[vpkozel]

Eagle, I would have more sympathy for your point if most of these monuments have been erected at the time the events happened, or shortly afterwards. As it stands, many were built at the height of Jim Crow to make a political stand that blacks should continue to be seen as inferior people and that the South should still be managed by their superiors. They were not erected to commemorate US history, but to make a political point to the "lower races". I am absolutely in favor of taking these pieces into museums, where proper context can be given, instead of their current places in public spaces.

There was no way that the statues could have been erected right after the war as the Southern states were occupied until the mid 1870s. And while it is a loud, if inaccurate, refrain that the statues were erected as protests to racial equality, it is more accepted that they were the result of

The south emerging from its financial devastation of the war

The dissatisfaction with the way that they were treated during Reconstruction

The appalling way that the confederate veterans were treated by the federal government

The economic pillaging of the South by the North

The general gloating and attitude of assumed superiority by the North.

There is a school of thought - and I happen to agree with it - that the south did not recover from the Civil War until the 1950s. There was no Marshall Plan undertaken for the South.

And, like it or not, that led to some pretty bitter feelings from southerners and was a major cause of the birth of the Lost Cause movement (which I don't accept) and that was the more likely inpetus for the statues.

 

[vpkozel]

But look how they treated black people. Why would I feel sorry for the whites of the south when they treated black people far far worse?

My response was specifically to refute a point that the monuments were erected as part of some sort of protest against black equality.

And I guess I could give a simple two wrongs <> right response but that would treat it as a simple issue, and it is far from simple.

First off, let's dispense with the notion that the North was some sort of utopia for blacks prior to or after the war. This is simply untrue.

And while slavery was of course a central issue of the war, the war was about preserving the Union, not freeing the slaves.

Then of course, there is scientific understanding of genetics, anthropology, etc. of the time period.

None of this means that I want us to go back to those thoughts. But to criticize people for knowing only what was knowable in their time period is nonsensical.

 

[vpkozel]

Thanks for your reply.

About science. It really is almost entirely a bunch of theories and hypothesis which have ways of changing. None of them should ever be taken to seriously, now, then or ever. Evidence is fact. The reasoning of those facts is only around until someone else replaces the reasoning with a new reasoning. New tools and new facts means new reasoning, but rarely any real answer. Lots of blather as though they have new answers. But it is just new reasoning that will be replaced.

Yes, boiled down to it, science is our best adaptation of things as we know them. And since we learn new things all the time, we should adjust our thinking.

But specifically on this topic, no one in their right mind would consider blacks as less human than any other race and the science certainly does not support it. That claim cannot be made of people in the ante or immediate post bellum phase in the US. North or South.

 

[vpkozel]

I saw this chap, Larry Nassar, on the news. Some blubbing girl trotting out cliches requested that he apologised.

And he did.

What is wrong with people nowadays? When asked to apologise for having done something one enjoyed, no matter how naughty it may have been, there really should be just one response.

He was a doctor who molested hundreds of little girls. Probably not the best person to use as yiur test case....

 

[vpkozel]

I know who he is. The point remains - these apologies are as worthless as they are latterly de rigueur.

What 2 consenting adults do is fine. But child molestation is most definitely something that is not OK.

Just curiously, is there anything you feel requires an apology?

 

[vpkozel]

My apologies, it would seem that I am not making myself clear.

An apology may be offered not demanded.

Ahhhh, then I am mostly in agreeance.