums, people I know who work in museums tear their hair out about this suggestion, that somehow, were going to ship all these Confederate monuments off to the lucky museum that has to find a place to put them. It does not disqualify him that he selected a husband for his daughter rather than allowing her to select one for herself. The removal of monuments erases the memory of those who fought against them in defense of the values they represent. In response to a question posed by The Daily Mail, the Queen Mothers statue in Trafalgar Square should be chosen. [44] Susan B. Anthony, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, and the white suffragists purposefully excluded black women. The 1921 Tulsa Race Massacre and the financial fallout, How Black protest may be key to finally ending racial violence, DNA shows poorly understood empire was multiethnic with strong female leadership. [49], Author Sophia A. Nelson, JD, who notes she is the granddaughter of a slave, states that she does not fear 150-year-old statues of old dead white men. Nelson argues that her classmates at Washington & Lee University didnt hate [black students] because there were statues of Robert E. Lee or George Washington (our nations first President and a slave owner) on campus. As Rod Dreherargues in The American Conservative,Americans should not make the same mistakes as France. Confederate statues were the focus of protests in Richmond, Virginia, last summer. 3. The interpretations have been contradictory, and the results are presented in the form of commentaries. The shooter was said to have glorified the Confederate South, posing in Facebook photos with the Battle Flag of the Northern Virginia Army (also known now as the Confederate flag, though it never represented the Confederate States) and touring historical Confederate locations before the shooting. That, my friends, is what we must work toward eradicating. [50], Ellis Cose, Senior Fellow at the ACLU, states that the statues should remain, with plaques and other material in place that point out that these men were traitors, not American heroes, and that their ugly legacy haunts us still. Politics plays a role in answering close questions. Sophia A. Nelson, Opinion: Don't Take Down Confederate Monuments. Jos Vasconcelos and Jos Enrique Rod have been appointed as ambassadors, and they have been actively involved in the work of the United Nations. Theres no doubt that with regime change, monuments are removed, place names are changed, portraits are added to postal stamps, and textbook content changes. Kelly Grovier, Black Lives Matter Protests: Why Are Statues So Powerful?, bbc.com, June 12, 2020, 26. Consider how you felt about the issue before reading this article. Were trying to let the government know were not going to wait any longer for our freedom to happen. [19] Celebrations of Columbus have long been criticized due to his colonization and genocide of Indigenous people, as well as the false narrative that he discovered America when he never set foot on North America. Annette Gordon-Reed, a historian of U.S. slavery, legal scholar, and member of the Presidential Initiative on Harvard and the Legacy of Slavery, spoke with the Gazette about the issue. ", ProCon.org. We should be able to discuss these historical figures and discuss what we admire about them and what we don't admire so much. They were on the wrong side of history. Lets talk about the history of these statues. It depends on who the person is and what the objections are. Top photo: The base of the Robert E. Lee monument in Richmond, Virginia, after his statue was removed from atop it. Take away anything that smacks of the sort of imperialist legacy which clearly that statue embodies. May 16, 2017 0 The statue of Confederate General Robert E. Lee and his mount, Traveler, face the setting sun on Monument Ave. in Richmond,. The stone sentinels that dot our landscape serve as artifacts of the past, providing us with a visual sign of where we may still go. Southern Poverty Law Center, Whose Heritage? Should historic statues be taken down? Also removed from the monuments base was a 133-year-old copper time capsule containing artifacts and ephemera related to the Confederacy. New York Times, From 2017: Confederate Monuments Are Coming down dcross the United States. Hannah Natanson, Theres a New Way to Deal with Confederate Monuments: Signs That Explain Their Racist History, washingtonpost.com, Sep. 22, 2019, 53. A statue of Cecil Rhodes being removed from the University of Cape Town campus, South Africa, 2015. SINHA: Exactly. Statues play a critical role in society. History is almost never the sole motivator for the construction of schools. Eventually, police descended on the. Arguments for why Confederate statues should be removed include the Confederacy's shameful history of treason and white supremacy, as well as the original purpose of these statues, which was to intimidate Black Americans while celebrating white power. Share This: Over 100 busts, statues, columns, and other memorials to the Confederacy and Confederate general and politicians have been removed around the country. The views expressed by contributors are their own and not the view of The Hill, by Rob Natelson, opinion contributor - 09/20/17 7:40 AM ET, First Republic fallout: Democrats fume as regulators bail out yet another failed bank, Yellen says drop-dead date for debt ceiling is June 1, Hunter Biden appears in court for paternity case, Big birds are having fewer chicks as climate changes, AI chatbot outperforms human doctors in responding to patient questions, Bidens plan to address migrant surge may make it worse, Who will replace Tucker Carlson at Fox News? They should be removed from public spaces because they serve as a reminder of the negative effects of racism and bigotry, as well as a symbol of how far we have come since the colonial era. Since this fundamentally conflicts with American values and ideas, they should be removed. The principal legacy of Confederate statues is white supremacy and slavery. The history of the United States is multi-layered, complicated, and ever-evolving. Stephen E. Ambrose, Founding Fathers and Slaveholders, smithsonianmag.com, Nov. 2002, 43. These battles have a strong historical context, as they were influenced by a very Venezuelan tradition: Bolivarian political historicism. This equates to 1.57 jobs, $76,000 in wages and $14,101 in tax revenues for every 1,000 tons of material recycled. but They Should Remain., washingtonpost.com, Aug. 18, 2017, 39. The issue rose to prominence again in 2017 after an Aug. 12 white nationalist rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, turned violent and deadly. "Historic Statue Removal Top 3 Pros & Cons." https://www.britannica.com/story/pro-and-con-historic-statue-removal-in-the-united-states, According to theSouthern Poverty Law Center. GREENE: Has your view on all of this changed since George Floyd was killed and we've seen such anger on the streets and such a growing movement at this moment? But I think whats so interesting about the City Beautiful movement is that it controlled public spaces in a very specific way, and it was ultimately a movement about assimilation, and a movement that came out of a real concern about immigration. Adam Serwer, The Myth of the Kindly General Lee, theatlantic.com, June 4, 2017, 19. While most Americans watch helplessly, ourstateside Taliban vandalizes and removeslong-standing public monuments. Source: Abdazizar. John Daniel Davidson, Why We Should Keep The Confederate Monuments Right Where They Are, thefederalist.com, Aug. 18, 2017, 37. What do you think of that idea? I got more interested in the U.S. history of monuments when I started to look around and wonder where all the neoclassical buildings came from. The movement against him is part of a wider drive to get rid of monuments to figures who are now. PRO AND CON: Should Confederate monuments be removed? Moving such monuments to museums or other places where they can be contextualized and interpreted is a goal of the National Trust. First, virtually everyone acts in ways consistent with contemporaneous social normsnorms of which later generations may disapprove. 17, 2020, 42. A similar scenario unfolded in 1918 in France, when the imperios took advantage of the French Revolution to gain power. Jasmine Aguilera, Confederate Statues Are Being Removed amid Protests over George Floyd's Death. The statues do not cause racism and could be used to fight racism if put into historical context. The Confederate statues have no redeeming qualities to them, but other statues certainly do. What did the Civil War mean for both the Union and the Confederacy? I was really dismayed to see the statue of Grant, especially, come down because Grant was never. Consider appealing to the American Alliance of Museums for the use of the statues removed from public display. GREENE: But what about historical figures with complicated, often racist histories who were also Union generals or former presidents? Lets argue about the facts, lets put them down on paper or on a marker and have a conversation about them. [24], Geoff Palmer, Scotlands first black professor, who disagrees with taking down the statues, warned against being distracted by the simple, concrete action of taking down statues: We dont want to leave this so that people looking back in 50 years will say: you know, they took the statues down, why didnt they do something about racism? [53]. We do not erect monuments to people who performed extraordinary feats that were unquestionably evil, even if their characters included some virtuous traits. A year after the United States had a diplomatic confrontation with Venezuela, Washington had a diplomatic confrontation with Caracas, and Venezuela had a diplomatic confrontation with Washington. By removing them, we can censor, whitewash, and potentially forget about the history. There was the thought that these immigrants needed to be turned into productive workers, and that concern is where a lot of our public spaces come from. Does this moment, and these efforts feel different to you? 325 N. LaSalle Street, Suite 200 Instructions for Pros / Cons Paper; Five (5) page essay (2) pages of "pro" and (2) pages of "cons . In the modern-day case of the removal of U.S. monuments that many argue commend white supremacy and colonialism, the shift in power could be seen as from those who deny the racist overtones of such structures or who maintain that some monuments have historical or aesthetic value worth preserving to those who embrace a national culture of inclusion. Like, FDR, after all, was responsible for the internment of Japanese American citizens. Many of them were erected decades after the fall of the Confederacy as a way to remind Black Americans of their place in society. The concept of La Raza -as* -as* is based on the idea that all latinos are united in EEUU and that they are committed to aquella tradition. Ultimately, as far as who gets to decide, I think activism is what gets it done. He was not forgotten or disgraced, but he was not a forgotten figure because he was one of Venezuelas most revered rulers. GREENE: You said something interesting. Below are the proper citations for this page according to four style manuals (in alphabetical order): the Modern Language Association Style Manual (MLA), the Chicago Manual of Style (Chicago), the Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association (APA), and Kate Turabian's A Manual for Writers of Term Papers, Theses, and Dissertations (Turabian). There is no easy answer to this question, as there are pros and cons to both sides. Also removed from the monument's base was a 133-year-old copper time capsule containing artifacts and ephemera related to the Confederacy. In several cities, these tributes have been vandalized or torn down by protestors or removed by public officials. SINHA: I've been against it all along. The monument divided the African American community, exposing various political philosophies on how to deal with white supremacy. According to theSouthern Poverty Law Center(SPLC), 59 Confederate statues and nine markers or plaques were removed from public land in 19 US states between June 17, 2015 and July 6, 2020. Download Full Image, When a door of opportunity opened a crack, this ASU marketing grad kicked it open all the way, '1923' actress graduates with honors from ASU, Military service inspires outstanding ASU grad to pursue engineering, Applied Math PhD selected as 2023 Outstanding Graduate Student for The College, Double major a powerhouse of undergrad research, accolades, First-generation grad catapults from struggling student to ASU Deans Medalist, Pulitzer Prize-winning Postcolonial Love Poem., Sun Devil Soccer's late comeback bid comes up short at Oregon State, ASU students solve real-world problems for Department of Defense, New College of Interdisciplinary Arts and Sciences, Grant to study health access for Native Hawaiians, Pacific Islanders hits home for PhD student, Hackathon gathers global students to tackle social, environmental issues, School of Mathematical and Statistical Sciences, School of Geographical Sciences and Urban Planning. What that signals is a shift in power.. Effective Ways to Save on your Mobile Data, The Law Enforcement Exception To The Use Of Deadly Force, Swearing At Police Officers Is Not Appropriate In Massachusetts, Everything You Need To Know About Car Insurance Companies And Police Reports, The Police In Nigeria Have The Authority To Arrest Without A Warrant Under Certain Circumstances. George Gerbner, PhD, and Larry Gross coined the term symbolic annihilation in 1976 to describe the lack of representation of a group of people. The Recycling Economic Information (REI) Report found that, in a single year, recycling and reuse activities in the United States accounted for 757,000 jobs, $36.6 billion in wages and $6.7 billion in tax revenues. Was there no other way to handle that situation? People on both sides vigorously defend their position, pointing out disturbingfacts about the Founding Fathers and the founding of America as reasons why the Confederate monuments arent so different from Revolutionary monuments. Stupendous vision, energy, competence, and couragedistinguished Christopher Columbus from others of his generation. The states declared they had not been fighting to preserve slavery and, instead, fashioned a set of ideas and arguments that they were fighting to hold back the massive industrialization of America, they were trying to preserve rural agrarian civilization, according to David W. Blight, PhD, American History Professor at Yale University. Debate around the removal of memorials and monuments that honor people and ideas whose messages and causes are considered offensive to certain marginalized groups has been a hot-button issue of late in the national conversation. Gary Younge is a professor of sociology at the University of Manchester. Sign up for daily emails to get the latest Harvardnews. Jackson was a slave owner. No one puts a monument up to Washington or Jefferson to promote slavery. A black resident of Richmond, Virginia, Tommye Finley, remarked of the citys Monument Avenue, which is home to five Confederate statues, When I first moved here from Mississippi, I thought these statues were ridiculous. Ted Mann, Lincoln Statue With Kneeling Black Man Becomes Target of Protests, wsj.com, June 25, 2020, 14. One claim for not removing certain statues of people who have committed egregious acts is that we should not treat people of another time as if they were second-rate citizens. And while it is true that many of the Virginian Founding Fathers - Washington, Jefferson, Madison - all owned slaves, we put up their statues not to commemorate their slave holding but for different reasons. When were talking about the Lee statue, its a really good example of what can happen when there is disagreement in the community about what its values are. emma.greguska@asu.edu. Today, some of the worst leaders of the French Revolution have names on public sights, like the metro station named for Maximilien Robespierre, architect of the Reign of Terror. Senior Editor at Arc Digital. There have been other videos, of course, but there is something about this image of a prone individual who is not moving and who we know is losing, or has lost, his life after an encounter that started over an alleged counterfeit $20 bill. Heres how we fight back. Among the items included in a new time capsule that will take its place is a copy of Diazs Pulitzer Prize-winning Postcolonial Love Poem., When my old basketball coach Wendy Larry texted me to tell me the Virginia governor's office was trying to reach me, I had no idea what they might want. [32] [33], Of the calls to take down Confederate monuments, President Donald Trump stated, This cruel campaign of censorship and exclusion violates everything we hold dear as Americans. Though they may represent history, the history that they represent is done in . Despite Nicole Douglas' team-leading 14th goal of the season, the Sun Devil soccer team was unable to claim its first Pac-12 victory of the season after falling to the Oregon State Beavers, 2-1 on Thursday night. The toppling of Edward Colston's statue in Bristol has led to a heated debate about memorialisation and what those statues say about their respective societies. ], [Editors Note: The MLA citation style requires double spacing within entries. First and foremost, they are part of our history and should be preserved as such. Activists are campaigning for a statue of Cecil Rhodes to be removed from an Oxford college. They glorify people who were responsible for terrible things. The Confederates lost the war, the rebellion. Its a different use of the space, one that recognizes the damage done by colonialism and that values self-representation of people of color and Indigenous people that have previously been excluded from such spaces. ASU News sat down with Lamp, whose current scholarship focuses on the classical influence on U.S. public art, memorials and monuments, and how those sites guide understandings of citizenship and civic participation, to learn more about the issues at play in this ongoing dialogue. I understand the importance of remembering those who died fighting for both sides of the war. All rights reserved. 5. The bus will arrive in Che Guevaras honor. The Shepherd monument would not have been returned to the National Park Service if it did not provide interpretive signs and returned it to its rightful owner. However, they have also been the centre of much heated debates surrounding their significance. So for instance, a lot of the sort of backlash against taking down Confederate statues was precisely this. Eight US presidents owned slaves while in office, with an additional four owning slaves while not in office. Monuments to men who advocated cruelty and barbarism to achieve such a plainly racist end are a grotesque affront to these ideals.

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